The Forgotten Lair Forums

Competition # 1 - Main Site Banner Competition

First Place - seuqajregeajxx
Second Place - Immortal
Third Place - Ririzzery



Congrats to the winners and THANK YOU to all those who had participated. I learned a lot from hosting this competition and will definitely add some extra perks in the next one I host. Look forward to it!

(Winners, a PM has been sent to you regarding your prizes. Please answer them.)

Discuss and/or rant about the unfairness/the fact that this competition was rigged and I was paid money... AND GO!

IT WAS RIGGED.
I discovered...
On the spinning wheel between all of us i got an unfairly smaller piece than the others, and seuqajregeajxx got TWO pieces! (EGADS) however since I'm nice, I'll let this wheel of fate slip by.

Very nicely done everyone. >=) ... refraining from commenting.

I don't think I recieved my pm. I don't think so at least..

I stil want my C&C Phoenix, at least though it hasn't slipped away my memory yet~~ ba ZINGG

WTF I know I PMed you... Stupid forum...

Basically it told you to pick a prize. Tell me what you want through PM or here is fine... I don't care. Refer to the first Competition Thread I had posted, listing all the prizes.

http://theforgottenlair.freeforums.org/ ... -t146.html

I believe you get to choose ONE. Choose one. I will PM or Email you the stuff.

And you want C&C? Out of the winners, you by far had the LEAST amount of work done to the original image. Actually, out of all the submissions you had the least amount of work done to it. Now I have to justify why you got third place. Well, even though you barely altered the original image (I repeat myself) I liked the simplicity and overall presentation to it. Heck, it did look like one of MY OWN half-assed banners I'd placed on my own site, so what the hell... (You know me too well.)

Sometimes simplicity works and over-doing it never takes the cake...


Composition: 1/10 (the text is the only thing that even counts)
Originality: 2/10 Once again the text. And holy crap, that's my design!
Technique: 3/10 Hurray for Guassian Blur. Would it have KILLED YOU to add some contrasting colors???
Execution: 7/10 At least you know how to crop images... And keeping it simple saved your arse...

I'm sounding mean because I care. And no complaining or crying because you still won.

Ok, since people are starting to ask for C&C on their banners for the competition, I'll be next in line if you would like to drop some C&C for me. It would be greatly appreciated since this was my first few times making a banner. ^_^ Thank you for hosting this competition! I think we all learned a lot. Looking forward to future events for sure!! Congrats to the winners!!

CONGRATS to the firt, second, and third place winners. ^__________^

i loved 'em all. but, i could only choose one.

Neo.Anime.Haven - I was waiting for someone to pick that up. Kudos for being the only one to read the rules thoroughly or having the guts to ask.

Yes, I had planned for runner-ups... However, I did not choose any from the submissions I'd received...



And busy banners aren't something I dislike... It's just that... Well, if you want C&C just ask me through PM if you'd like...

Heliosept1104 - I'm glad you're asking for C&C. I'm not the best in making banners, but I do have experience in certain things such as blending... And that's where a few of you had trouble. (Using a different character and blending it on a self-made background is tricky and not recommended for first timers. Good try though, and effort is always a plus in my eye.

Basically your scan (Lia her name is?) did not blend. It's one of those "slap on sticker" effects. Take a look at her shadows. The light hits her face on her right side (our left side) and the shadows on her arm clearly shows it getting darker towards her back. You placed a massive amount of rendering effects with bright lights next to her, where her shadow lies... Blending real life humans to rendering effects is hard. The skin tone is difficult to work with. That's another problem you had. Take a look at where her chest is. It's too dark, therefore looks flat against a 3D render. You have to play with the contrast and lighting. (Lighting is a rendering effect and Contrast is an Image Adjustment in Photoshop.)

Also, the text should not have been slanted or have a white grayish glow. Lastly, Lia looked too small and like an afterthought to this banner. The text shouldn't be the main focus. Just a subtle reminder.

Hope that helps. If you want help on how to blend with correct lighting using this banner, head over to the Help sections with the psd in hand and I'll talk you through it step by step. ^_____^

To work that scan, you'd have had to recolor her a bit. I never gave a tutorial on that, but I think Andy had one on his site regarding the re-coloring of the hair. It's the same concept, only I use it to color-correct skin tones. Once again, a difficult and experienced method, using layers masks, intricate brushing, etc...

Below is a link to my online portfolio site. That page shows a SIMPLE color correct that involved changing the brightness a bit and adding a slightly different hue to rid of the BLUE from the original.

http://www.imgcatalyst.com/touch.php

See the subtle but important difference?

Really eh? It's that thing where the psd file looks better than shown up on browser, but most of the layers were composed of effects and changing of the lighting. When it's coming from you, I can't complain much of what the viewer sees.

But hey, I thought it was suppose to look like your design~~ the text however, that's just my thing. >.>

Oh well, it's over now. =P I'm not fit for contests. Damn voting sessions.

I don't care what I get >< With my trusty Eenie, Meeni, Miini, and Mo, let's go for:
Ayumi Hamasaki - Secret
Thanks for your services, Phoenix. =) Most appreciated.

Ah, I see Phoenix. Wow I overlooked a lot! >.<

Thanks for taking the time to give C&C. I appreciate the advice and will take more attention towards the subtle effects in the future.

In the image example you gave from your portfolio, did you use a Levels adjustment layer as well to balance out the colors better?

No. That is a way to do it, but I simply blended another layer of it in soft light, adjusted the brightness and filled and blended a single color of more RED on top of everything to get rid of the blue.

I barely touched that photo and if I'd wanted to, I could have done a lot more, but I just wanted to randomly do something quick for that page of my portfolio LOL. Very little effort there....