Artstorm! How I Choose the Winners!

Before I publish the Artstorm winners today, I want to make this post about how I choose winners as people often comment that it must be a hard job.

Also, I am conscious that my choices might be controversial unless you know how I make them. I have been challenged about my choices and my answer is always the same. I thank the complainer for their views and suggest that they are free to award a prize from their own money to the entry they think should have won. While I pay the prizes, I choose the winners.

SME Joinup

For some time I've been waiting for a theme where the entries would demonstrate it well. 'Owls' fits with this.

So here is how I chose the winner in digital art:

There were 6 entries.

First, I searched google for cartoon owl images. This is a 5-second job.

Next, I compared the entries to those online.

I found one entrant had used an exact copy of this image for the owl:

Clker

So it was goodbye to that entry because it not only broke my contest rules but also gave the entrant an unfair advantage over people who took the time to draw their own owl.

Then I worked through the remaining 5 entries. I do it in the order they were received.

I reject any that I think took more than 15 minutes. Today I was happy that all could have been done in the time allowed.

I compare them two at a time and, literally, choose the one I like best as the winner.

On to non-digital art:

I had 16 entries in this category.

Using the same method, I worked through the entries.

I rejected 5 entries for copying online images. This is because they were not the entrant's original idea.

I rejected a further 3 entries because I didn't think they were drawn in 15 minutes.

That left me with 8 entries to choose the one I liked best.

So, there you are, that's how I do it.