Modeling Contest #26 - Results

[MiniMage]

C) -Grendel 1st
D) HappyCockroach 2nd
B) Freddyk 3rd
E) icewolf055 4th
G) Pvt.Toma 5th
A) Blood Raven 6th
F) MiniMage 7th



Apologies for taking so long.

Misha's Judgement

Freddyk
Mesh: 8/10 I quite like it, nice, clean and detailed, although a few engine pieces do look a bit too small
Animations: 8/10 nice, a few global animations, like how various things spin on the walk animation, like the goblin gunner's animations, I like the chimney, and I like how the model dies
Texture/UV: 10/10 clean and crisp, all textures have been used and wrapped to the maximum, and i especially like the golden accents
Mechanics: 10/10 nothing to complain here, everything works and model looks very warcraft-ish and steampunkish, basically, goblinish
Effects: 4/5 i like the small things added like the wave on the front on walking, chimney smoke, small puffs of steam on the engine, glow of the furnace and the effects on death, but it's not having sprite attachments that will allow it to burn like any other mechanical unit would
Creativity: 9/10 well, a goblin hovercraft is a pretty unique idea, and all in all, it's a very well thought-out model

Pvt.Toma
Mesh: 8/10 the mesh is really well done, has a nice silhouette, but some pieces are a bit too small, however, they all add up to very nice detail
Animations: 7/10 thee animations might be a little bit too quick sometimes, but they are smooth flowing for the most parts, good job
Texture/UV: 9/10 the texture and UV feel pretty nice but steamtank texture might be a little blurry if used on something big like the body. minor tho
Mechanics: 8/10 The model fits well in war3 and is easy to import, but feels a little bit less warcraft-ish. still it is good enough. also if used as unit the particles from death animations don't stop and remain until the model disappears
Effects: 5/5 This model really lets you know how heavy and imposing it is, particle effects and sounds on each step of all animations, good spell and attack effects, steam from exhaust pipes and fire from the furnace complete it well
Creativity: 8/10 Not many gnomes decide to build a mechanical titan and rampage with it, while also being pretty classy about what's inside the cockpit, so yes, very unique. although Toma might be overusing the steamtank texture a little bit in his models

-Grendel
Mesh: 10/10 that's a brilliant, sophisticated, gentleman-y, mustached, steam-powered, deathmachine, that you got there, my good sir.
Animations: 8/10 there might be a few clippings with the cape , but the animations are very fluid and well done. though i couldn't get it to do anything on casting spells
Texture/UV: 10/10 Need i say it? the textures are really well wrapped
Mechanics: 10/10 nothing to complain here :> everything works and looks well. it also fits well in warcraft
Effects: 5/5 I say, my good sir, that the occasional steam vents, and a bit from the 'smoking pipe', along with the terrific death explosion, are a jolly good idea.
Creativity: 10/10 A steam powered, gentleman warrior mech, need i say more? it really fits in well with the rest of war3. and his name is just as great.

Blood Raven
Mesh: 7/5 it is quite good, nicely designed, and cool, not too shabby
Animations: 3/10 I mean, what happened? the death animations are like this repeating 'K-K-K-K.O.' from tekken 3 game i played, it is comical how many times death animation repeats itself in a quick succession until the thing finally starts to decay the same thing also happens on morph animations, but not really quick. also the draw animation makes the bow clip with the TC part of the bow, instead of the whole bow morphing along
Texture/UV: 7/10 it is pretty nicely wrapped and cool, but it is also using a lot of steamtank texture, which is a bit overdone
Mechanics: 5/10 It kinda fits well, but the bug with the animations makes it a bit unusable, still, good job mate
Effects: 3/5 Not too shabby, they feel neat enough.
Creativity: 6/10 There are a lot of ballista models around but this one might be a little bit unique, however, steamtank texture is really overused

icewolf055
Mesh: 10/10 Nothing to complain here, i quite like it
Animations: 10/10 this one is well equipped for many things, spell throw, melee attacks, bladestorm and even has a well done in-built portrait, it feels also a bit jittery in a good way, making it a pretty cool mechanical construct. i also love the way flail is animated in all moves.
Texture/UV: 8/10 I quite like them, they are very nicely chosen and well wrapped textures, but some parts might feel a lill dull.
Mechanics: 7/10 It isn't really having a good sound for his walk, bladestorm animation, or for the death animation, but it does feel very well done and is functional.
Effects: 4/5 Not too shabby, i like the flames, smoke and steam
Creativity: 9/10 A rolling mechanical warrior is a really cool idea, but the previous contest has also had one.

MiniMage
Mesh: 7/10 a neat, shark-like-shaped submarine, feels good
Animations: 0/10 a penalty has been issued because the animations weren't done completely by the model creator.
Texture/UV: 7/10 it is nicely wrapped, but some parts like the fins, the propeller, and the upper part (just below/around the hatch) might feel somewhat strange
Mechanics: 10/10 the model fits well with the war3, functions nicely and 'burns well' when damaged
Effects: 3/5 except the water waves and death animation smoke, this model doesn't have much effects, but it's ok
Creativity: 8/10 A goblin steam powered shark submarine is a pretty cool thing, but it kinda feels a bit too modern for them

HappyCockroach
Mesh: 8/10 reminds me of Pyramidhead char a bit , also feels a bit too thin, that was intended, i guess.
Animations: 10/10 Nothing to complain, they're fluid and nice
Texture/UW 8/10 A bit too uniform, but it's wrapped well
Mechanics: 8/10 feels good, but also feels a bit odd in warcraft, also it is more clockwork than steampowered, but i guess that's also good.
Effects: 3/5 it ain't that much, but they feel good.
Creativity: 9/10 definitely an out-of-the-box design, but it does feel a little bit too frail

Fingolfin's Judgement

Freddyk
Mesh: 7/10 This model is really well executed from its concept, although i feel like it overall lacks the wow-factor required to reach a higher score. The snirkly metal trims help add steampunk factor which is nice.
Animations: 9/10 I was thoroughly impressed with how well you did here. There are several tricks you can employ to make a mechanical unit come to life, and you have used them all. The pulsating boiler and wobbly chimney are both really exquisite details that many modelers can learn from. If anything, the death animation could use a few extra frames to smooth it out.
Texture/UV While overall sufficient, there are some areas which suffer from some serious stretching and blurriness. The worst of these are the floor, which is bad because of how central it is to the model. I would have suggested you to add more polygons and used a combination of other textures to get a nice floor, rather than just gone the easy way with the tinker texture, There are few who can truly work this texture, Frankster is one of them, but i generally dislike seeing it overused.
Mechanics: 8/10 The model behaves very well in warcraft, sounds, attachments and collision geometry are all present. It is good that you added an animation for firing at airborne targets, though i do wish you would have included a spell animation.
Effects: 5/5 I cannot see how you could improve on them. Good work here.
Creativity: 7/10 While you haven't gone overboard with the steampunk theme, it is still a neat concept. I am neither stunned nor bored with the level of creativity here.

Blood Raven
Mesh: 6/10 I am not quite sure if i "get" this model. Lets just start by saying that the mesh is fine-ish. Your concept really doesn't give you much room to impress, and i know you can do a lot better.
Animation: 6/10 It is nice how you have incorporated a lot of motion in the walk animation, and how the string shows a level of "boiiingg" when it fires, but apart from that i am unimpressed. With such a simple
concept, you could have given the effort to translate the firing motion into the bow itself. I get the idea with the string being stretched by the cogwheels, but it just doesn't look very
good from a game camera perspective. The death and morph animations are also a bit simple, you could have shown off some intricate machinery animations here, with cogs or hydraulics moving
rather than just having the wheels hover into place. The variety in animations is also low, apart from the morph set.
Texture/UV: 5/10 The wrap stretches pretty bad in several places. While there are no huge issues, this is once again an opportunity to impress which you did not take. The lines on the tubing are very wobbly, and the bolts are not maintaining their round shape - this is something you usually want to work for. There are few points of definition and all parts of the model look pretty much the same.
Mechanics: 6/10 You have mostly done a good jobs, like sound events, and well-placed team color, but you are missing a camera, the death animation is set to "looping", and i think you could have added a
few more attachment points. Tank footprints would also have been a plus. The model fits into warcraft.
Effects: 2/5 I would have appreciated some more effort in the death animation. A single particle emitter is all there is right now, and it looks more like a discharge of energy than an explosion. You
could have added black smoke in the decay anim, a bright flash in the death anim, and perhaps some smoke or dirt bursting up.
Creativity: 6/10 While your model is definitely steampunk-ish, the morph set feels redundant. You morph from being a ballista traveling on its wheels, to... a ballista traveling on its wheels, except spinning,
and folded underneath it. You should have spent your energy on adding mechanical detail instead, or adding more animations. I find the idea of using giant cogwheels as missiles quite unpractical, but hey,
stranger things have happened in the warcraft universe.

icewolf055
Mesh: 7/10 Pretty nice mesh which fits well with the wrap and doesn't stretch during animations. You would wonder though at which angle the enemies would have been firing for the arrows to stick vertically onto his shoulder!
Animation: 8/10 Beautifully done. All animations are very organic and fluent, but i wish you would have shown a bit more "gravity" in the dissipate animation. Also, i find it a bit awkward how he is constantly
jittering in the stand and portrait animations, but i can live with that. The mace and the banners are really, really well animated.
Texture/UV 8/10 The wrap is really good and there are no areas of stretching. I like the wrap on the mace, but the face feels inconsistent in detail with the rest of the model. Warcraft usually has a very articulated style, and the details in this head are a bit too fine and small to fit with that.
Mechanics: 8/10 A full set of attachments, collision objects, and sound events. He has a team glow which is appropriate for a hero, and i like that you also added it to the weapon (though you could have made it larger). Tank footprints would have been nice, and team color is nonexistent save for the glow. I would normally dis-advice against using bright red and blue banners since it could further confuse people over unit ownership.
Effects: 4/5 Nothing super fancy, but definitely appropriate for this model.
Creativity: 7/10 I kinda feel like this is very similar to the winner of the last modeling contest. Sadly, it does not fit as well with the warcraft stype as it did. You still have some very creative elements, such as the mace, but ultimately i still feel like i have seen this before.

MiniMage
Mesh: 9/10 Stunning. This unit truly looks like a mean predator. My favorite details are the fins and the
brass propeller shaft. The jet-like engines are also cool. In some areas you are suffering from poor triangulation, such as near the periscope, in the transition between the turret and its base, and near the tail fin.
Animation: 1/10 As a moderator, you should have known better than to accept help on a contest submission. I really wish i could judge these, as they are really good.
Texture/UV: 7/10 As i admitted earlier i am not a huge fan of the Tinker Tank texture. In some areas, you get a lot of stretching, but often times it is little enough for you to get away with it. The wrap on the turret is pretty bad, yet overall i think you did a nice job.
Mechanics: 9/10 Plenty of attachment points, proper sound and collision shapes. The fact that you have added sprite attachment points is a plus.
Effects: 5/5 Wonderful all the way through. They are very vivid and fit perfectly into Warcraft. I hope you did these yourself, lest i would have to stand here like a fool praising your name.
Creativity: 8/10 Overall cool design and creative idea. Doesn't read as much steampunk as just plain mechanical though.

HappyCockroach
Mesh: 8/10 Cool silhouette, interesting leg construction, and nice use of billboarded objects. Still, the fancy part is in the design rather than the mesh, which is pretty simple.
Animation: 8/10 Very fluent, save for the walk animations. The regular walk animation snaps horribly. A good piece of advice is to not have the start and end frame exactly identical, but rather put a keyframe for all bones one or two frames before the last frame, and use it as final frame instead (remove the old last frame and move the new one into its position). This way walk animations will loop more seamlessly. Otherwise you do a great job at adding a lot of motion into the animations.
Texture/UV: 9/10 The use of the UndeadBarge texture on the wings is genius. I was at first convinced this was a custom texture, so that is impressive.
Mechanics: 9/10 I love you for adding footprints, and the attachments are all there, except for on the feet. The way you implemented team color is very creative.
Effects: 4/5 Effects are simple but fill their purpose and look pretty good.
Creativity: 7/10 While your concept is quite cool, the reason i am not giving you more points here is how this model fits the least into warcraft. It is something about its dark, slender look that is both appealing and disturbing. It reminds me Pyramidhe@ds work, and would go nice with his models.

-Grendel
Mesh: 10/10 Your polygon use is totally excessive, but damn, this looks good. From the shape of the Mohawk to the cloak and brass engine - i am loving every part of this. There are still PLENTY of places where you could save hidden polygons though, such as inside his pelvis, where everything is obscured by the loincloth anyway.
Animation: 8/10 Pretty good, but the stand victory animation lacks any kind of vividness, and i would have appreciated some debris chunks of his body in the death animation - just having him pop out of existence is a bit cheap. A spell or spell slam animation would also have been expected for a model like this.
Texture/UV: 10/10 I simply cannot stop marveling at how amazingly creative your use of in game texture is on this model. Every piece is picked with perfect consideration to shading, which is worthy of respect.
Mechanics: 9/10 Team color is wonderfully integrated, you have footprints AND subtle footstep sounds, all attachments you could wish for, and even a collision shape. However, you are missing "portrait talk" animation, and you don't have any spell animations. For a hero, it could also have been nice with a hero glow, but that is completely optional.
Effects: 4/5 The effects are sufficient, but like i said, it would have been nice with some debris in the death animation. I like your use of ribbon emitters for the swing.
Creativity: 10/10 I don't think anyone hit the mark on the theme as much as you did. You created a completely unique character which feels steampunk to the bone (or should i say beam?), and the use of in game textures is some of the most creative I've seen. An absolutely staggering accomplishment.

Pvt. Toma
Mesh: 7/10I like this model a lot better than your last one. Your mesh is pretty solid except for the back, which looks flat and stretched. The modeled interior is a pretty cool move, and i like the face of the gnome.
Animation: 6/10 Somewhat stiff at times, but you also had some nice ideas, like the cockpit popping out when the mech dies. The "Stand Alternate" animations needs the most work as of now.
Texture/UV: 7/10 I am somehow not a huge fan of your texture choices here, but at least you are consistent with your coloring and the model looks good from a distance. My least favorite texture choice is the one for the exhausts, it doesn't look like metal and is too yellow.
Mechanics: 8/10 You have plenty of attachment points and sound events, a proper portrait camera with talk animations, and even an ubersplat for the death animation. I don't like how you use such an unsubtle sound for the footsteps though - it gets annoying very quick and i would rather if you used the less prominent sound events which were made for footsteps.
Effects: 3/5 These are mostly fine, though you should have picked another color than white for your exhaust smoke in my opinion. I also think the fire should be more red than yellow. My favorite is the "Spell Alternate" animation, nice use of the glow particle there.
Creativity: 7/10 It is clear that you have evolved as a modeler since last contest. Your concept is creative and no doubt fits the theme. While the art style doesn't really fit warcraft, you show lots of creativity in the animations and some of the mesh details.

eubz's Judgement

Freddyk
Mesh: 9/10 Mesh is nicely done and is not high poly but there are some parts of which you can weld vertices that might lessen some kbs.
Animations: 8/10 Animation is just fine, but I think you can turn off the visibility of all geosets at 11665, this is in death animation.
Texture/UV 9/10 It is always a wise decision to use in-game textures, and you did this.
Mechanics: 10/10 The model and the textures are steampunky and most of all, because it uses in-game textures, fits well in warcraft environment.
Effects: 5/5 Effects used fits well.
Creativity: 8/10 As for this model, creativity is nice but I am looking for more than just an attack vehicle. Something that could go underwater, the design, and more than these things.

Pvt.Toma
Mesh: 10/10 Mesh is done well. Poly count warants for the kind of model.
Animations: 8/10 You did well here but what the heck he is doing during attack alternate animation? I thought he's gonna use his hand weapons but he didn't.
Texture/UV 8/10 That golden pipe seems giving me troubles, seems like too much decorated or something. I think you can find other gold textures in-game. Also, that octagonal cap at the back of the model can have a polished UV alinement or something.
Mechanics: 10/10 All went well with the theme and fits well in war3 environment. Nice!
Effects: 4/5 Well, smoke is too light and fire seems too yellowish. Both lack blackish color or something dark.
Creativity: 10/10 You are creative enough, man.

-Grendel
Mesh: 10/10 You did this well though being too high poly.
Animations: 8/10 Animation is well done but you forgot to check the Attack 2 to non-looping. Attack animations, as for me, should all be none-looping.
Texture/UV 10/10 I like how you manipulate in-game textures though I know you can make custom textures for this model. The texture fits well to the model itself.
Mechanics: 10/10 All fits well to the warcraft 3 environment. Nothing more I could say about this except for it being high poly and some issues on animations, but these are just too little to be looked into. The model itself fits to be in the steampunk environment.
Effects: 5/5 Effects are well created and fits with the model and the animation where it has to be visible. I saw this ribbon emitter and wonder where it will pop-out. I couldn't saw it. Seems like you forgot to delete it. It should carry some kbs but will not affect you points, still 5.
Creativity: 10/10 very creative indeed.

Blood Raven
Mesh: 10/10 Nicely done with the mesh. Dude.
Animations: 7/10 All other animations except for stand, stand alternate, portrait, walk, walk alternate should be none-looping. I guess you forgot this. Birth should be none-looping including attacks and deaths, these might affect game play if you set all these to loooping. Attack animations can be much better if there is a little shaking on the body or something like this.
Texture/UV 10/10 You dealt with this nicely
Mechanics: 10/10 Fits well with the steampunk theme and the warcraft environment.
Effects: 4/5 Why is the steam too white?
Creativity: 10/10 This is indeed a very creative way of creating a balista.

icewolf055
Mesh: 9/10 There are some geosets where you could lessen down for lesser kbs. Overall, you did a new unit.
Animations: 7/10 Portrait and Portrait talk animations can still be improved. At walk animation, it seems like the blade he is holding is too light and he looks like running fast that makes the blade fly considering what holds the blade is a metall chain. Other animations seem fine to me.
Texture/UV 8/10 I think you can still find other cloth textures aside from the doodads0. It seems like he is inclined to both humans and orcs. Other textures seem fine but in most part like geoset 6 needs some more work in its wrap.
Mechanics: 10/10 This model fits with the theme very much.
Effects: 4/5 You could add a little smoke in his chest but other effects seem fine.
Creativity: 9/10 The style of the model is not very much new. More like a lava spawn or a water elemental being black and having some wheels.

MiniMage
Mesh: 10/10 This is a nice work you have, sir. I couldn't say more.
Animations: 0/10 Everyone knows the reason why score should be this.
Texture/UV 10/10 You really used in-game texture wisely.
Mechanics: 10/10 Like some of the other entries, this one also fits with the theme.
Effects: 5/5 Not really the supreme kind of using effects but one of the best.
Creativity: 10/10 I like this kind of submarine but why is the goblin too much prone to being hit as he is very much open atop. He could be enclosed with a little glass I guess, but the creativity is superb.

HappyCockroach
Mesh: 10/10 The mesh looks very simple as the model itself is like a black beast with a pair of wings but when you examine the body, it really has a complex mesh. Nicely done.
Animations: 6/10 The walk animation twitches too much. Also, in walk alternate animation, I am surprised why the hind legs seems static. I think it is better to have a smooth movements in these animations. Another, Walk Fast animation needs some more smoothing.
Texture/UV 9/10 I like how you use the in-game textures, but where is its eyes? IS it blind or does it use some special sense to locate its enemies?
Mechanics: 10/10 Fits with the theme a bit and using in-game texture makes this model fits to the warcraft 3 environment.
Effects: 5/5 Nicely done with this part.
Creativity: 9/10 This one looks like a black hawk, a crow, or something. There is a little creativity here but not the one I expect most.

 

[Heinvers]

Finally
Also it would've been better to list the winners by placings not alphabetically a.k.a ranking.

 

[PROXY]

Would be better if you listed them rank-wise.

Anyway, congrats to the winners

 

[Kyrbi0]

Woot! Glad to see this is out. Thanks for letting me be a part of it.

 

[-Grendel]

congratulations -Grendel!
also, congratulations to Happycockroach and Freddyk!

 

[Kyrbi0]

congratulations -Grendel!

.... lol

 

[MiniMage]

Updated it with the judgements now. Enjoy.

 

[Deolrin]

Congratulations to the winners.

 

[-Grendel]

some weeks later...
i still haven't received my +rep prize and award icon

 

[Lockheart]

Congratulations to all of you!
If you're missing the award you should check this.