1000 citiques in a week. Possible? CA will unveil a surprise IF....

[Jason Manley]

Why is it that there is more jabber on this forums than critiques helping other artists? Why is it that there is more stroking compliments, often times, than there is helpful critiques? If we can hit 1000 critiques a week in the helpful critiques forum for 4 weeks in a row then Conceptart.org will unveil the first part of a big surprise for you all. It is a very good gift to the community. It will change CA for the better forever. Your abilities to meet other artists and to learn here on the site will become much easier. Learning in this group situation will be very much improved.

Come on people...we can surely do this.

http://www.conceptart.org/forums/forumdisplay.php?f=59

If I had it my way, there would be at least a 1000 critiques a week in these areas...especially the helpful critiques forum. We have 180,000-250,000 unique visitors a month on conceptart.org and 20,000 members. Can we not do better than we are in terms of helping people with their art?




Jason

[dfacto]

You mean each of us can finally have that pet Davi we've always wanted??



(You've piqued my interest however. Bribery can go a long way. :dur: )

[Prehistoric]

amen to that, brother!

i'm on it. never did like blowing smoke up people's asses.

but mostly i crit in people's sketch books. that's gotta count too, no?

[Sinix]

Well, I'll try. This site does do a great job at helping people with their art already though. It keeps me focused, motivated, and inspired. Pretty much everything I know about art has been a result of this site.

Edit: Did the Sketchbook section just become the main art board? If so, that rocks.. it's been my favorite area probably since I joined. Always thought it should be more of a focus with all it does. Sort of the base of operations for all serious people.

[Odds]

i just did 5 critiques, hurry up guys :D

[Jason Manley]

the restructuring of the site came from the very first crit i recieved...a good one too...not about art...but about making a cleaner forums.


so there ya go...and yes..sketchbooks deserves its own board.


j

[Skulldog]

I personally make it a habit of stopping in here at least once a day and posting a crit, more if art catches my interest. If everyone did that, that be like...a whole shit load of crits here!

Since I can't stand surprises, I'll be crit'in up a storm, I /must/ know what this secret is..

[USER777]

i'm sure in on this.
*checking the helpful critiques forum*

:^^;:

[chukw]

You're on, Manley! "Course, when I saw your post I thought it said "1.000 Cintiques in a week...." When do I get mine? :wink:

[N D Hill]

Sounds like a plan.

[Odds]

this is great.. seems like people have been critiqueing like crazy since they've seen this announcement. anyways, how are you counting these crits, jason?
keep crittin' everyone!

[arghmisfit]

awesome, love the new forum design!!!

it would be great if the massive crit session went longer than a week.. we'll see i guess :yayca:

[Floris Didden]

Oh bribery, sounds good.

[SJ Bennighof]

Hey, are you counting crits on sketchbooks as well?

[cthomp]

how are you counting them?

[Poohgee]

C'est tres fantastique ... will I get my pet dinosaur for my birthday ? .. uhh surprises ... Im already feeling terrible for posting so little :nohope: .. I'm still swimming through all the sections of CA ... finding new things behind new cornes ...........

Ill propably be absolutly useless at being helpful .

:^^:

Go dino ! :yayca:

[endregan]

what about crits in other sections jason!!!

Hehe how are you going to track it :)

[jetpack42]

Hey, are you counting crits on sketchbooks as well?

that would take a year to count them. i'd assume only the critique section counts...

[gasmask]

i so agree jason, there is way to much ass kissing on here, everyone is to buddy buddy, and everytime i give critiques people treat me like a dick

[Victor B]

This sounds fantastic, I've given 2 so far will continue so if just 100 of us members post 10 good critiques a week we'll make it? Well just in case 100 don't post I'll try to keep giving C&C as much as i can from now on! :yayca:

[mcotie]

you mean there isn't 1,000 critiques a week?? a guy leaves for a few months and everything goes to hell in a hand basket. ha ha. I'll contribute.

Mitch

[klinesmoker]

Yeah, I've neglected the site a bit recently, but things have been happening. But tonight I posted like a bandit squirrel, nuts and all!!!!!! :yayca:

Whatever the hell THAT means. :^^;:

/is tired

[aesir]

Not to sound too negative, but to be honest, I dont really see the reason for a section only designed for people who want critiques. I mean, doesnt everyone want critiques when they post a finished work or even a work in progress? Personally, I think it'd be easier to consolidate some sections together, but thats just my opinion.

[Slash]

If only i had the skills to crit people.. well, ill give it a shot.



orange juice.

[thebluepuppy]

ill help as much as i can. :wink:

[Red_Rook]

mmmmmmmmbribes :)


FOR THE CA! :yayca:

[Hanuka]

thanks jason. I'm glad you guys care so much about this community.

[dogfood]

I don't want to ice down the steaming genetalia, but I don't think this will go without more art being posted on this part of the forum. There are only so many really good crits that can be written. I visit regularly (very) and after four or five good comments, no more really needs to be said (in most cases, unless someone pulls a Manky83).

I love this community and get a warm oogy feeling when someone replies that they valued my comment, but Scotty, we need more power! Hopefully folks will see this effort and start posting more.

And t-shirts; everyone would post more if they were sporting a spiffy "I helped crit a 1000 times a week and all I got was this shirt (and syphillis)" t-shirt.


Maybe we should crit the DSG, too...

[Odds]

i think we should crit everything... definitely including the finished section.

[Form]

guys please help!! They have me chained to the sweaty back of a fat, hairy demon goat and wont let me go until ive finished counting all 1000 critiques!! MAke it easy for me to find em and post more, k?? Thanks!!

-Form (and the goatse)

[Dan.v.D.]

c'mon form i know that´s how ya like it best

[dogfood]

If we can hit 1000 critiques a week in the helpful critiques forum for 4 weeks in a row.

If I had it my way, there would be at least a 1000 critiques a week in these areas...especially the helpful critiques forum.

I guess I'm confused. It seems like the focus is on the Helpful Critiques forum, but then you mention "these areas". I'm all for this and crit when I think I can help, so I'm not trying to have "the rules", just a little clarification so folks can wrap themselves around this.

[Dan.v.D.]

see... ppl just won´t be happy without the strictest instruction possible.
common sense is a lie!

[dogfood]

I don't claim to have an ounce of common sense, Dan (a rare commodity, despite the name), but as in my earlier post, there just isn't enough meat on the White Tailed Leaping Helpful Critiques Forum for a thousand jackals to feed upon and several posts indicate folks aren't sure where they should be focusing their efforts.

Now, if some admins were to divert some of the finished work that could use more help, I could see the effort grow some fat.

I'm going to keep going on as usual, posting where I think I can help.

[S.C. Watson]

My own personal opininion is that this should be system wide. Yes, the helpful critiques section absolutely needs attention, and those in there would and do definately benefit, but I think that this can be utilized far more broadly than just there.

The one issue that I run into frequently in the helpful critique section, and that Dogfood brought up, is that I am perfectly willing to critique a picture, but often when I check something, the critiques that I would have given are already there, so it doesn't really make sense for me to post unless I see something that hasn't been brought up, in which case I do. By spreading the critiques to other areas, I think this is far more effective.

Cheers,
~Shane

[Pontemonti]

I'd say crit wherever possible. I guess it's more about making sure that (almost) all posts get some sort of critique than reaching a certain number of posts. 1000 crits a week are useless if they are all posted in the same thread, saying the same thing.

About counting...
It's easy to query the database to see how many posts have been made in a certain forum over the last X days...and it shouldn't take too long to estimate the amount of posts which are crits.
I'm not saying that's how the posts will be counted, just saying that it's possible :)

[Jason Manley]

the main thing we want to do is bring up the quality of learning and the learning experience here on the site. the only way to do that is if we do it ourselves.

crits are site wide. I got one about the forums structure...all good input is appreciated by those recieving it ya know?


J

[S.C. Watson]

the main thing we want to do is bring up the quality of learning and the learning experience here on the site. the only way to do that is if we do it ourselves.

Right on. I'll see about setting aside a specific amount of time every day to work on this.

~S

[fukifino]

Meh...given the rash of oneline crits by a few posters, I'm not sure this was such a great idea.

Quality > Quantity imho.

But then again, outside of those few who don't seem to get it, I guess it's still given the other quality crit makers some more incentive to post stuff, so it's a win in the end.

[Jason Manley]

i agree with you in ways fuk. you have some great points...and thus another great crit. whee!

Please if you are posting crits to be aware that being aware, and thoughtful as well as experienced in your words, will be of more value than just spewing out a total number of crits. I too would rather see one hundred great crits than a thousand mediocre ones.


jason

[donkeyslayer]

i agree, it is better to know how to do three things well, then it is to know how to do 100 things half-assed.
however, if you can do 100 great things, then you're on to something :}

[Form]

its often hard for members like myself to judge exactly where they stand with critiquing. People like myself tend to know about a fair amount of things, but not at a professional level. For instance id know to point out to someone if they werent applying the basic rules of light like core shadow and bounce light. Id know to point out overall composition flaws/tangents. Id know to point out basic colour and saturation disagreements.

But theres a point where I sometimes feel like i see something wrong, but this guy is so professional im not sure whether to critique it or trust their judgement over my own.

I think encouraging people to post critique is important but its a fine line between people not posting because they doubt their own knowledge, and EVERYONE posting crits that they dont actually know anything about. I want to be able to go into a thread, see a pic by coro, jason, wes, hpx, carl dobsky, whoever, and be able to go "look, that just doesnt look right to me". Im kind of used to it because i know most of those guys now and im pretty comfortable doing that. However not everyone is... i think the only way to solve this is on an overall site philosophy level - keep going the way we are going. Keep an eye on the pattern of HOW people critique as well as how often... encourage 'noobs' to make OBSERVATIONS and encourage the artists to learn how to use their own judgement on whether to follow the crit, ignore it, or keep it in mind for later. This is something that will also train artists to work for AD's and for clients.

Stepping into a much more technical realm.

Could we use a forum mod, and make two little check boxes above 'submit reply' in the message window

[] Critique [] Comment

If they select critique the post is modified (either through adding 'critique' automatically to the message 'title', or through a semitransparent background colour behind the text - i prefer the first)

This will help artists when reading their thread. If its a 'critique' post they will know it isnt just 'oh wow, thats cool can i have your babies', and if theyr in the mood for praise or banter the other posts are where its at.

From a professionals standpoint this would really help to sift through the multitude of inevitable compliments, and for non-pros it would just ease the flow of information (its a communication thing - creating subconscious systems).

Anyway thats my.... *counts* ..... 427 cents.

I could have written half an essay in that time!! :yayca:

[DragonGX]

People are too nice on this forum... I can crit just about anything posted by a non-professional, yet when I do, people get mad for tearing them down.. Too many people on here don't want to give crits and just want to ohh and ahh e verything posted, even if it has flaws... One guy even had the audacity to tell me that I'm not "qualified" to give out critiques, since I'm not a professional artist working at a studio.. Apparently only pros can see problems with composition, anatomy, color and plain bad design.. :rolleyes: Thats why I rarely crit anything anymore... I'm sick of the people Ohhing and Ahhing jumping on me for pointing out things that need improvement. I agree sometimes my crits come off a little rash, but honestly, thats 100x better than just saying "awesome job dude!".. :blahblah:

[Form]

i think that was the point of the thread mate :D

However its important to also consider that crits mean different things to different people.

Ill use myself as the example in saying - up until just recently i considered myself a complete noob...not to say im even close to pro now, but i can do something and get compliments from people - thats kinda where i stand. Up until now, when ive posted something, compliments have meant more to me than critiques. Because i was learning so much already that a mass of crits wasnt really going to help me - i couldnt take it all in. WHat i needed was compliments to say good job, keep it up, lets see more stuff. Whenever i go things like that i worked and learned more.

On the flipside, professionals need like 100% criticism. They dont need motivation. Art is just what they do... they want crits and crits and more crits so they can refine and refine and refine.

SO when your critiquing someone, think about where theyr at - think about how much information you need to dump on them and how much encouragement you think should be offered. Find the balance for each individual - that is the path to succesful critiquing!! >:D

[Floris Didden]

Form, so basicly, we ask people to use good judgement :).

[Form]

when you put it that way, my argument seems fataly flawed haha!

remember the world was flat once though! STRANGER THINGS HAVE HAPPENED :^^: /m\

[SJ Bennighof]

I don't want to ice down the steaming genetalia

Dammit, food, you have a way with words. Not gonna draw that one, though. :hatsoff:


SO when your critiquing someone, think about where theyr at - think about how much information you need to dump on them and how much encouragement you think should be offered. Find the balance for each individual - that is the path to succesful critiquing!!

Now, you see, in my case, and given the fact that I'm not on the same level as most everyone else on this site, I made sure to include a bit in the first post of my sketchbook to say that I didn't mind the harshest, most direct crit, so long as it was specific. I mean, I know that the best way for me to improve is to know exactly in what areas I suck as of yet. For one thing, I was literally not aware that my facial anatomy skillz were lacking as much as they were. Guy pimps saveloomis.org in my sketchbook. I found the one on the head and hands. It's like just-add-water art skillz. Some people might consider a simpel "you need to improve on everything, and antomy, here is a link to an anatomy book" to be a slap in the face, but I consider it to be a life preserver chucked out to me in the lake of "I think I'm pretty good. Time to develop a style." So it varies from case to case, and I think it'd be helpful if people made some kind of indication as to how harsh a crit they were willing to listen to in whatever they were posting. I want mine straight up, while others might like theirs on the rocks. So let us know, crittees.

[Pontemonti]

How about a small drop-down box when you're posting in the post-your-art-here forums (especially the helpful critiques forum)...you can choose between a few different modes saying what type of crits you want:
1. Tell me that I suck!
2. I will start crying if you aren't nice to me!
3. Any crit is good with me.
etc...

That way you can indicate what type of crits you want without having to write about it every time.

The idea of splitting separating comments and crits sound pretty neat too. How about some rating function for every separate crit? That way it will be easy to see who posts lots of useless crits, who posts lots of good crits, etc., and we can then easily give the best "critters" a special icon or something like that.

[Dan.v.D.]

ponte: they got something like that over at deviantart and imo it´s as gay as it gets.

"I will start crying if you aren't nice to me!"

that´s the longest option with 10 mostly pretty short and simple words.
anybody should be able to type em in a description if that´s what one is about.
and i must generally say that i´m not to keen of that mentality to take over ca.
i´d be gone imediately.

[DragonGX]

A big part of the reason the forum is here is for people to have somewhere to go for crits.. I can see what you're saying about needing compliments, but sometimes it's a little too much.. For example, the thread I was talking about was full of "nice work!" and "thats awesome!" etc, but as soon as I gave a crit, people were all over me for ripping into his art.. One guy was even defending the OBVIOUS anatomy problems that I was pointing out and told me I didn't know what I was talking about because I'm not a pro.. You don't have to be a pro to be able to see that an arm or a leg is drawn in an unnatural way, or foreshortened incorrectly.. I'm just saying, people on here need to learn to take constructive criticism and not get bent out of shape when someone points out problems. if someone doesnt want crits, then maybe they should have to say so beforehand.. i dont know.. there really isnt a way to control what people say..

Besides, if any artist plans on becoming better, they need to learn to take criticism as a constructive way to learn what they should work on... You don't see art teachers only complimenting brand new artists to boost thier confidence and hoping that they will improve on thier own... they crit thier work to hopefully get them to think about it and work on thier problems.. If someone can't take a constructive crit, they shouldn't be here... maybe they should go show their artwork to thier parents instead.. ;)



i think that was the point of the thread mate :D

However its important to also consider that crits mean different things to different people.

Ill use myself as the example in saying - up until just recently i considered myself a complete noob...not to say im even close to pro now, but i can do something and get compliments from people - thats kinda where i stand. Up until now, when ive posted something, compliments have meant more to me than critiques. Because i was learning so much already that a mass of crits wasnt really going to help me - i couldnt take it all in. WHat i needed was compliments to say good job, keep it up, lets see more stuff. Whenever i go things like that i worked and learned more.

On the flipside, professionals need like 100% criticism. They dont need motivation. Art is just what they do... they want crits and crits and more crits so they can refine and refine and refine.

SO when your critiquing someone, think about where theyr at - think about how much information you need to dump on them and how much encouragement you think should be offered. Find the balance for each individual - that is the path to succesful critiquing!! >:D

[Pontemonti]

ponte: they got something like that over at deviantart and imo it´s as gay as it gets.

"I will start crying if you aren't nice to me!"

that´s the longest option with 10 mostly pretty short and simple words.
anybody should be able to type em in a description if that´s what one is about.
and i must generally say that i´m not to keen of that mentality to take over ca.
i´d be gone imediately.
yeah, you're right. I'm probably a bit like those deviantart guys - I don't always think if the feature would actually do good or bad :S
I can see how it's useful - so we can easily see what type of crits the user wants, maybe even have it displayed when listing threads. BUT...it will probably do more bad than good. If this place is about improving as an artist, I guess it should be "hard" to post something and just ask for nice comments.

[SJ Bennighof]

Hm... Well, I'll keep saying that I want to be kicked around so I'll get better, but I do see your point about people saying that they want nice crits. To tell you the truth, I can't see why anyone would want nice crits. I said I wanted harsh ones, and people still preceded their crits with "You're off to a good start", which are words I like to hear, and since a good crit followed those words, it makes it that much better. Given a choice between the harsh crit and the nice comment, I'd take the harsh crit, so I say that, and if people want to tag a compliment onto the harshness, that's cool with me, and it means that much more.

But yeah, I don't want people saying that they want nice crits either.

[dogfood]

The turds with frosting are better than the plain ones.

[nil]

...How about some rating function for every separate crit? That way it will be easy to see who posts lots of useless crits, who posts lots of good crits, etc., and we can then easily give the best "critters" a special icon or something like that.

i suggested that a while ago and it met with a resounding "no" :)

[Form]

Come on mate, read what i wrote please??

anyway ponte - the idea for rating crits is really bad for forum flow. Its the same as the star rating everyone is worked up over. It just leads to misleading assumptions. I mean imagine if a top pro joined the site and have ten posts, and posted up a critique, and it was totally disregarded cos he had no crit 'rank'.

I think it serves the site best to keep it very simple. Thats how CA has always run in its best moments. Nice and simple and efficient. People dont want a long list of options to choose from or anything that makes the postin gprocess overtly long. My idea about the tick boxes above 'submit' is about as far as id go - because it allows people to bypass it, or use it in a very speedy and uninterrupting fashion.

People can take a lot of information in unguided. I think people will quite quickly begin to see who the regular and reliable critiquers are without the need for a rating system.

Theres some more thoughts.

Not to rain on the parade but im thinking we try to wrap this up with some admin-made decisions soonish, cos threads like this tend to go on forever with too many good ideas and suggestions!!

Adam

[SJ Bennighof]

I would still move for one forum for posting non-sketchbook artwork, one consolidated forum.

[Pontemonti]

anyway ponte - the idea for rating crits is really bad for forum flow. Its the same as the star rating everyone is worked up over. It just leads to misleading assumptions. I mean imagine if a top pro joined the site and have ten posts, and posted up a critique, and it was totally disregarded cos he had no crit 'rank'.
That wasn't really my point. The idea of crit ratings would be to
a) make it easy to find good crits (including being able to search for posts with only the highest rating)
b) give some recognition to those who post good crits. sure, they will be known to the regulars but it wouldn't hurt if the noobs could immediately recognize them..

I don't believe crits will be disregarded if they don't have a rating. If they only have 1 star/whatever, though...then people may ignore them, and probably for a good reason.

I agree that we should keep the site simple, but a crit rating system won't make it much more complicated. Some small, clickable stars in the header section of the post is all that it would take.

With that said, I don't think it's too much of a deal and there are many other things which are much more important IMHO :)

[chukw]

One of the most important skills we need as professional artists is the ability to take and apply crit. We've all seen those who can't :nohope: and we never see the work of those who are afraid of it. :[ I tell people to get all the crit they can, but its up to them to sort out the good and ignore the bad. It's a skill and mental/emotional strength you need to develop on your own. A rating system just seems like an overly complicated hand-holding system to me. Keep it simple, keep it direct.

I see a lot of opinions expreesed about work posted. That ain't crit, it's just your two cents. It doesn't really help the situation- kind of like all the gushing praise that blunts the effectiveness of any forum. I, for one, would flush that fucking bowing smiley icon immediately. I wince every time I see it, no matter how good the work posted is. Guh.

[Form]

haha so true man!! i agree with chuckw's points!!!

:bow:



:dad:

[endregan]

Ive noticed the energy the last little while has been really positive...

Lets keep it like this forever!!!!!
Maybe just cuz its nearing spring and the snow is starting to dethaw here in good ol Canda and because I just had some cookies, but I have noticed a lot more involvement from all sides. Pros helping out the little guy, vice versa and the community coming together for their common goal: art!!

Crit week foreverrrr!

[Sok N. Wett]

Is it 1000 yet?
Is it 1000 yet?
Is it 1000 yet?

[OLSEN]

It's more like 50-200 in the helpfull crit section I think... 50 if i guess low, 200 if i'm unrealistic.

But that's still a lot more crits then there used to be, so it's still good stuff. :)

[SJ Bennighof]

Oh dude, it has got to be more than that.

[dadamafia]

i want scholarship money for my crits.

[Pontemonti]

I want a dollar for every time I visit the site :sadcheerleader:

[Jason Manley]

lol

ponte you would be rich if that were the case. we definitely couldnt afford you.

:)

keep up the good crits...


j

[darth massacre]

ITs been a week...or so....did we exceed the target?

[jmascho]

I think theres like...200? :\

[endregan]

what you talkin bout jmascho

i prob gave out a good 5-10 crits this week spread out across the forums!

if 200 or less people did the same then we have our limit~!!

How do we track it ?

P.S. I hope the reward is CANDY!!!!

Just kidding
but seriously.

[USER777]

yeah, i tried to crit the hell outta some people here. so, I WANNA KNOW NOW!!!


DONT LET US WAIT!!!
:bashful:

[tensai]

i really really love it when i read a good crit like this one here by Chris Beatrice
http://www.conceptart.org/forums/showthread.php?t=40685

and it got me thinking - maybe instead of rating crits as was suggested before - you could just do a crit-of-the-week sticky. ask one mod to take care of it for a month and roulate the task.

that way people can read the actual crit aswell as have an incentive to do a quality crit themselves - without having the normal ratings thing going again (and people doing crits of crits).

just a thought..

tensai

[dogfood]

Perhaps save the best crits, especially Chris's linked above, in a subforum below tips and tricks or helpful critiques... It would kind of be like the best of CA for crits.

[chukw]

Now you're talkin'! One good crit can be applied to so many works- that a helpful suggestion and a damn good crit of the system!

[tensai]

exactly what i mean - do it with a sticky or a subforum, whatever!
point being so many peeps could learn from a good crit, or apply a good crit to their own work.

theres quite a lot of them out there but their scattered all over the place..


tensai :perv: