Mr. Shiny & New wrote:Why is there a rule that limits it to three pics? My creation is complex enough that I can't capture all of its details in just three photos; can this rule be relaxed a little? If I had, say, 6 photos, I could probably caputre the detail properly. This is for the hideout MOC, so it's fairly large, not like a cart or a minifig, which is physically much smaller and thus easier to photograph from one angle.
Or, can we do composite photos? That is, have one main photo and have other photos inside it, showing some detail from a different angle. Or maybe two photos, each 400x600 combined together into one. That sort of thing.
Also, while I'm on the subject, why is there a limit of 800x600 for the photos? I can work around that; I'll just photograph stuff normally then shrink the photos, but it seems like a needless loss of image quality.
Both of these rules are for a very simple reason: We don't have infinite time. Every Admin will 'grade' every creation submitted. Last year, we had over 200 submissions, and needless to say, grading took a while. If every submission had 6 photos instead of 3, this would increase the time it takes to grade by almost double.
My suggestion is to be creative with how you take pictures. Composite photos are only going to allowed when they show some sort of action before and after.
It should be noted that you may take more pictures and post them in another Bshelf folder (that is, have a seperate folder for your contest entry) - and share those with your friends while the contest is progressing. But when it comes time to evaluate the contest entries, the Admins will only look at the 3 photos.
For several of our Admins, their only access to the internet is via dail-up - photos larger than 600x800 take an excessive amount of time to load, plus they are often larger than our cpu Monitors. It may be higher photo quality, but it is a rare MOC that really needs that much extra detail.
On a personal note, photos much larger then 600 high on Brickshelf really annoy me - they take forever to load, and I have difficulty looking at the MOC because it is too big on my screen.
Another key part of this is that we want this to be a contest for MOC building, not a photography contest, not a who has the most expensive camera contest. This contest is designed to be open and winnable by anyone who enters - you dont need massive amounts of brick or a fancy camera to win.
So, to sum up - the rules are gonna remain in place: photos should be 600x800 at the largest (or, obviously, 800x600), and no more than three per entry. Please have each entry in a seperate folder.
-Lenny