yeah, in this case it's quis exagitet ipsos exagitans? :lol:

Actually, I have just been thinking about this, and there are several systems where you can rate people's reviews. You know on Amazon, the reader reviews? You can give a "Was this review helpful" yes or no vote. And I've seen it on film sites. And I've seen a few forums with an option to give a "Thanks" vote to people's posts. So it's not as complicated as it might look at first glance, and I could see some definite possibilities for it.

However... I can only currently see those possiblities as working as part of a larger "sub-community" type scheme. Which is not what we seem to be working towards here.

I'll keep mulling it over though.

Well, while you have a good mull, i'm having an early night. BTW here's hoping you wern't affected too much by the floods over your way.

Night all.

Jack

Not too bad Jack, although this was the view on Monday from where I work:
http://www.bbc.co.uk/southyorkshire/content/images/2007/06/26/keith_johnson_470x365.jpg

Things are getting back to normal in Sheffield now, the M1's open again thank goodness.
Still several villages around uninhabitable though, I have no idea when those poor souls will be able to go home :sad:

ipsos custodes ?

Damned Latins!  Why couldn't they just speak ENGLISH like other civilized peoples?!

:lol:

Damned weather!  Why can't it be nice everywhere?

I used to just take life as it went--now I'm critical of everything! :lol: Or complaining of everything.  or something.LOLOLOL

You wanna talk weather, Joel?  It's 117F outside right now which is why I'm inside ... LOL!

Not surprised.  The weather sucks EVERYWHERE this year.  Smog alert here, with 100 percent hudity and temps around 92 degress F.

At 117F, my inside temp would be enough to melt my apartment.  @__@;;  

Damned global warming!  I'm about to suffocate here from smog.  I'm ready to move off-world to a new place of adventure and opportunity!

I'm gonna go lay down now.

Looking at Karen's flood picture...
So that's where all the water went??? No wonder down here in California we're on water conservation alert due to not enough rainfall.
Trade you some sunshine for some water ;)

Joel, you seem to have it all, water and warmth ;) :P

Victoria... OMG! I spent a summer in Scottsdale few years ago. 
I swear, walking across the street at noon one day I felt like my nose hairs got scorched!
Loved the thunderstorms and the lightning show :)

Humidity is only water if it falls to the freaking ground!  It's so dry here, the ground has huge cracks in it and everything is dieing off.  I wish it would rain a LOT.  We're a couple of feet below our average rainfall this year.

ANYWAY!  @ Conniekat8--thanks for that thread you did up on my benefit on the problem of doing specular highlights to simulate sweat on the face.  It helped me loads and I passed that info along to GreyWolf Starkiller to use in his up-coming pic!  Your info helped more than me.  Thought you might get a case of warm fuzzies from that. ^__^ V,, It helped!

Awww, thank you! :)
LOL, I don't even know what I did... was it the thread about ambient light or something with textures and specularity??
And of all the theads I've been sticking my nose in, I thought I'd leave yours alone... I've been feeling like there was too much of me everywhere LOL
Awh, it's hard work being as self conscious and scatterbrained as me :blink:
I better go look at your thread!
Hugz :)

Textures and specularity!  That's the one, by gum!  I just wanted you to know that your hard work and efforts to dig out useful info to get me to be a better artist had more effect than you might have thought, AND it's really appreciated by this 3d artist!

Sort of a practical demonstration of how both images in a gallery AND a forum can help not only the artist asking the question, but others as well! Wheeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee!

I'm an EXAMPLE!! :lol:

My life is complete! :laugh:

Awwww, THANK YOU!
I thought I was just being a nosey preachy know-it-all.

JEEEEEZ!  It takes a lot to convince ya, that ya done good!! :lol: You are quite welcome!

Add me please!

Id like to be added!

Woot!!! This girlie is BACK!!!!

LOL I know y'all missed me :P

Look forward to seeing everything! :D

hugs

I want to leave the group. Karen, please remove me. Thanks to all who commented on my previous images, several times you really helped me to evolve. From now on I will disable comments in my images. If anyone really wants to contact me or comment anything, you can use the sitemail.

Thanks!

Please remove me as well. I have enjoyed the group a lot, but some things have changed here, so I don't find the time for comments. I still think the critique group is a good idea, and I still would like to be a part of it, but since family and job have priority, I have to leave. I did not manage to comment anything in the last weeks, so that staying only would have brought me a bad feeling.

Sorry. If times change I will be back.

How's the evolution of the critique group project going?   I ask because Im debating whether or not to leave myself but I have been waiting to see if something was going to change any time soon.

Update would be super = D

I'll second jjroland's words. Certainly isnt working well as it is now.

Well we didn't really get as many voices giving their opinions as I'd hoped we might :-S

Tell ya what... I am gonna post an image in my gallery telling people to get theirselves over to this thread to let us know what they think. I reckon a lot of people aren't checking this thread now. So this might catch some more.

I'll give it until the end of this week and then we'll make a decision based on the majority preferences and what's technically possible right now.

I'm open to what ever!  I have improved big time from the useful and insightful folks around here!  The Critique Group has given me aid in ways I can scarsely imagine before I signed up.

What ever happens, I would like to say THANK YOU!  Thank you to all who left interested and useful comments on my Pictures.  ALso thank you to folks like Rutra, Acadia and Conniekat8 who gave some of the best and most insightful comments.  These three stand out in my mind because one sent me PMs on how to improve and the two others started threads that drew out other people's insights to aid my artistic endeveavors.

The whole idea is to comment where you can, help where you're able and take in what you can use to improve.

I just wanted to say Thanks to folks that helped.  Just because I didn't mention you by name--doesn't mean that I do not appreciate the comments.  My memory is just so lousy, I could only remember three out of the many. LOLOLOL :lol:

I know you said you cant e-mail everyone, but what about posting a short questioner? I know you can do them, I've seen some on the site. Put it up as a stickie and there is a chance most people will see it.

We can't use questionnaires/polls within the forum though. :sneaky:

Also for all its faults, free posting will allow everyone to say why they feel the way they do, or make other suggestions.

Or just post "I dun care" or "No. 6"... whatever.

Please Karen, remove me as well. All that stuff helped me a lot, but i'm going through a lot of projects that tend to keep me besides the critique group (i'm building my web site, and other stuff...). If you agree, i keep the option to come back in the group later :)

Many thanks to all people who helped me to enhance my (little) skills. I'm so sorry having been out of my comments these days. If some people want to remove me from their list because all they were begging after me was some comments, well... lets go. If some other people want to keep me, well... lets go too :P

Thanks a lot again all  :D

My .02 cents worth...

I never really got alot of critiques beyond the 'good job' kind which I ALWAYS like to hear : ) and I have to admit that I'm just as guilty of that as well.

However there are a few shinning contributers, the one that comes immediately to mind is **JOELGLAINE! ** He almost always had a constructive critique for me, along with usually a 'good job!" : )

For awile now, I've been watching the traffic flow on posts around my posts and I watch as visitors simply bypass my work (or my name - whichever). I've come to realize that this is a clickish place and that's perfectly fine, that's just the way it is, but it's made me decide to chill on the posting for awhile and enjoy summer away from the computer. : )  How about that for a novel idea?

So I'd like to request removing me from the group for now...but thank you for all the great comments you've given me!!!

ACK!  Me and my big mouth! LOLOL

One thing to clarify things!

**I'M NOT LEAVING.
**I'm gonna keep shooting my mouth off on everyone's stuff who wants it from the group!  I think this is an important thing to have on ANY site, and god know WE NEED IT HERE!  Giving good critiques is as important as recieving it.  ANY time I see something, ANYTHING broken--I have to fix it, or at least tell the person responsibility what's wrong.

Call it an ethical descision.

Look at the state of the world today.  It's broken.  Individually we can't fix it, but if we pull together, we just might save the world.  What I do here is just a reflection of what I do all the time in the real world.

If I can help make one artist a BETTER artist, I'm helping make the world a better place for us all.  Maybe it's sounding like I'm calling for a holy crusade or jihad on bad art or something.  Not at all.

We all want a better world to live in. Picking up your own litter is a choice.  Helping make comments to artists who want it is another choice.  I'm just selfish in a useful way. ^__^ V,,

i like the idea of a forum over a gallery, finished artwork could be be put into a gallery for show and the wip would just stay in the forum until commented on and finished.  

and hi everyone btw, my first post here i think, thank you to those that have commented so far on my gallery, although i dont always change a picture after a comment or suggestion, i take the opinions on board for next time. 

ps... your piccie got me in here karen!

As a lot of you know, RL has been hectic around here but I have been posting both here and in the Art Theory forum on an image I'm working on right now.  The images are definitely WIP so I've disabled ratings but not comments.  I've gotten a lot of great input and the image is definitely evolving past the original post.  Here they are, in order of appearance:

http://www.renderosity.com/mod/gallery/index.php?image_id=1471185&member
http://www.renderosity.com/mod/gallery/index.php?image_id=1473775&member
http://www.renderosity.com/mod/gallery/index.php?image_id=1475372&member

I'd love for everyone to take a look and let me know what you think of the evolution so far.  Right now it's rendering in the background after a lot of work on the water so I'll post the next version when the render is done.

As for the Critique Group ... I think this is the way to go ... post an image and post a link over in Art Theory in a separate thread.  When you post the image make sure you crosslink to the Art Theory forum thread so we can jump between the two.  Does that make sense?

Well, it's not really my place in section poser, but I want to say something...

The jealousy is the big war in this site, i know for to be victim of this strange way... But only one way is for all the people here : to be ART and be correct with all the people....

I don't see never the homepage of a lot artist because it's not important to know if it's a man or woman or little or bigger, or younger or older person... The more important for my eyes it's the ART and the passion how do make some people their work or picture...

i know, some people decided to make trouble with some comment or some politic very strange with the ranting or something like, but sincerely, it's with these personnes you go loose your time and head??? no, please... The ignorency is the bigger arm for all the humain...

This web have something like 400 000 members registred and like the true life, we cannot to be good or to be friend with all people, and it's normaly.. I think... But when the people entered in this web it's for only one thing : The ART.. Don't forget...

be good with all please.... and peace

(sorry for my english, I learn all the day, thanks to all my friends here :) You see, something positiv !!! LOL )

I agree with JOELGLAINE in every word.

I also would like to stay. (Yes, I know I have been away for awhile. Like most of you, time most of the time is not enought. Bots keep pilling up in my e-mail box).

umm...i forgot what the votin options were :D but i vote for havin a critque welcomed genre in the galleries

Hi to all,
I think with the critique group it´s not so easy to handel as we thought in the beginning.
For myself, I only can write a usefull critique to a category of art which I can do by myself and where I have a better knowledge of higher level as the other artist seems to have. 
So by sample I never could write a real critique for Rutra as he does something totaly different to my works. But I can say if I like his images or if I think if the second version seems better as the first now.
Through the critique group I have meet a lot of artists with other focuses as I have and I´m really glad to know their works now I don´t want to miss their images. But I can´t write a meaningful bash to them.
"Rubens can´t write a good critique to Dali, and a stage designer isn´t a warfare photographer."

For me, I have just had a few real good reviewer from whom I really have learned. But I also had some reviewers who wrote something about their personal taste only, and that really doesn´t help.

From my point of view it would really better to create a special gallery for images for technical critiques. In this gallery we can post our works for which we are need some help and suggestions.

Quote - Oh my, MissNancy, then we'd need a critique group to critique the critiquers... ;o)

Talk about quis custodiet ipsos custodien... (or however that goes, Latin ain't my strong point)

Bet you know what my sig line means, though. :D

BTW, I like the idea of another forum.  It means nobody is swamped with 79 million ebots and people can look in as they please.

I would liek the group to continue. I have had some really helpful suggestions and it is nice to see people that are not afraid to make suggestions and also receive suggestions :)

I would like to see the critique group continue, Even though I have not been posting or commenting much, I do try to at least view everyones work as it comes down the pipe.   I am still in limbo with what is happening with me medically, All I have found out is that my brain isnt going to explode (major plus) and that I have Dain Bramage (knew that before going to the doctor).  I plan on sticking around and posting as I can but, don't be surprised if I am quiet at times.

Well,

I would like to see our own forum, and if possible, our own gallery.   It wouldn't be difficult would it Karen?  Given that it would be just another category of images.  The same number of images would come in regardless, so its not an additional strain on the site.  In fact, wouldn't it actually relieve some of the load on the site because you'd have people getting in que to go to a fairly particular part of the site rather than the whole Poser gallery? 

Just my thoughts, as small and insignificant as they are.

Quote - I would like to see the critique group continue, Even though I have not been posting or commenting much, I do try to at least view everyones work as it comes down the pipe.   I am still in limbo with what is happening with me medically, All I have found out is that my brain isnt going to explode (major plus) and that I have Dain Bramage (knew that before going to the doctor).  I plan on sticking around and posting as I can but, don't be surprised if I am quiet at times.

I had a stroke in November, and had suffered minor brain damage from becoming Diabetic. I was dehydrated and my brain swelled up.

Life goes on.  All the hideous and awful things that have happened to me made me tough enough to withstand a couple of little internet voices that said when I first posted Poser art over at Deviant Art, "Joor art is teh suxxors!"
They were right, though they couldn't critique to save their asses!  If you can FUNCTION in this world, in this medium--you are blessed and are luckier than maybe 90% of the whole freaking planet.  To have a computer, electricity that doesn't stop every couple of hours, lines to carry those communications, and to have the tools and materials to MAKE your images come into BEING!!!!!!!!!!!

Oh, COME ON FOLKS!!  This isn't rocket science.  We're in cushy city, here!

I thought I was lucky until I started to get useful comments that allowed me to evolve and grow as an artist. Wowee.  This stuff rocks! Word!

You hang in there Syd!  Ya don't have to be brain-damaged to like it here, but it might help! ( :lol:)

I think a Forum and specialized forum might be a good approach.  I got use from BOTH.  Maybe one alone is like one hand, or leg or eye.  One can get you by, but with two, you can really accomplish miracles more easily.

I think both a forum & a gallery is a good idea - a forum for the WIP & feedback & then gallery to upload.

Hi all, I just wanted to say that I am still involved in the critique group, but my participation is very limited due to interference from that pesky real life. I've been very pleased with the feedback I've received on my own images, but as I've viewed others I've noticed that critical comments have kind of faded away. When I was participating more actively I was examining images very closely, looking for areas that could be improved. It was a time-consuming, but enjoyable process. Recently I've seen very few comments of that sort. Has it just been too much trouble to critique images or has there been a negative reaction to criticism? A couple of random observations: -I find it difficult to critique images that already have several pages of comments. You have to read through the previous comments to see if your point has already been made and often that just takes too much time. -There are artists who work in genres that just don't connect with me. Their work may be technically fine, but it just doesn't appeal to me. So I've turned off notification to help keep my ebot population under control. -I've been working with my new camera, trying to get it under control. I posted a few images to the Photography gallery and found it is a lonely world over there. In the Poser gallery you expect to get 200-300 views in the first 24 hours (and another 100 if you've flagged nudity ;-)), but in Photography, a typical image seems to get 20-40 views ever. My only wish, which I've voiced before, is that revising an image based on the feedback it receives could trigger an ebot. I think this would make the criticism process more of a dialogue, without cluttering your personal gallery with multiple versions of the same image. -Alan

I truly think a separate forum that we could all bookmark would be good. I don't believe that marking everyone in the group as favourites is helping a lot. Although I do look at every image that I am alerted to I don't always see the need for a comment :)

joel, I did not know about your stroke. but I hope that your recovery is going well. best wishes.

Sidney, I'm sorry to hear about your health issues. I'm glad your brain's not about to explode :-) I hope you get out of limbo and some proper and effective treatment soon.

Joel:
I think a Forum and specialized forum might be a good approach.  I got use from BOTH.  Maybe one alone is like one hand, or leg or eye.  One can get you by, but with two, you can really accomplish miracles more easily.

I'm guessing you meant "a forum and specialised gallery"? I think your motto is spot on, if so. (If not, I haven't a clue, heehee.)

Paul:
Yeah I do know what it means :m_laugh:

Gallery  I've been up WAY too long to be REALLY good friends with English. LOLOL  I should be unconscious right now. Dammit, Meh.  Sleep enough in the grave, I guess.

Folks who didn't know about what health issues I have,had, or whatever--don't worry about them.  I don't talk about them much, because I don't think they're that overwhelming or important.  I got really interested in the Critique Group from wondering if I was still up to par after my stroke.

THEN I started wondering, "HELL, Was I EVER up to par to BEGIN WITH? If not--I better get my artistic act together and start producing what I REALLY want to!"

Well looking at GALLERIES aside, I'm gonna go look at the inside of my eyelids for seven to ten hours, IF I can.

I try not to let insomnia be one of those things I lose any sleep over.

I don't post as many images as I would like to but the advice given on what I have posted is helpful and makes a difference.

I think a separate forum and gallery as Joelgaine suggested would be a good way to go.

You get some sleep Joel...

Doctor Who once said "Sleep is for tortoises" but I think it's different for Time Lords :biggrin:

:lol:

Sometimes, we might not get much done--but LORDY, we have fun doing it!

Or not doing it.  Or...whatever.

COME ONE! COME ALL!!  Come on down and we'll point out your flaws, slap your preconceptions silly and lift you up when you're down.  If you say the wrong thing, we might sock you, but we'll respect your apology and then hug you til you're dizzy! 

It's like one HUGE family of mismatched people.  Alone, we can never really progress beyond our self-imposed limits.

Together, we can reach the stars!  ^__^ V,,

:b_tonguewink: