NWDA's 2020 Theme Challenge - "Travelers"

Started by DannyG, May 12, 2020, 03:00:22 PM

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DannyG

Entries must be submitted by July 6, 2020
Submit Entries - HERE

CONTEST RULES & GUIDELINES:


Contestants are to create a "Travelers" themed piece of their choosing with the highest level of Photo-realism as their goal. (Open to Interpretation – Real Life, Sci/Fantasy, Anything Goes)
  •     The contest is open to any 3d software package
  •     1 entry per contestant to be completed by a single artist (No Teams)
  •     The final render must be rendered within a single application.
  •     Image Size – 0.6MB Min – 8MB Max
  •     Rendering layers and composing in 3rd party application(s) is permitted.
  •     Approved Post-Work – Sharpening, color/level adjustments, resizing, and other subtle techniques that simulate 'typical' lens effects, ex. chromatic aberration, DOF, and lens flare. NWDA has the right to reject any image that is deemed overly 'enhanced' by Photoshop or other image editors.
  •     Non-Approved Post-Work – Replacing and or adding any element via Photoshop or any image editor. All elements must be rendered within the artist's chosen application.
  •     NWDA reserves the right to question any entries construction and may require the artist to submit the Gathered project before approval. NWDA will reject any entries that do not conform to the above guidelines or images that are deemed 'incomplete' by NWDA.
  •     Contestants must submit judged entry with raw render output image (Composed layers into a single image, Pre-Postwork).
  •     Submitted entries must be submitted by above date and time and include an Image title, Artist name, email, & judged entry with raw output image (ex. Composed layers into a single image, Pre-Postwork)


Grand Prizes Totaling Over $8,000 USD
1st Place

    Houdini Side - FX, Indie License
    Vue Enterprise & Plant Factory, 1 Year Subscription
    E-ON Plant Catalog, 25 Render nodes, 1 Year Subscription
    Terragen 4 Professional or $700 voucher for annual maintenance fees
    QuadSpinner Gaea, Professional (Perpetual License)
    Substance Designer, Painter, Alchemist & Source w/ 30 Mats per month, 1-year Indie License
    Quixel Megascan's 1 Year Personal Subscription - 500 Points
    XFrog Plants Vol 1 & 2, 2900 Plants (tgo, obj, vob, & 3ds)

2nd Place

    Houdini Side FX, Indie License
    Vue Professional & Plant Factory, 1 Year Subscription
    Terragen 4 Professional or $500 voucher for annual maintenance fees
    QuadSpinner Gaea Professional (Perpetual License)
    Substance Designer, Painter, Alchemist & Source w/ 30 Mats per month, 1-year Indie License
    Quixel Megascan's 6 Month Personal Subscription - 250 Points
    XFrog Plants Vol 1 & 2, 2900 Plants (tgo, obj, vob, & 3ds)

3rd Place

    Houdini Side FX, Indie License
    Vue Creator or E-ON Plant Catalog, 1 Year Subscription
    Terragen 4 Creative or $350 voucher for annual maintenance fees
    QuadSpinner Gaea Professional (Perpetual License)
    Substance Designer, Painter, Alchemist & Source w/ 30 Mats per month, 1-year Indie License
    Quixel Megascan's 6 Month Personal - 250 Points
    XFrog Plants Winner Choice - Vol 1 'or' 2 (tgo, obj, vob, & 3ds)

Travelers JUDGES:

  Allan Mckay

    Award-winning VFX Supervisor, Owner Catastrophic FX, VFX Artist Industrial Light + Magic, Blur, Prime Focus, Pixomondo (Bloodshot, The Equalizer, Star Trek Into The Darkness, Transformers Dark Side Of The Moon, 2012, Superman Returns) IMDb Profile
 
    Greg Teegarden

    Supervisor of VFX Digital Domain (Terminator Dark Fate, Avengers Infinity War, Thor Ragnarok Oblivion, X-Men First Class, TRON Legacy, The Fifth Element, Vanilla Sky)
    IMDb Profile
 
  Alex Jevon

    VFX Artist Britannia, The Planets, Teletubbies (Lola Post), Mars (Framestore), The Alienist (Peerless)  IMDb Profile
New World Digital Art
NwdaGroup.com
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WAS

This theme has me playing with a lot of different concepts. Trouble deciding what WIP to focus on.

Dune

It's really wide open, so a very difficult thing to judge I'd say. I have a few ideas, but they tumble over eachother.

I also thought about assets permitted, and would like a bit of clarification. It would of course be pretty easy to use a lot of purchased high quality photogrammetry assets, or even projecting a crisp photo on a simple background (say rock wall) - which would be quite the same - add some travelers, and get a really nice photo-realistic render. But in essence it is a photo.

N-drju

Quote from: Dune on May 13, 2020, 02:13:17 AM...projecting a crisp photo on a simple background (say rock wall) - which would be quite the same - add some travelers, and get a really nice photo-realistic render. But in essence it is a photo.

I think that would be rejected on account of not being rendered in a single application. ;) And of course such techniques don't seem to be fair. I plan to add some objects but made from scratch by myself. Maybe not Pixar-grade. But 100% mine.

Projecting a photo on an object would be like those painting books - all you have to do is to use crayons, but does it mean that the pattern itself is your "work"?
"This year - a factory of semiconductors. Next year - a factory of whole conductors!"

Dune

Well, any treebark texture is of course a photo, but a TG render of a forest considered as a pure TG render, but I'm just saying that there's a vague line between (mostly) procedural and mostly photo.

N-drju

The question of "how much is too much" as they say! ;)
"This year - a factory of semiconductors. Next year - a factory of whole conductors!"

WAS

Sorta just falls under "effort". Lol I'm sure the judges, like many others, will be able to tell such low-effort entries. It's like dropping a low-res hegithfield into TG and populating it. Meh. Cool bro. Lol

DannyG

Quote from: Dune on May 13, 2020, 02:13:17 AMIt's really wide open, so a very difficult thing to judge I'd say. I have a few ideas, but they tumble over eachother.

I also thought about assets permitted, and would like a bit of clarification. It would of course be pretty easy to use a lot of purchased high quality photogrammetry assets, or even projecting a crisp photo on a simple background (say rock wall) - which would be quite the same - add some travelers, and get a really nice photo-realistic render. But in essence it is a photo.
He gents,

  With the exception of "Cliff" all previous NWDA challenges allowed the third party created and or purchased assets. TRAVELER'S guidelines are parallel with modern production workflows. Again anything goes as far as asset creation and or sources. The only restriction is the Final render must be rendered within a single application. I hope that clears things up. Good Luck guys !!
New World Digital Art
NwdaGroup.com
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Hannes


DannyG

Quote from: Hannes on May 22, 2020, 12:16:04 PMIs a subtle denoising allowed?
Hannes,
   Approved postwork is per the above guidelines.
New World Digital Art
NwdaGroup.com
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Agura Nata

#10
I am there with my surreal works ;)

"A mountain justified by Luis Trenker and a floating traveler"


... Lonely is the traveler, who hovers restlessly from summit to summit
 his knowledge weighs heavily on the things that most remain hidden ...
"Live and Learn!"

amandas

Hi there,

2 questions:

a) are self-generated HDRI maps allowed (like in TG)?
b) are self-captured and processed photogrammetry assets allowed?

Best regards
Artist / Developer
open for freelance / full project cycle
http://arturmandas.com

N-drju

Quote from: amandas on June 10, 2020, 10:32:06 AMa) are self-generated HDRI maps allowed (like in TG)?
b) are self-captured and processed photogrammetry assets allowed?

a) Not sure if you need HDRI in Terragen because...
One - there is no place to "load" them into the scene as far as I can tell.
Two - normally you just use the sun, clouds, atmosphere - lighting model in TG is physically accurate. ;)

b) Yes. As long as it is not a part of a post-production effort but an asset within the scene.
"This year - a factory of semiconductors. Next year - a factory of whole conductors!"

N-drju

Okay, there is something I really don't understand...

The requirement is to submit a pre-postwork image. A raw render output. Yet, the submission page clearly shows two dialogue boxes - one for a pre-postwork image. The other for a postwork image.

How shall I interpret the submission page then when confronted to the contest rules?

The reason I ask is that I don't really see much of a "postwork potential" for my image judging from the test renders. The only postwork that I plan for is my signature.

Which brings me to the next question which, I'm afraid, has not been properly answered yet; is it okay to put a signature onto a finished (raw output) image?

Any help is much appreciated. ;)
"This year - a factory of semiconductors. Next year - a factory of whole conductors!"

DannyG

Quote from: amandas on June 10, 2020, 10:32:06 AMHi there,

2 questions:

a) are self-generated HDRI maps allowed (like in TG)?
b) are self-captured and processed photogrammetry assets allowed?

Best regards
a) Yes
b) Yes

Good luck
New World Digital Art
NwdaGroup.com
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