Ok, I\'m truely Baffled now

[Lurch]

I am at a loss to explain the situation I am seeing below. I thought you all could, perhaps, help me with this.
(And as a side note I am not complaining about the scores, just trying to make sense of them is all)

The first one is my Flesh Eater:
http://www.coolminiornot.com/?id=36436
This guy is getting a 7.0 on the scale. I talked to Zaphod and Trevor on this and both said I needed a little larger pic with better resolution.
So I submitted a new pic:
http://www.coolminiornot.com/?id=37861

Now this new pic is a better pic but is over a full point lowere in the scoring.
What have I done wrong in the second pic that was not there in the first?

I have a few more examples of the same thing:
Griffon Executioner:
Old Pic (6.7) http://www.coolminiornot.com/?id=36432
New Pic (5.6) http://www.coolminiornot.com/?id=37859

Kaylar:
Old Pic (6.5) http://www.coolminiornot.com/?id=36440
New Pic: (5.6) http://www.coolminiornot.com/?id=37856

Any help you can give me to understanding this would be greatly appreciated.

 

[Fizl]

The only thing I could suggest is that maybe the very bright lighting on the new pictures is affecting your score? I think it is washing out your highlights. the only reason I guess its the light is that I presume the bases are painted black around the edges, but they actually show up as very light (at least to me).

If its anything else I\'m not sure, unless you are as timid with your highlighting and shading as I am.

Hope it helps,

Shaz

 

[finn17]

Big is not always best....

I can understand your puzzlement. I am sure there is a technical explanation for this effect but it will take a better person than me to explain it. The simple analogy I would use would be those great big TVs. They look fine in the showroom and we are led to believe that they are \'better\' in some way but when we get them in our living rooms they are often crap. This is because unless you live in a palace there is an optimum size of TV screen and detail you can deal with.
Similarly, I believe there is an optimum size of picture and degree of resolution for images submitted to CMON. Perhaps your examples have exceeded that optimum? Don\'t forget that \'bigger and clearer\' shows up all the brush marks and faults that much more...
In many ways the only difference between pornography and medical shots is the degree of magnification and clarity involved?

 

[ZaPhOd]

I still say that the algorithm allows folks to breeze through with their low scores... Maybe the older pics were posted before this started? This could be the proof I am seeking :O

 

[sivousplay]

A different angle on all of this might be that when you post something the first time, you\'re proud of it, you mention it to your friends .... they vote early, and the average starts out a little high, but being herd animals, the rest of the voters follow suit. Your reposts aren\'t as an exciting event for you ... you don\'t tell your friends about it and are at the mercy of those who come by to vote w/out the benefit of a few friendly votes.

I\'ve certainly noticed that as much as we\'d like to think that the combination of cleansing and many votes will average things out, that the first 20 votes (or so) will set the average that your mini tracks to because of the herd instincts.

I doubt that CA has the info to look at this, but I\'d be real curious to see how may votes it takes for a mini to get to and stay within 1-sigma of its \"final\" average.

jim

 

[SaintRigger]

I think the people who vote are fickle and favor the technique du jour. I have an example where if I post one model, it get an X score. If I post another pic of the same model with another figure in with it, it gets a lower score, so really it\'s not judgement on technical merit (unfortunately) but whatever the masses happen to be feeling at any given time. It\'s not like there are any hard and fast objective guidelines to judging.

*shrug*

 

[Lurch]

Originally posted by sivousplay
A different angle on all of this might be that when you post something the first time, you\'re proud of it, you mention it to your friends .... they vote early, and the average starts out a little high, but being herd animals, the rest of the voters follow suit. Your reposts aren\'t as an exciting event for you ... you don\'t tell your friends about it and are at the mercy of those who come by to vote w/out the benefit of a few friendly votes.

I\'ve certainly noticed that as much as we\'d like to think that the combination of cleansing and many votes will average things out, that the first 20 votes (or so) will set the average that your mini tracks to because of the herd instincts.

I doubt that CA has the info to look at this, but I\'d be real curious to see how may votes it takes for a mini to get to and stay within 1-sigma of its \"final\" average.

jim

This would make sense had I friends I tell about it.
Unfortunately I am a little on my own as far as CMON is conerned.
While I DO have a few friends, Msot of them could care less about my miniatures.
In fact many of them arent even aware of the CMON website ( due to me being the only painter in my circle of friends as well).

Due to this fact I don\'t advertise to them when I upload new miniatures.
It is due to this fact that I highly doubt your suggestion.
Still I will take it under advisement.
Maybe if YOU came to Kansas and taught me how to take a gosh durn photo? lol

 

[sivousplay]

Since you won\'t catch me in Kansas (being an Illinois grad, the whole Bill Self thing has me too p*ssed off at Kansas), my photograhic algorithm is an easy one:

1). Buy expensive camera
2). Take many pics
3). Post best one



jim

BTW, my first attemp to semi-hijack a thread.

 

[Dr. Bob]

I have to say that I think your reposts in general don\'t look as good as the originals. On my computer the reposts look more washed out and a little grainier (not that the image is grainy, but the paint job itself looks a little rougher).

Maybe the scores are reflecting this?

(More evidence that it isn\'t the mini really, it\'s the presentation!)

 

[yrret]

At the risk of sounding sacreligious...

It\'s all about manipulating the masses too. Or what I think of as \"The Swingers\".

If the score is an average, and you care about the score, (and let\'s face it, we all do at least a little) than the key to getting the score you think you deserve, is based on receiving at least 50% weighted votes that are ABOVE what you think you deserve.

And to a certain amount, there are large numbers of people that don\'t vote just what they think the mini is worth, they try to \"make the voting right\"; they try to Swing the score, and vote higher or lower than the score they have in their head.

Now the question becomes how do you manipulate the Swingers, as they are the ones who are actually making the votes that count. the majority probably vote what you think you should be getting.

So here is my theory, and I have said it outloud, so I will probably be sniped ruthlessly.

If you vote your \"First Vote\" low enough that it sways the \"Make it Right\" consituency, you will stack the deck with higher scores. In addition, if you vote is low, but not ridiculous, it will eventually be tossed out at 50 votes, and your score will actually go up a bit again.

Rating your mini high with your first vote kills it with the Swingers.

But that is just one data analysts perspective.:|~

 

[GunjiNoKanrei]

Originally posted by yrret
Rating your mini high with your first vote kills it with the Swingers.

I agree, but this is only true if you are not one of the big names.

Lurch, I feel the same as Dr.Bob about your new picture. However I do think your miniatures are definitely underrated with a score of 5.x.

 

[kittykat23uk]

It could be that people gave you the benefit of the doubt with the smaller pics in that \"I\'m sure it deserves 7 but it looks like a 6. I can\'t tell enough so I\'ll give it 7 just to give the benefit of the doubt\". Bigger pic- \"ah I can now see that\'s a 6..\"

Or it could be that there have been a good batch of really great piccies recently. So these get scored more harshly. Any number of factors could be involved!

Regards

Kat

 

[paint me]

I agree with Dr. Bob. Your newer pics, since they are larger, reveal more flaws in your painting...hence the lower scores. Why is this confusing?
Take a look at a pro\'s pics....they are flawless even close up. That\'s why they\'re pros.
You\'ll see this trick on E-Bay all the time. Sellers who want to hide poor painting quality don\'t zoom in as close when they take their pics.
I\'m not saying your painting quality is poor, just that you can see more flaws when you zoom in closer. For instance, the blending doesn\'t appear as smooth, or the paint appears grainy and thick.

 

[vincegamer]

Just my personal opinion of the 2 flesheater pictures:
The new one has a bad background. Or at least an incompatible one. The color of the background calls attention to the blade, which is a similar color, and the blade appears rough compared to the armor. That roughness is emphasized by the texturing of the background.

Oh, and you can\'t see his head as well with the new angle.

 

[No Such Agency]

Rating your mini high with your first vote kills it with the Swingers.

My god. I frequent a website for swingers. With this, I have truly hit rock bottom.

 

[Trevor]

I\'ve deceided that the only logical explanation is that half the voters are smoking crack...

How else do you explain this crap http://www.coolminiornot.com/?id=36532 scoring the same as this not so crap http://www.coolminiornot.com/?id=38921

the first barely have any highlighting, whilst the second was painstakingly highlighted and based on a scratch sculpted base...

Actually its becoming very clear that there are many factors which influence your score other than the painting (pic, NMM, size, new sculpt, freehand etc etc), one that just occurred to me is the quality of the previous mini, if you see 4 after 4 and then suddenly get a decent mini you may over compensate and vice versa.

Voting will always get harsher over time, it can be demoralising, but if you want a real idea of how you are doing post a link in here and we can leave comments.

 

[Dr. Bob]

I actually think your squad ought to have a higher score than the single.

I didn\'t really like the foliage, but I loved the freehand flames.

It\'s all a matter of opinion of course! (And I\'m not on crack!)

 

[Braveheart712]

Contrast

To answer you original question Lurch, the reason your larger photos are not doing as well is simple...contrast. When you redid your photos, you lowered the contrast level either with brighter lighting or somewhat longer exposures. Whatever the case may have been, I believe a simple darkening of your shadows and three quarter tones will defintely help. If my opinion means anything, I can see from both sets of photos that your minis are painted excellently, but the smaller higher contrast photos are much more pleasing to the eye.

Of course that is just my opinion, I could be wrong...

 

[Trevor]

I would agree with the contrast comment. I think that there is a reason why most professionally done minis are photographed on a blue background, it looks good and helps with the photography. I think this could help you with getting the \"right\" contrast.

I didn\'t really like the foliage, but I loved the freehand flames.

And this is why comments are better than votes, you only get to know what \"works\" and what doesn\'t from comments.

All flames and no foliage for me from now on! lol

 

[Jkaen]

I agree with the grainy comments for lurch\'s minis and for Trevor not only do i agree with the flame thing but I think the highlights are too harsh on the chaos sorc