A message from BinaryCortex

[binarycortex]

I love it when you guys thank me for running these competitions. Sometimes it can be a pain, like when its time to setup the voting, but mostly it's pretty easy. However, some of you know that I have an ulterior motive for doing these competitions. So, I'm going to tell you the story of how these competitions got started, and at the end there will be a personal message from me to you.

Every now and then someone on the forums would make a remark referencing how great it would be if we had competitions, but they never came. I have often had the same thought. When I was merely a member of the community and an artist, albeit not very good at the time, I was always scanning the gallery and forums for new luxrender artwork, new pretty pictures. Even the user suppport and materials help forums yielded the occasional nugget of awesome. As time went on I ended up becoming one of the devs by improving and maintaining the blender 2.49 exporter. I have even thrown in the occasional nibblet in to the core. Still no competitions. I was always saying to myself, "Damn, I wish there were more lux awesomeness to look at." The more I thought about it, the more I saw it through a developers eyes, and that thought expanded to include driving development of LuxRender, showcasing new features, and finally the ultimate reason...to showcase the abilities of LuxRender itself. One day I saw Abel on IRC and asked how hard it would be to add a competition section to the forums. Abel responded with something to the effect of, "Are you volunteering to administer them?" So I said...Sure! We started with a post in the WIP forum, and when it was clear that there actually was interest we had the Competitions area created, as well as the Competition gallery area. After posting the second competition on blendernation, things started to pick up and we even got a bunch of new users to the community. At least, I think thats why they came over? From that posting, BlenderRenders.com offered up our first real prize for winning. Many thanks to Aaron from BlenderRenders.com for getting that ball rolling.

So you see, I am doing this for the good of the LuxRender project, but I also want to look at all the awesome renders you guys make. Every time I post these competitions I wonder if you guys are tired of doing them, are they too close together, should i wait longer so you have time to work on your other projects, will i get more participants if i do that... Sorry, I'm rambling. The Poetry in Motion competition yielded some great images, unfortunately this was the first of my own competitions that I missed out on. But, with a new baby, I just didnt have time to work on my own 2 possible entries that I started. The turnout was lower than I expected, but it was a difficult requirement, and even still you guys exceeded my expectations. Already the new Materials competition is looking to be awesome.

Every time I post a new competition you guys exceed my expectations. I want to personally thank you all for participating. I may be coordinating them, but without your submissions there wouldn't be any competitions. Thank you all, so very much for making these competitions a success.

[binarycortex]

P.S. I like the pretty pictures, so post more WIPs.

[paco]

You do a great job with the comps BC - keep it up!

[moure]

BinaryCortex for the win!

[SATtva]

BinaryCortex for the win!

+1

[jeanphi]

Hi,

Yes, thanks a lot for your continued efforts, even with your new baby (and I kow what I'm talking about ). I am myself continuously puzzled by the quality and diversity of the submissions to the competitions.

Jeanphi

[B.Y.O.B.]

The competitions are great!

Every time I post these competitions I wonder if you guys are tired of doing them, are they too close together, should i wait longer so you have time to work on your other projects, will i get more participants if i do that... Sorry, I'm rambling.

For me as a student busy with many projects all at once the competitions are too close together to parcipitate in every single one - but I like the themes, the topics you choose very much, they give a great room for artistic freedom. And I also like to see the images other artists create, stunning peaces of originality and imagination.

Sorry for every mistake I made, my english unfortunately isn't the best, but I think it's improving.

regards
Simon

[Carbonflux]

I have been very happy about the comps, its clearly quite a bit of work and I think you are doing a great job BC, thank you

HUGZ!!!!

[luxRoot]

I think one month between the comps is just the right gap to be... I think. For me 2 mounth would work better, but that's coz I think I could invest more into complexity of a submission.

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Hearts to Mister BC for all the work he does for us with orginizing the comps

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[Kira Vakaan]

I wish I had discovered this thread sooner!
Thank you very much for your efforts on these competitions. I agree that this helps out the LuxRender project in an awesome way and it all gives us a bit of eye candy.
Yours is an interesting story, though I always enjoy hearing how people got to be where they are. Good luck with your new family member and thank you for these competitions! Now I wonder if I should start on an entry for this one. School's been pretty tough this month, but I'd really like to take an afternoon and play with a realistic granite material! We'll see!