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Animal Contest: Results!

Thursday, April 14th, 2022

At the halfway point of our animal painting postcard contest, we were tied at 3 wins apiece and it was anyones game. All the paintings are now complete, sent, received and judged. It’s time for the final results! With no further ado…

Anglerfish

The judges (who were picking the subjects) began to get creative here, and this pick was one that would test our ability to paint lighting effects! Mine is on the right and Bernard’s on the left, and you can see our approaches are quite different. Mine seems cartoony, but I learned doing research that there are quite a few different types of anglerfish and I did my best to reproduce one of the more unusual breeds.

The judges had trouble with this one, and three split their votes. In the end I won with my fish 3.1 – 1.9, with many judges citing my light as being the decider. Here’s some specific comments:

“The fish on the right because of how well the glowing orb has been rendered.”
“The fish on the left looks a bit like something else – an orc or goblin. I think that’s because the surrounding murk looks like hair and a neck.”
“I like how dark the one on the right is and the creepy eyes.”

One judge may have said Bernard’s looks like an orc, but I can’t unsee what Bernard himself said his fish resembles: Mr T!

Porg

And here’s a judge giving us a not-real animal! Mine is on the left and Bernard’s on the right, and… well oh dear. I made a critical error in rendering the rainbow in the background (for no reason other than to use my new neon paints) and Bernard himself cited his method was to produce a portrait in the shortest time possible. Overall, the judges weren’t too impressed with either of these and it seems they were mostly choosing the one they felt least unimpressive!

Bernard won 3 – 2, and my two votes – both for the rainbow – were countered by three votes against the rainbow! It seems the judges had difficulty seeing past my the rainbow when evaluating these:

“The rainbow looks a bit half-hearted.”
“The one on the right looks like a spaniel.”
“I haven’t thought too much about the size of these artworks up to this point. I have always known that they are on postcards so in fact quite small. I can appreciate the difficulty of creating a detailed and interesting artwork in such a small space, especially in watercolour. Still the one on the right feels a bit lazy. Has the artist become bored with the competition. Is he lacking inspiration? Perhaps he is not inspired by the subject? Perhaps, like my hated of Minions, he despises the supposed cuteness of the fictional creature whose existence seems completely worthless. The banality of the subject has been rescued in the artwork on the left by the splashy rainbow, and this artwork therefore wins.”
“I LOVE the right. That porg pout. Holy bajesus!”

Quokka

Mine is on the right, and Bernard’s on the left. Do these paintings even depict the same creature? If you’re wondering, I had attempted – and utterly failed – to paint a fur texture freehand. Even before the paint had dried on mine I said to KLS “This is Bernard’s to lose” but in the back of my mind I hadn’t forgotten the judge’s comment on the his porg and thought perhaps I could sneak a win?

It turns out I had no chance, and his painting blew mine away. The only surprise was I got any votes at all, and that his win was only 3.5 – 1.5. And yet this shouldn’t have been a surprise, since the judges continued to be as unpredictable as ever! Their comments:

“These are both delightful but the one on the right wins.”
“This is a tie. I think left presents the subject a little bit better but fundamentally it looks quite derpy. Also the nose looks weird. The right has an evil look on its face… I don’t trust the right quokka!”
“Having seem them up close in real life when I visited Rottnest Island, I feel confident in selecting the artwork on the left as the one which most accurately captures the quokka’s stupidly happy spirit“

Frog

The very first thing that entered my mind when frog was given to us as the next subject was a frog prince. I rejected it as too whimsical, and instead planned to paint a poison dart frog. But black paints are problematic (see my gorilla…) and I couldn’t get the prince out of my mind. Plus I did have some metallic watercolour paint…

Mine is on the left and Bernard’s on the right, and this one gave the judges quite a bit of trouble! Both approaches are fundamentally different, both striking in their own way and neither easily dismissable due to technical faults. Judging for this one was easily the longest of the entire contest, but in the end I won 3-2. Here’s what the judges had to say:

“King frog is best frog!”
“I love the gold crown on left, but I adore the slight leftward angle of the right head.”
“I like the color contrast of poisonous frog on mushroom. I like the eyes and soft feel of the painted frog, a little bit like Monet, but the coloring is too weak.”
“Left seems crafted to appeal to the supposed preferences of the judge. One might find the bright pretty colors and shiny baubles somewhat obvious and patronizing but I hate to admit I love this picture. Simple, balanced, well-crafter. The crown is magical. While this artwork is largely fairytale it’s as charming as a prince.”

Spider

There’s over 45,000 different types of spider on Earth and yet – with no collaboration – we both chose the same one! To Americans this is a black widow, but to both of us this was a redback spider. Going into this one I had a comfortable 6 – 4 lead, so I knew at least the contest would be a tie, and as such perhaps the pressure was off. But I redoubled my efforts, and in this case that meant I put extra effort into the web and perhaps not as much into the spider: mine is on the right and Bernard’s on the left.

As soon as I saw Bernard’s I knew the win would be his, and yet I was once again surprised when the judges agreed, albeit with a slight 2.9 – 2.1 victory. It turns out my web was impressive enough to score me a few points! Here’s the comments:

“The left spider is superb. How the artist was able to create such dimension with just two colours is genius. The natural stance of the spider is perfectly captured. The legs are well defined and the abdomen beautifully bulbous, ready to devour her mate.”
“The one on the right has a cartoon quality. The spider is cute but harmless. The colours are bright and the definition in the artwork belies the medium. The web is particularly well done.
“A tie. The shadow on the left is pretty nice. The web on the right I appreciate because it looks like it took a bit of effort. In the end though they both need to die in a fire because spiders!”

Scarlet Macaw

Mum chose the first subject (Panda) and it was finally time for her second choice. We were expecting squirrel but for our last animal she chose a colorful parrot! Bernard’s is on the left and mine on the right, and once again our efforts confounded the judges.

This was the third time three judges split their votes, and perhaps fittingly this was the result with the closest final score. In the end I squeaked in with a 2.7 – 2.3 win, and it literally came down to the very last vote of the contest! Here’s what the judges had to say:

“I vote for the one on the left, which has the best watercolor technique.”
“Left has more depth.”
“The colours are done well in both birds. The face gave each of you trouble. The winner is the one on the right; I love the composition.”
“The one on the right sparked the most joy.”
“Left is the better watercolour but right has better colours.”

Final Results!

Twelve animals over three months, and 60 individual evaluations by our panel of judges. It’s time for the final results…

I won, with 7 wins to Bernard’s 5!

Looking at total points, I scored 33.8 to Bernard’s 26.2, which means the final decision came down to only 4 votes. Looking at individual entries, it could be argued that Snake won the entire contest for me (since I swept that 5 – 0).

Looking back on the contest as a whole, here’s our opinions on our work, and the results:

Bernard felt his best piece was his cat, and while I agree it was superb, I think his very best was his spider.
I felt my best piece was my eagle, and Bernard agreed.
Bernard felt his worst was his Porg, but I believe his snake was weaker.
I felt my worst piece was my quokka, but he thought it was my cat.
Bernard believes he should have won cat instead of me, and that I should have won eagle instead of him, and I agree with him on both of these.
When asked for a statement on the judging, Bernard said this: “My win was clearly stolen by a panel of judges easily distracted by bold colors and metallic paints!“
My comment on the judging is: “My win was harder than it should have been due to judges overlooking blatant rules violations by an opponent who brought pencil sketches to a watercolour contest!“

Jesting aside, thanks very much to all the judges for your valued and wise critique. Watch your mailboxes for a special reward from an award-winning artist…

We didn’t take as many work-in-progress pictures this time around, but here’s a few of mine:

I used washi tape for my spider web, which I cut lengthwise before applying to the postcard and then painting over with a grey wash before removing the tape. I did this three times in fact (for practice), and the other two are in the mail on the way to lucky recipients. Of course while this looks good, the problem was the web was too small to paint a large spider on, and that it was extraordinarily difficult to find a reference photo posed correctly so I just made up the spider 🙂

The above shows my anglerfish, which used only two colors. As you can see by this point I had mostly eschewed sketches and was applying the paint from a sort-of palette.

The size of the images sent to judges made detail difficult, and I was especially concerned (for no reason, as it turned out) that the metallic paint for the crown on my frog wouldn’t be visible. The above is a detailed photo showing how fancy that paint looks!

So another annual contest has ended. If you’re keeping track I won Postcards (in 2020), Bernard won Portraits (in 2021) and now I have my second win for Animals in 2022. What will the 2023 contest be? Perhaps we already know… but you’ll have to come back next year to find out 🙂

Posted in Animals, Art, Blog, Crafts, Family, Miscellaneous, Postcards | Comments Closed

Animal Contest: Halftime!

Tuesday, March 1st, 2022

A new year meant a new postcard contest, where the worlds most amateur artists would once again render a selection of topics and have them judged. Things were mixed up this time, and the rules were as follows:

The subjects are all animals
We would paint each using watercolors
There are twelve animals in total: Five judges pick two each, and mum picks the first and last

Six are done and the judging is complete. Let’s see the standing at the halfway point…

Panda

Mum’s first pick was a real surprise, but I won’t say what I thought she’d pick since she’s got one more coming. The watercolor nature of the contest immediately made it more difficult than the portraits! We’re both using watercolor pencils, and in the early weeks I drew a pencil drawing then wet it to achieve the paint effect, which meant detail was extremely difficult. However… Bernard ignored the rules and didn’t even create a watercolor!

Mine (on the right) was given the win by the judges with a score of 4.7-0.3 (Bernard got a tiny nod due to cuteness).

Here’s a comment from one judge about mine:
“Movement and emotion are conveyed and one can almost hear the panda munching away on his bamboo.”

Eagle

Mine is on the right and Bernard’s on the left and once again (sigh) we see he failed to add water and therefore didn’t create an actual watercolor. He feigned ignorance of the rules at this point, but it was clear he was exploiting the fact the judges themselves were ignoring the rules since he won this one 3-2. One judge even said “Left doesn’t look like an eagle but it has more detail so it gets my vote“! Imagine that: giving your vote to the non-watercolor that doesn’t even look like the topic!

It was at this point that the truth of this contest was becoming clear: the judges are inscrutable and whimsy and emotion factors as much into their decisions as artistic merit. This would have to be carefully considered by the artists…

Betta (Siamese Fighting Fish)

A salute to the judge that picked this, since it allowed liberal use of color! The strong difference between each approach made this a harder choice for the judges. Ultimately Bernard (on the right) won 3-2 but I sensed it was very close.

Some judges comments:
“Left is the first one that actually looks like a watercolor“
“Right looks like a goldfish!”
“Right is more three-dimensional with a beautiful impression of fluidity“

Incidentally I was very happy with the shading on my fish (the light spot on the upper back), which wasn’t easy for me to obtain. I don’t think any judges noticed it 🙂

Cute Domestic Housecat

This one was unusual since the judge added a condition: cuteness was key, and an image of a plain cat would be valued less than a cute cat. No judge had done this previously (or since), but as artists both B and I accepted the condition without comment. I took it very seriously and my creation is on the right, with Bernard’s on the left. Which one is cuter?

Ultimately the win was mine 3-2, but three judges split their votes, with the biggest being 0.3/0.7! Two judges commented that they gave me more points despite the technical skill shown in Bernard’s being greater since they assumed/understood that mine was in accordance with the criteria.

One judge decided Bernard’s was technically better and cuter with this comment:
“The definition of cuteness I will follow is ‘attractiveness that is pretty and endearing’. Left displays considerable skill in the choice of colors and the minimal application. The shadows on the face convey the soft shape and are extremely well done; the cat peeks out of the page with a perfect expression of indifference. The soft pink of the ears and subtle grey shadows lend strength to the brilliant blue/green eyes which make this exceedingly pretty and irresistably endearing. The cuteness factor is off the chart!“

Isn’t it interesting that we both chose white cats with grey shadows and both used pink as a secondary colour?

Gorilla

Another surprise choice, from a judge who I expected would have picked any number of other animals. Mine is on the left, and Bernard’s on the right. The judges wasted no time in their deliberation, and awarded Bernard the win 3.3-1.7 (yes, more split votes).

I went with bombast in my depiction, intending to evoke Kong silhouetted against the sun. But my intention exceeded my ability, and some of the finer detail of my pencil drawing was lost when wetted (see below).

Here are some judges comments:
“I can’t get over the expression of left“
“I’ll pick the silverback on the right; I like the use of light“
“Left is a tortured gorilla’s cream on behalf of all gorillas killed by selfish and greedy humans to satisfy a rich mans ego. The bold lines and dramatic colors evoke deep trauma and injustice. A world in which this typically peaceful giant is hunted and abused is an ugly world indeed and this artwork reminds me to be angry and sad and to do something to make the world better for all the beautiful creatures that live in it before human stupidity destroys all of it. Right is peaceful and gentle by comparison. The colors are soft and natural. A gorilla going about his day bored of any human observer. It is a fine artwork but the indifferent beauty depicted serves to intensify the impact of the emotion portrayed by left.“

Snake

Two judges are impossible to predict, one likes bold color, and two respond to dramatic imagery. This was my conclusion by this point, so to win I had to use bold colors and do more than a simple depiction of the subject. When Snake was chosen, the obvious choice therefore was Lucifer and his apple, and my depiction is on the left. I had been impressed by Bernard’s gorilla and queried him about his techniques. As a result this was the first time I didn’t simply draw a pencil illustration and wet it: I also applied the pencils directly to the wet postcard and mixed paints on a palette and applied them using a super-fine brush I cut down just to show the scales. As this one went into the mail, I was confident.

As it turns out the judges agreed and gave me the unanimous win: 5-0. I can see flaws in mine, but I think B had a few missteps here, not the least of being a lack of ‘mouth definition’ (which three judges cited).

Here’s some of the comments:
“Right looks like a cross between a snake and an alligator!”
“Left makes me think of a hidden danger in a gamebook, where the critter on the right is a tad eel-ish for my money.”
“Great texture in snake and apple”
“Use of the apple in left is very clever… The colors contrast and compliment to a lovely effect… The eye is odd but suits the supposedly friendly nature of the snake to tempt a sweet virgin to taste forbidden fruit!” (This was the only judge that commented on the biblical theme.)

And so, after six animals, the tally is: we are currently tied with 3 wins each! This is good for the contest, but hard for us. I was hoping for an early lead to I could ‘get experimental’, but with the competition as tight as it is every card matters and I must always think of the judges as I decide what to create.

Here’s some behind-the-scenes photos of some of my creations before I added water:

And here’s my cute cat in pencils:

One aspect of the contest invisible to judges are that we are both using an identical set of twelve postcards. This was an arbitrary decision of mine (I printed two copies of a 12-card set several months back) and only after we decided this did I realize this added an extra wrinkle: we couldn’t discard a picture and start again since we wouldn’t have enough postcards! So if we want to practice we need to use other cards. Bernard has done just that a few times, and he has also been sending me his practice arts, none of which were intended for judge submission. Here’s his alternate ‘cute domestic housecat’ and ‘betta’. He won Betta but I won Cat, do you think he could have won had he submitted this one:

As usual in about six weeks I’ll follow up with the final results. As of right now, this is anyone’s game 🙂

Posted in Animals, Art, Blog, Miscellaneous, Postcards | 1 Comment »

500 Postcards!

Thursday, November 11th, 2021

Yesterday I received my 500th Postcrossing card from Anastajia in Russia:

Reminds you of a certain film doesn’t it?

It was six months ago I passed 150 cards so I’ve been receiving them at the rate of about 25 a month. Since the last update I’ve received cards from 7 additional countries, to a total to 49:

There’s still a long way to go though: there’s users from 206 countries on Postcrossing! Looking at the above chart the average travel times have gone up by a few days compared to six months ago, no doubt due to the pandemic. And as usual it takes about a week longer for me to receive cards than for those I sent them to to get them.

The cards are as weird and varied as ever, helped no doubt by me saying in my profile that I like weird cards! Here’s a couple of notables from this last six months:

That’s a card from Belarus and as you can see the sender matched the stamp to the card. This is the third time this has happened and I’m always impressed since it couldn’t be easy!

That’s an old advertising card I received from Germany. The card is clearly very old (it’s heavily yellowed on the reverse) and a quick google search showed the program it advertises screened in the early 1950s. Could this be a 70 year old card?!?

As always I love the stamps, and the majority of users seem to as well since most put effort into using pretty or unusual examples.

I received a card from Guernsey (a small not-country in the English Channel) which is one of the smallest regions in the world to have its own postal service. While the queens portrait gives a hint as to the connection with Royal Mail, I’ve always been intrigued by these small independent island that have their own mail and it was a treat to get this card.

Look at this gigantic Indonesian stamp! I’ve got some massive stamps from Russia but I think this must be the new record for big stamps!

And then there’s this from a sender in Austria. The stamp and surround perfectly fit into the envelope into which he put the postcard. He mentioned he was an avid stamp collector but he is now aging and is giving away his collection. Amazingly he also included a United Nations first day cover in the envelope:

I’ve never sent a card back to a sender (that’s not how Postcrossing works) but I made an exception in this case and sent him one plastered with a variety of retro stamps.

At 500 received (and 502 sent) I’m now well above the average for US users (which is about 100 cards) but well, well below the top ranks, which is over 14,000 cards for a US user and more than an absurd 33,000 cards for any user (in this case, a German). In fact this German guy has sent an average of 7 cards a day since he signed up about 13 years ago. Imagine the time and cost!

So my next target would be 1000 cards, which at this rate should be in about July 2023. I’ll update when it happens and we’ll see how close my prediction was 🙂

Posted in Collecting, Postcards | 1 Comment »

Rain Of Frogs

Monday, August 16th, 2021

I sent Bernard fifty frog postcards at the same time!

I started by numbering them all. The cards were, of course, unique:

I then hand-addressed and stamped all fifty:

At first I was unsure what to write on each of them, but a quick amazon search gave a handy alternate solution:

The (exactly fifty!) frog stickers were then applied, and I wrote the lyrics to Rainbow Connection across all fifty cards:

This took some time as you may imagine, and the cost was about $40 for the cards, stamps and stickers. Given Bernard only paid $20, he got quite a deal.

“Paid?”, you ask? This was part of a deal i offered him: 50 frogs for $20. I never mentioned it was postcards (or indeed any details at all), but he gladly accepted regardless 🙂

I sent them all on the same day from a variety of post offices and mailboxes. Four days later he received 43 in the mail, and I expect the remaining 7 will arrive today. I hear they were a hit with him and Lakshmi. Overall I deem Operation Rain of Frogs to be a grand success!

I’ve still got a few frogs – and many toads – left. If you want one, indicate as much in the comments!

Posted in Animals, Art, Blog, Family, Miscellaneous, Postcards, Stamps | 2 Comments »

Portrait Contest: Halftime

Friday, June 25th, 2021

Bernard and I are having another contest, and this time it’s an art contest! To be specific: portraits. We’re each creating portraits and they are judged by the same five judges as last years postcard contest. While we’re sending these to each other on postcards, the cards themselves have no role in the judging this time.

The rules were simple: we would alternate choosing the subjects week by week, and create neck up portraits in any medium or style. The judges decision would be final.

That was five weeks ago, and we’re now halfway through. Let’s review the results so far!

Elvis Presley

I started choosing subjects with The King and right out of the gate Bernard ignored the ‘neck up’ rule with his ‘portrait’ (on the left)! The judges gave it to him 4-1, but since comments were as blatant as “Wins because of the pose” and “Wins only because of the guitar” I felt the contest had derailed almost immediately. Nonetheless the judges decision was final and Bernard took the early lead.

Arnold Schwarzenegger

The best subjects are ones with many different looks, and you can see from my watercolour (on the left) and Bernard’s pencil sketch that Arnie fits the bill! The judges were torn on this one, and one even declared a tie, but ultimately Conan defeated The Terminator and I won 3.5 – 1.5. Judges comments included “Conan is too slick” and “Terminator doesn’t have enough color”.

Cleopatra

Perhaps I chose Cleo since I expected an easy win, but it’s certain I wasn’t prepared for the magnus opus created by Bernard (on the right). KLS joked that mine (on the left) was very masculine, but even had I demonstrated a better grasp of facial anatomy I daresay Bernard would still have got – as he deserved – the 5-0 win. Incidentally while the photos don’t show it well, both of these feature metallic inks! Judges comments included “The detail is extraordinary!”

Bruce Lee

Bernard chose Bruce Lee, perhaps because he had an image in mind? But Cleo had lit a bonfire under me and there was no way I was handing him another win, so I started taking things seriously. My portrait (on the right) swept all judges for a decisive 5-0 win. Comments included “I love the eyes” and “Excellent use of shading“.

Steve Irwin

We agreed to let Kristin and Lakshmi choose a subject each, and KLS was first up with her choice of the crocodile hunter himself! This was a difficulty subject since he’s so known for holding animals that it was hard to produce a neck-up image that conveyed his essence well. I took a bold approach with the stencil art on the left, and Bernard… well he chose to ignore the rules again. Once again the judges overlooked this infraction and gave him the 5-0 win, even commenting (as one did) that he won “even though it isn’t a portrait”. As for my image, I expect this is not a contest that will reward a novel approach and will return to more conventional styles ahead!

So halfway though, Bernard is up 3-2. Since two of his wins were (arguably) due to images that flaunted the rules the neck-up rule has now been abandoned.

Five more subjects to come, and it’s still anyone’s game! Who will we draw, and who will win? Find out in five weeks!

Posted in Art, Blog, Family, Postcards | Comments Closed

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