Category Archives: Challenge Favorites

As you know I'm in a bit of a computer bind this week due to the stolen laptop, so I once again have to make this, unfortunately, more brief than my usual contest finalist write-up.

So I'm going to put all of our excellent Finalist into a grid below. You can click on each one to get the illustrator's name and see the image at full size.

Thanks to everyone who entered and congratulations to our Finalists! As to the overall winner, I'll add that after the gallery ...

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As you can see I am unfortunately pressed for time today, with the traveling and the day job. But I have gone through the wonderful entries for Character Contest 83 and have put our Finalists after the jump. I don't have my usual commentary, but you can hover over each image to see who drew it, and click on it to see it at full size.

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Thanks to everyone who entered the very difficult Character Design Contest 82: Pride! Without further ado, here are your Finalists, the submissions I thought had something particularly special about them.

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Many thanks to everyone who entered Character Design Contest 81: Greed! Without further ado, I give you your Finalists:

I thought Albannach's "Futility of Greed" told its story very well.

AMS' "Midas" is a great character study.

I liked the way Blue Blazer created a non-standard sort of man in this one, along with the effective storytelling.

Diazmydiaz's "Burn the World" also features a distinctive looking character, though I think the burning of the world is going to be a "chestnuts roasting on an open fire" sort of moment for him.

FRM's "Tax Collector" is included mostly for the nice butt -- I'm not sure how that was done but it looks like it was drawn that way.

Gendonesia's "Grave Hunter" features a great composition and highly effective lighting to set the mood. All the little touches (like the spattering on the ground) work really well here.

I liked headlessgeneral's character design as well as the great use of the "Greed" design element in the background.

Kytana's dragon in "Greed" is just stunning. The hoard of gold is spot-on and the design of the creature itself is perfect.

Mashlagoo does a stellar job with this classic D&D monster, the Mimic.

What clenched Razor99's entry for me is spinning disk in the eyes and the similar leering grins on both figures. I think it sells "Greed" very well.

I think it's hard to use HeroMachine to put together a good political cartoon, but Skybandit manages it quite well here.

Watson Bradshaw also brought a nice political cartoon with his "one percent". I like the use of the cranes in the top background particularly.

WolfMoon's "Hail Money" is a great poster, with outstanding composition. I love this image.

A few others I thought had great illustrations (i.e. Tarkabarka) but I didn't get "Greed" from looking at them.

Out of the list of Finalists, there can be only one overall winner, though many were certainly worthy. I ultimately decided to go with ... Kytana's dragon! Every time I look at it I see some new little feature that adds to the overall effect without being intrusive. I definitely can see "greed" when I look at it, and taken just as an illustration it's great.

Awesome job, and congratulations both to our winner Kytana and all of our Finalists! I believe dblade is again doing his very generous "Finalist Supplemental Prize" (or some other, cooler name), so definitely check the comments for that update.

Wow, you all outdid yourselves in our first non-UGO event, Character Contest 80: Wrath! We have a ton of great Finalists to present, so without further ado, here are the ones I thought stood out the most for one reason or another.

No, wait, a few more ados. First, I very much appreciate everyone who takes the time to name their entries properly and to post the direct links. It makes things so much easier.

Second, I believe that dblade is generously starting a new award where he'll randomly select one non-winning Finalist for whom he will do a custom HeroMachine 3 item, which is pretty awesome. Thank you, sir!

Third, I am now in Austin and I start my new job today. I'll be doing my best to keep blog content and administration flowing at its usual pace, but please bear with me during the next week or two as I continue this major life transition.

And NOW with no further ado, your Finalists!

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Since this is the holiday season, I'm not going to pick an overall winner for this week's contest. Instead, all of the following Finalists should consider themselves winners, albeit without an actual prize. Thanks for all your creativity this year, everyone, and Happy Holidays!

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