posted 09-28-10 10:37 AM CT (US)
After three years of designing enthusiasm and cinematic tradition, the
Whether you're an accomplished designer or just someone meandering your way through the vanilla editor and still, like me, discovering new ways to improve your work, the cinematic is a relatively easy way from the laborious confines of a campaign and a good practice to have some fun with this timeless game! With that said, the objective of this contest is to design a cinematic scenario that utilises story and visuals to good effect and to satisfy the enjoyment of the viewer. As always, you are limited only by your imagination, and there is no set theme for this contest. Your entry may be a prologue or epilogue to a project in-the-works, historical or fiction, or a cut-scene in and of itself; an adaptation of a classical play, a script or a famous novel. Your entry may even be a music video, whereby what happens on screen coincides with the song, such as seen
With that in mind, you can find previous contest entries
To participate in this contest, please simply post a comment below and you will be shortly placed in the topic post as a contestant. There is no deadline for signing up; you may do so at any time during the competition.
The deadline for all file submissions is tentatively set for
(
- All entries must be submitted to the
Blacksmith by 26 January 2011, 11:59 PM (EST - forum time). Entries submitted after this time will not be judged. Files not approved before this time will be judged, so long as the submission date is prior to the above deadline. - All entries must have the initials of
ACSC10 entered in the submission title. Please use the naming format ACSC10 - [entry name here] when submitting your entry. If not, your entry will likely be renamed by the blacksmith moderators to fit this format.- All entries are to be submitted to the
Cinematic Scenarios category of the Blacksmith. - The overall size of the entry must not exceed 25 MB.
- The cinematic may be in .scx or .cpx format.
- The cinematic should run between 5 minutes and 60 minutes of in-game time. Anything less than 5 minutes constitutes little more than a teaser, while anything more than 60 minutes is probably too taxing on our judges. If the contestant wishes to submit an entry that does not fall within these limits, please post in the thread with good reasoning and the judges will decide if it is acceptable.
- No interactive elements allowed; the player should never have to move the mouse. There are no exceptions to this rule, but we will allow taunts to start the scenario.
- No submission of work done by multiple designers. This is an individual contest.
- Only
one entry per designer. - Cinematic scenarios already uploaded to the Blacksmith cannot be submitted into this competition. Anything not previously available for download is however acceptable.
- All use of the following tools is allowed: AoKTS, Genied1, Genied2, and AGE. All DAT editing modifications are allowed. Graphical changes (typically called modpacks) are not allowed. Editing language files is also not allowed, as it is for a cinematic only.
- An instruction screen image (bitmap) and sound files are allowed and strongly-encouraged. An avi file is also allowed, but remember the total file limit of 25 MB. Please do not include the bitmap or AI files in the zip, as they save in the scx file.
- Lastly, in order to be eligible for judging, the entry must follow the general submission rules that apply to the Blacksmith regarding offensive content. If you are unsure if your scenario is acceptable, please make sure of this well in advance of the deadline.
- All entries must have the initials of
The first place winner will receive their choice of a custom title on our forums! Also, the top four entries will receive a review from our judge(s).
There will be three judges for this competition, and are as follows:
The criteria consists of five categories, based lightly on the review guidelines but more focused on the consideration of what makes a great cinematic scenario. The categories were designed to minimise overlap while covering all major evaluation points for a cinematic. What the judges will look for when scoring each category is defined below.
Judges will consider how much they enjoyed or were entertained by the cinematic. This is purely a rating of the entertainment value of the design, and as such is the most subjective category. The judges will be asked to keep an open mind to styles or storylines that they might not prefer, but each judge will ultimately be asked to rate the entry in this category according to his own enjoyment. For this and all four other categories, the judges will give a score of 1 to 10 based on the scale provided.
This category will be judged based on the overall smoothness of delivery of the cinematic. Every scene has writing, or what the designer tells us is happening, and the actions, the trigger-work that shows us what is happening. In this category, the judges will consider the quality of the actions, how they correspond to the dialogue, and the smoothness with which they are presented. Generally speaking, the less the designer leaves up to the viewer's imagination and the more that is actually presented as action, the higher the quality of the presentation. Even the methods used to display the dialogue can show a high quality of presentation.
The flow of the cinematic is a rating of how well it is timed and transitioned from scene to scene. A cinematic exhibiting excellent flow should have easy-to-follow and properly-timed dialogue and actions, feature seamless transitioning between scenes, and move at a comfortable pace. The delivery should by no means feel rushed or sluggish.
The judgment of creativity will focus on any unique characteristics of the entry. Creativity can be found in all aspects of a cinematic scenario, from trigger effects, to map design, to the soundtrack used, to the story, and so on. All aspects of the cut-scene from the opening screen elements to the aftermath screen can be considered for creativity. For this category, the judge will not focus on rating the quality of techniques used, as he would for the other categories, but rather focus on any that are used in a unique manner or show a fresh approach.
Judges will consider both visual and audio aspects of the scenario. For scene design, the judges will consider all aspects of map design, including good use of terrains, elevation, units, objects, etc. The effectiveness of each scene visually will be considered. This is an evaluation of the quality of the 'backdrops' for each scene.
For the Soundtrack, the judges will consider the music and sound files used, if any. The inclusion of a soundtrack is a good thing, but it may or may not guarantee a higher grade. We aren't going to give credit for adding a piece of music; it has to fit and work for the scenario. The effectiveness of any music or audio effects used will be considered. The judges will look for how well music is timed to scenes, how well it fits scenes, and the overall quality and effectiveness of audio effects. The judge should not let their personal preferences in music affect their scoring, but rather ask themselves if the music used works well within the cut-scene.
When giving a rating for this category, we will be looking firstly at the scene design and determining a rating for it; If the soundtrack was above average and increased the quality of the scenario, the overall score should be increased. If the soundtrack is lacking or does not fit properly, the score should be decreased. A cinematic with no soundtrack does not have to be rated down for this if the judge feels it was the designer's intention or was unneeded. That said, it is likely that the inclusion of a soundtrack will give a better rating in this category.
The entry will be judged on its story, from the opening instructions until the end of the scenario. When evaluating the cinematic, the judges will first determine what the designer has intended the story to be. An attempt at a humorous story will then be evaluated on whether the dialogue and writing is actually humorous or witty, a historic story or classical literature adaptation will be evaluated on how the known events are told, and a fictional work will be judged on how good a fiction it is. Judges will also consider whether it was supposed to be a complete or partial story, and not penalise a prologue.
Judges may deduct points for spelling and grammar errors, particularly if they feel these mistakes were damaging to the overall understanding or quality of the story. This is left at the judges discretion.
(in alphabetical order)
Courtjester1
Crusader_7
Fanica
Fattybryce
G omega
joshua4missions
Lord Basse
paperclip007
Pears
Possidon
Sebastien
srinath1113
Trisatya
Turtov
Watson
Dead_End
Matt LiVecchi
panel
Teotl
tripp eev
ursul
Wind of the North | Defence at Lorgan's Watch | Blood of the Bear
StormWind Studios
[This message has been edited by Mashek (edited 01-27-2011 @ 08:42 AM).]
