The theme for October is....

SACRILEGE!

Please submit your photos here by 10/29, and voting will go from 10/30-11/05

Rules (can be changed):
- Anyone here can participate, one photo per person
- One theme per month, for example: Funny Pictures, Outdoors Pictures, Pictures with famous locations (ex. landmarks), With food, Fighting, etc. I'd like everyone to be able to participate, so the categories should be open to anyone with toys.
-Photo editing allowed (but don't edit a toy into a background)
- 3 weeks of posting your photos in the designated thread, followed by 1 week of voting by all. I think 3 weeks is enough for everyone who wants to participate.
- You should post some sort of reason why you voted for a photo, to not just have people vote for friends
- If there is the unlikely tiebreaker, there could be one more week of voting during the next month
- PRIZE: You get to pick the next month's theme!
- Ideally, I'd want to have people submit new photos so that people don't just see the same photos over and over
- Let me know if you have any thoughts/ideas for the contest

Entries so far:


by living dead


by EVOM


by Ultra999


by nefasth


by jtsui1105



-Hall of Fame:
June: Fight Scenes! (winner: kurumonz)

July: Mayhem! (winner: nefasth)

August: Out of Place (winner: Ultra999)

September: Don't Put That in Your Mouth! (winner: Daimyo)

Sounds like a fun idea, only part that I take issue with is "No Photoshop/photo editing, to have everyone on an equal footing." Many people fix things like white balance in Photoshop, which is technically photo editing, but is not anything like adding in backgrounds/etc, which I think you are referring to. Photoshop is a necessary evil for fixing minor issues and as a result, everyone uses it, but yeah, totally sounds like a fun idea and I know I'd most certainly participate. That and I feel like the prizes should be toys as opposed to cash; it helps reenforce the whole fact that we love toys =P

Love the idear!! I will be participating for free I don't see any need for you coughing up $25 a month.

@SirNarwhal: I guess minimal editing is ok, but no too much. I don't want incredibly vivid photos due to editing, but just from planning the photo and lighting from the environment. Ideally, someone could win with a photo from a disposable camera. For the prize, maybe a pocket/medium super7 toy in stock on their website?

@Martoy Black: Thanks. If people want to participate just for the heck of it, that's fine with me. I just wanted to provide some incentive so that more people would submit photos

Great idea. I like the thought of raw pics, no editing. I think it gives everyone an equal chance. Some people got the talent but never exploit it because they think you need a great camera and a computer.

No need for cash, I love snapping pics at my toys. It gives me a chance to play with them without my wife saying I'm playing with them .

Great idea Russ, you should really put it together.

I think this idea is awesome. I really need to start a picture sharing account somewhere so i can start showing my pics off. I take a bunch but i never show them off which kinda bums me out. Maybe a little friendly competition will be a good incentive to do it.

Thanks for the input guys! Maybe the "prize" can be choice of the next theme, or choice of two themes and everyone else votes between the two. Hopefully everyone can participate and we get lots of killer photos!

Well put.
Let's go !

dig it.

the only thing about "raw" images, is that people with kickass cameras will win this 99 times out of 100. just getting sharpness in your photo can make all the difference. you can definitely get lucky or good with a cheapy, but it's that much harder. i think photoshop actually levels the playing field. some people will do great things with it... and some will destroy their images. just my thoughts.

Yea, I think the "shopping" wont really make things uneven, I mean you still have to have good composure and subject, etc. If your photo sucks PS wont help much.

Speaking as someone who has trouble focusing IRL, let alone with a camera,
I'm on the "No Rules" side:
If you're going to have a 'best pic' comp, it shouldn't be about HOW it was made,
just the end result,
and the people voting will bear technique in mind I'm sure.

As far as any PRIZE goes, wouldn't kudos be enough?
I don't see the need for you to shell out 25 bux a month or watever.
The idea of having a theme each month might help motivate people to enter though,
so the "winner picks next month's theme" idea gets my vote too.

Sweet idea for a n00b ...

GOGOGOGOGO!

In so much as this might be something you wanna advertise to non-SB denizens, there's a nearly abandoned kaiju subreddit: http://www.reddit.com/r/kaiju {ftr, i have nothing to do with, just noticed it's there..}

I was thinking a contest, popularity of a picture or otherwise, yields itself well to the reddit upvote/downvote paradigm. Then again, it's not that important to make that much of it.. Or maybe make a flickr group for this.

Love the idea of a monthly photo contest, and really feeling the prize concept you mentioned here of choosing the next theme. No cash involved, still all for fun, and aside from putting creativity into the entry, we can also be creative with our prize. If this is a photo contest, I agree on the no-photoshopping rule... If it's an "image" contest, then I guess photoshopping would be appropriate. I am a fan of unaltered images, but maybe I'm just too lazy to edit.

True! Actually I think no one is wrong giving the fact that some people don't know how to use ps. But it will level the playing field for those who do and camera is not up to par. I guess a little ps should be cool. I think there should be a few Specific things the judges should look at and we can go from there.

Everyone seems pretty excited so draw the rules up and the theme and let's do this. Also I think it'll be a good idea to use something like tumblr or Flickr to upload the pics. We can send them over to whoever is incharge and they'll have the access to load them, at the end of the contest winning pic stays for a couple of days. Just some ideas you guys decide.

I don't think you all are going to agree with the 'rules' about photoshop or not. Why not make an open contest monthly and the winner of that month gets to choose the subject and 'rules' for the next one?

Is that a blending of "composition" and "exposure"?

I think everyone is fine with photoshop. I just don't want someone photoshopping their toy in front of the white house or something if the theme is "Landmarks"

I was just planning to have everything on here, since not everyone has a flickr, tumblr, etc. You could upload to any photo site and post your photo in the designated thread. Then people could just vote in the same thread? Sending it all to one person could add a lot of work sorting through all the entries

Ding!

yes..yes it is...

Sounds fun...let's do it!!!!

Even though my autofocus POS sucks sea donkey hoof, I will throw down. May I request those with better equipment and skill sets give us some shots in 1920x 1080? I have a feeling we are going to have some great wallpaper shots popping up.

So, Russblue, I guess you should start us off with a theme for June?

We can post in this thread for starters.

I have zero photoshop abilities but I am in. As was said before any excuse to play with my toys

EDIT:

The theme for June is....

Fight Scenes!

One-on-one or massive brawl, your choice! Fake blood for bonus points (not really haha)

it's your contest, so set the rules and let's have at it! whoever wins can set the rules for the next round, so if someone doesn't like your theme, they can go suck an egg

wheeeee!