Maximum Submissions per Contest

[mashby]

One topic that came up in the Chat room place this afternoon was limiting the number of entries that one person can enter for each contest. So, let's discuss that here before anything final is done. First, let me tell you what I've done while in the function for adding a picture. If you are entering your first image to a contest, nothing has changed. If it's a second, third, or whatever, a message appears indicating how many you've entered so far in the contest. If it's more than five, a second message appears.

Is this a good idea, bad idea, or something else? Please provide any and all input. At the moment, we haven't done anything to have a maximum number entered yet.

[Keb]

I'm not sure of how good of an idea this is. I mean limiting entries. It has been our goal from day 1 @ choppix to allow all freedom of expression in the contests irregardless (except for any pron, etc.). Limiting entries is limiting creativity in a way.

[Hypertaf]

 I agree about encouraging freedom of expression, Keb. I also believe that limiting the number of entries would in turn increase their quality. Perhaps this could be implemented only on more technically-oriented contests where creativity is not necessarily the main focus, such as gender change, clowning, etc.

[jebus314]

It is a tough call but as a new guy I'd like to see a limit. I am still learning and often I make what I think is a very good chop but then it is up against so many multiple enteries that it really does not have a chance at a top three. I think there are plenty of contests and opportunities to express one's self for it to be too limiting to set a limit of enteries per contest.

[babaloo]

I dont like the idea of limits, suppose we set a limit at 5 and then someone creates a masterpiece #6 entry, I say we have no limits except for maybe Mundo, we should limit him to 100 entries per contest.

[Keb]

One of our goals is to have active members. It just seems counter productive to limit any member's activity. I think this will cause a member to be more active on some other PSing site. I also believe competition makes us all want to do better. The more competition we face the harder we should try to make quality images. We have a long entry period in our contests so making more than 1 entry or 5 is not an issue IMHO. 

Jebus; A good entry will rise to the top of the heap no matter how big the heap is. A lot of us have been chopping for many years and know how frustrating it is to work hard on a chop only to have it place lower than we think it should. I'm not saying your images aren't good, I'm just saying a clean, sharp, well thought out image will score high no matter how many others it is up against.

[pelican]

Hmm...good arguments. I'm torn about having an opinion either way. I know that on at least one other site, the only time they limit entries is when they know that a contest will produce 2 or 300 entries, most of which will be rainbow colored grapes. But that's not exactly what we have here.  What I see is a bunch of quickly thrown together, poorly masked junk chops coming from someone whom I know does very respectable work otherwise. That I don't truely understand. I would be embarrassed.

I would like to just urge that quality is much better than quantity. We have plenty of time to find good sources and produce the best chops we can without showing everyone how quickly we can fill the bottom of the barrel.

And Jebus, I agree with Keb that the best chops tend to float to the top. Every once in a while I see a stinker in the top three, but not too often. You just keep doing what you're doing. Your work is fine. I remember when I first started. My first entry took dead last in the training grounds area at one of the other major sites...not pretty, lol.

[Hitspinner]

The more the merrier. But if I had to pick a number, I would say 4 because given the time limits between contests here, that is the number of QUALITY chops I could produce in that given period that would have a chance at a top spot. I have gotten my speed down to about 7 hours per chop averaged out. I can produce them much faster but quality suffers and I feel I owe it to Choppix and  myself to only put out stuff that is top plate entertainment. Sometimes I succeed, sometimes I tank but keeping the entries low enough to maintain a high standard is my goal.. Guys like Mundo amaze me. They can still keep the quality up at blistering speed and I find that entertaining as hell. But Funkwood said it best, "Take the efforts of 10 chops and put them in one and you will probably have gold."

It wouldn't hurt to have a "Speed Chop" contest once in a while to get our ya yas out.. just for the hell of it.
Quantity vs quality hahahahahah

That's my two cents
Cheers

[oblomov]

I agree with Pelican ; no limit on number of entries and kick Mundo off the site !

[mashby]

The functionality to limit the entries is actually very easy to implement, but it certainly has an impact on user functionality. I've spent time researching and implementing various ways to render the final contest images (Neato, Wowza, Slideshow, TVMode, Flipper Slideshow) and all of these really have no impact on user functionality. They merely offer up different views of the contest images. So for this one, I guess my initial reaction was yeah, we CAN do that. But I knew it would impact each user, so I took it here to the Forum to discuss it. One of the neat things that I'll definitely be keeping is indicating to you how many entries you already have in each contest when you enter a new one. Makes a lot of sense in the two galleries, Show Your Face and Unrated Gallery and likely in general, too.

I think the most important thing to learn from any and all of this is that we listen and encourage feedback/suggestions from anyone (well, anyone who is a member) regarding what we do functionality-wise. Some things we've done just because it felt right (and was logical). Some things I've done because I thought it would be cool. Yeah, we own the domain and I guess I run the software/coding stuff, but we do everything with the user base in mind. If we ever stray from that (or have before), please let us know. That's not our mission here. We're nothing without you.

[Mundo]

Hello people..I hardly ever visit the forums, but since Mashby brought this to my attention, I stopped by to see what was going on.. and I noticed my name brought out in this discussion, and so I'll add my feedback into this also.
Now as you all know, I love to chop, and I do admit sometimes I do get carried away , so much at times, that I overlook quality, and I know that, and have seen it and brought to my attention too...but I find the best part of it all, is that comments help a lot..if something is wrong with an image, or perhaps something that I overlooked there's an option where you can fix that, so I find comments very helpful, whether bad or good, that's how one improves, but you all know that...My mind works in  a weird way, and although I have tons of fun doing this, I find a  lot of satisfaction in entertaining people, with my ideas, which sometimes are funny or sometimes are not...that was the main reason I made my website to post my pictures for people to see and enjoy with my crazy ideas...believe me by now I have no idea how many images I've created, in so many sites that I've been in...but all in all it's just for the fun, for me, and for all of you to enjoy and perhaps bring a smile or a giggle once in while...My good friends Mashby, Keb, and Baba, among all the rest of you, know that I've been around for quite sometimes, here and on the other site, and my main purpose is to have fun...and perhaps bring some enjoyment to the photoshop sites also..
Since I've join here at choppix, I find the atomsphere very comfortable, very good and friendly people here..and I plan to stay, for as long as possible, if for some reason you guys find my entries offensive or of poor quality please bring it to my attention, I certainly won't mind one bit....and I will also like to add, that Mashby has done an awesome job, here to make this site look so great...I really envy him, and his talent....well hope I made my self clear, and also hope I didn't offend anybody with my words...and I will certainly put more quality effort into my work...oh and actually limiting entries is no big problem for me, so what ever is decided I'll just go with the flow...cause whether I enter a contest or not I still keep on chopping, if my chops fit the contests fine, if not I save them for a rainy days, that is why sometimes I enter so many images..
Thanks...

[Keb]

Mundo, You certainly haven't offended anyone. We made this site for folks just like you. Don't stop being "Mundo" and keep them images rolling in.

[Hypertaf]

What Keb said.

[Hitspinner]

What Mundo said LOL
I couldn't have said it any better.
As for offensive, -never seen an offensive Mmundo chop, ever.
Seen plenty of offensive Hitspinner chops though hahahahah.
And  I might add that Edmundo out of all the speed choppers that I have encountered still maintains super high quality way above the rest. I think that maybe I have seen a handfull out of hundreds that looked like he could have given an extra ten minutes but that is true of all of us, eh?

I was thinking about it and chopping has sort of morphed into three apparent schools, Classic, The Power Chop and the Art Chop.
Classical chopping such as head swaps, simple scene changes and limited effects lends itself to the speed  chopper
The Power Chop is the complex multiple layered piece with tons of effects.
The Art Chop is a beast unto itself where there is more illustration and radical alteration of source images. Animal Island, Woodland Witch and Ghostly  in the current Freestyle are good examples of an art chop.
So, it seems a little sad to see these three categories of chops in the same pool sometimes because what would be a normally excellent classical style chop generally gets murdered by the Power or Art chop.
But what is even sader is when the classical, head swap class smokes the Power chops and when that smoke clears, Mundo is usually standing there Hahahahhaahahahah

[Mundo]

Hitspinner, you have actually brought out something that has been on my mind for quite a while..and you are so right, and I've noticed it too, just couldn't put into words. (But you have.) Photoshopping has fallen into differant catagories....like you said. And a very good example is at FN, there people tend to make their images more like a fantasy type look to it...now there is nothing wrong with that, and in fact some are extremely good, but I find them too cartoonish, nothing natural to them, on the other hand I try to make mine more natural looking, using just the basic tools the software has, to make them more believable to the eye instead of a cartoon...plus the fact that I'm not experienced enough to make those type of chops. I do tend to make them humorous, and the same time believable...I guess that sets my chops apart from the rest..unfortunately seems like people tend to like the cartoonish type more, I say that cause a good example is Mr. Azrainman, at FN, his chops are mostly too fixed up with all kinds of filters and textures, making them look so unnatural...I'm not saying they look bad, but not believable and not natural....but he is more experienced in doing stuff like that...I'm not.
And you Sir...,have always said good things about my work, and I truly appreciated it.
Also your images are more into quality, then mine, and is very noticeable, and I  congratulate you.
Like I have mention dozens of times, I am not an expert on photoshop, in fact as much as I tried to learn all the tools and layer stuff in photoshop I still haven't been able to do it..What I use is Photoimpact, which can be used without the layers options, unfortunatley Photoimpact doesn't have as many tools and filter options as Adobe Photoshop, perhaps that is another reason I can accomplish more chops also.
I believe I mention this to someone, can't recall who it was, that I took classes for photoshop, and got my certificate and all....but I'll be darned if I actually learned anything. My instructor was more of an idoit then I was....so that was a waste of time and money...ultimately I do with what little skills I have and with the least tools this software offers...
Creating stuff to me is more of a hobby or a pastime, now if I was really skilled at this, I would certainly would do it more for a profession and profit, I'm sure, too bad I'm not at that level yet...or find the need to be....
Well I think I have wrote a book already, so I'll stop my blabbering, and end here..
and if you went to the trouble of reading all this stuff I thankyou, for the time wasted reading it..lol.