The submission of entries for the Sulit Christmas Card-Making Contest officially 12:00 midnight Nov 30. As of 2:33 pm today December 1, 2010, there are around 306 official entries but only 20 christmas cards will move on to the next round where Sulit members will get a chance to cast their votes and support their favorite entry or show their support for the member who submitted the entry. The member who garners the most number of votes shall win the People's Choice Award and brand new Iphone 3GS. I have just decided to view all the entries which is already sealed in a .pdf file making it unclickable :-) Since that would take a tremendous amount of time, I might as well come up with my Top 20 Fearless Forecast. This is just a forecast and does not reflect in any way the outcome of the internal deliberation.
I'm setting a few guidelines on how I will go about this time-consuming activity:
1. Check for relevance. As per admin, relevance to the theme is important, if an entry is not relevant to the theme which is "Pasko 2010: Pasko Ng Pamilyang Pilipino Sa Makabagong Panahon" it will not be scored anymore. On that note, I will just look for the entries who are most relevant to the theme in my opinion.
2. Check for originality. I'll be searching for entries that have original concepts or close to being an original concept lol.
3. Artwork. I'm far from being an authority when it comes to viewing artworks. This is 50% of the criteria for judging. Biggest chunk. I'll try to give this a good deal of importance.
4. Textual Content. I'm going to look for messages that are unique and I have never seen before and that are also appealing to someone who might read it. This constitutes 20% of the final score.
5. Presentation. Not really sure what this is. But I'm assuming that if an entry looks too busy that is not good presentation. If the concept is too vague or hard to grasp, that is not good presentation.
These are all criteria for judging by the way.
This is going to be one hell of a work hehe. To those who will not make it to my list, this is just my own Top 20 list so don't you worry. You still have a good chance of making it to the top 20 as taste is quite subjective.
I believe I can come up with an impartial list since I really don't owe anyone any favor but again this is just my personal top 20. Everyone is free to come up with their own set.
I'm going to open each entry to give it a quick glance, if I like it, I'll open another tab in another browser so I can take a second look later when I pick my top 20. This is my own way of doing an initial screening.This step is going to be based more on what I think looks great as a card with less emphasis on other factors so I can come up with more entries to choose from.
I'm not going to talk about my entry anymore in this blog since this blog site is already all about my entry. So my entry is Top 0. #0 in the list.
There's a reason a contest has a set of mechanics. So the entries that I thought had stick to the rules and interpreted the theme better than the others (in my own opinion only) got my thumbs up.
THE THEME AGAIN OF THE CONTEST IS PASKO 2010: PASKO NG PAMILYANG PILIPINO SA MAKABAGONG PANAHON.
Other important considerations as per contest mechanics:
• File formats allowed: .jpg, .bmp, .png., .gif
As much as I would like to include some entries in my list because they are so cute in other file versions (animation), in the spirit of fair play and playing accoding to the rules, I only took into consideration the card version which is in the allowed file formats :-)
Note that we are looking for an official Christmas card to be printed out and be sent to our members...
This one has been specially mentioned in the mechanics, so the first thing that comes to my mind is simplicity,elegance, elaborate but not messy meaning looks pleasant, representative of Sulit as a corporate entity.
Change of Plan.
Instead of keeping the ones that I like open in browser tab so I can copy the URL later, I decided to just download the images since it's quite tedious and eats precious CPU memory lol. And it is really getting a bit tiresome as well. Sorry if I would not be including the URLs of my chosen top 20. But if you want just say so, but link mine in your blog too please? hehe.
I noticed some trending concepts: the use of christmas tree and the sun insignia of the Philippine flag. I'd like to ask why, but I kinda already know the answer to that question :-)
I think a lot of Sulit members is quite nationalistic too lol,
The theme is quite really hard to interpet honeslty specially if you don't have the skills or artistic sense that's why I personally could come up with a single entry, I had a concept in mind but didn't have the materials to do so. That is why I say, kudos to those who have made more than one but with different concepts.
It came across my mind suddenly, that this would also serve a purpose to those who will not make it to my top 20 list: it will let them see some competition.
Special mention to this entry because it woke me up when I was about to fall asleep doing this:
I need to finish this work before the admin does otherwise, this is really pointless hehe. Thanks to ENTRY 234 it made me laugh because I thought I was quite slow in getting what the messages written across the card meant.
My biggest dilemma when I was still thinking of creating my card is that I really cannot draw so I have to work with images that I believe are already public domain and will not encroach on copyright infringement. (This might stir up a lengthy discussion or debate so I will stay away from this subject matter). With that in mind, I thought that even without using people or family photos or images in the card, one could still make an entry relevant to the theme with the help of text and proper choice of elements. So the real question is: Will the textual content or the choice of elements be really enough to make an entry relevant? If these are enough basis, then what are the odds of winning against entries that look relevant from composition to textual content since voting result also has a certain percentage that could really sway the final result of this competition.
That we will have to see after the winners have been announced lol.
This blog is slowly becoming a real blog.
I have just finished downloading the ones that had the most visual impact on me, and I did that with a lot of consideration regarding the contest mechanics. I actually saved around 69 images (that's what it says in the folder's properties) but I need to show only 20 otherwise this wouldn't be My Top 20 Sulit Christmas Cards.
It is so hard to decide on the Top 20 because there are just too many nice-looking cards. I chose entries that looks unique to me also aside from those who I felt were most relevant to the theme. I also tried to think what would I do if I were one of the judges, what would I want to print and send out to people. I chose the ones to me would have a general appeal. As textual content is 15% I did not select the ones that look good but did not bother to put textual content aside from again the theme and the required caption. And lastly, I decided to pick representative of several card concept categories that became apparent as I went from one entry to the next.
Again this is just my TOP 20 list. Feel free to make your own if you don't like what you see in here hehe. To each his own.
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UPDATE DECEMBER 7: NOW THAT THE TOP 20 CHRISTMAS CARDS HAVE BEEN CHOSEN INCLUDING MINE. I DIDN'T REALLY EXPECT THAT AT ALL. I'm going to give you a peak on the 69 entries that caught my attention when I was making my fearless forecast:
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IN NO PARTICULAR ORDER OF PREFERENCE. THESE ARE MY TOP 20 SULIT CHRISTMAS CARDS.
I chose this card among so many card entries with christmas trees and many cartoon images of people because it still feels like christmas and not fiesta or gearing up for a trip or vacation.
I chose this card because it's the one card that I saved which depicts charity or generosity.
This is one card that doesn't really wanna make me question the nationality of the family so much (although if the lines in lieu of eyes are made a little longer, they are all going to look like "singkit" na hehe) and it looks cute too.
I chose this card because it has some magic moments and real people with good photography. Among all entries with photography this stood out.
(click card to play)
This card looks more like an ad but nice concept and a nice work so good job.
Something about this card that made me think twice before taking it off my list. I think the hugging part made me keep it. You feel the warm hehe.
I like this card because it looks like a child painting, not so much the S on all the sides (which can be easily taken care of) but plus points for being hand drawn. There are other hand-drawn entries but I chose this one. Again matter of taste.
I like this card because it looks great and the animation is nice. Looks hand-drawn also. Looks like real old paper too.
(click card to play)
Another simple elegant card.
I'm not really into the cute clip art looking people but this entry is cute and I think on its category among so many others, this one stood out for me,
(click card to play)
I like this card because it looks like it's hand-drawn also. Reminds me of Simbang Gabi even if I don't see any actual church.
I like this card for it's visual impact it catches your attention. I allowed the trees so I'm allowing the Parol.
One of the nationalistic cards, but still subtle at that and looks global pinoy. Didn't do it for me at first because I didn't see the Christmas elements right away, but after I saw what I was looking for, I said ok.
Personally I don't like velvet but color is something that can be changed if needed and there's something with this card that will make you look again. Still looks pinoy even if it is cartoon.
I'm not so much into the nationalistic cards but the artwork of this card caught my attention too. I chose this because I don't see the Philippine flag or the nationalism is subtle. So I hope this would represent the population of the nationalistic Christmas cards :-)
I couldn't save the animated version of this card but it looks like a real christmas card to me. I like the placement of the square outlines,another breakaway from the clip arts.
I chose this card because it made me look twice also. Now I'm looking again. It tricks my eyes.
There's something about the use of text in this card that makes it stand out among all the others who did the same.
I like the use of colors also in this card, although I don't personally like the use of color black for a christmas card but this looks nice to me and the blacks did not become so prominent because of the colors.
Another Christmas tree entry that I will allow in my Top 20 because there are just so many christmas tree entries central to the card concept so this hopefully will represent their population.
That is my Top 20 Christmas Cards. Now which ones are yours? Feel free to make your own then let's make a bet!!! Haha. Sulit currencies at stake! 500 pts!
