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Hey all,

I wanted to take this opportunity to get the community's feedback on competitions. Have any new contest ideas? Complaints? Improvements? Go ahead and throw it at me here and remember, you feedback is better received when it's tactful and detailed!



Aaaannnd GO!

Edited by user Friday, November 9, 2018 1:21:01 PM(UTC)  | Reason: Not specified

Everything is good, this is the first time I have got into the contests (haven't had an Xbox for a while) and I'm enjoying them.

One thing, the rules say to post up to 3 photos. Would it be possible to stretch it to 4?

It would be cool to have a side, front, rear shot as well as one "action shot" if you like.

Edited by user Wednesday, June 27, 2018 3:46:43 PM(UTC)  | Reason: Not specified

Are you referring to the livery contests? If so, yes, I don't see why not :)

I would enjoy reading a Contest Winners thread (or maybe a dedicated News article) that included a photo of all of the selected winning Photos each week, and Liveries with the gamertag, model, filename and keywords.

The current system of gamertags alone doesn't do much to promote finding and downloading the winning liveries.

Thanks for the opportunity to give the community a voice on the matter!

I'd like to recommend that, in regards to the photo contests at least, winners of the previous week be omitted from the following weeks contest, a rule that previously existed and is even mentioned in the current list.

Having followed the forzatography community for a number of years now, I can attest to repeat winners being a point of contention for many. I myself have no issue with someone winning consistently and even back-to-back but others do. On top of numerous disrespectful comments, some believe these contests to be rigged. I feel that reinstating this rule will help reduce some of the negativity within the community while simultaneously increasing variety and diversity in the contests.

I want to say that it'd be a win-win but I can respect that reinstating that rule would be something of a loss for those who do win regularly which is why I'd also recommend increasing the prize money to 1 million credits. Doing so would address and correct the potential loss for contestants who would otherwise normally be able to win back-to-back prizes of 500,000 credits.

The increased prize money would also make the forzatography hobby a little more worth while as, currently, the photo contests are the only way for photographers to earn money from their photos. Unlike, tuners and painters who earn credits from downloads and likes, photographers don't really receive anything for their work which is why the bump in prize money, regardless of if the previously mentioned rule is reinstated or not, would be a very welcome change for the community.

Thanks again for giving us the opportunity to voice our concerns and our ideas :)

Edited by user Wednesday, June 27, 2018 6:16:59 PM(UTC)  | Reason: Not specified

I'd like to see something more added to the Livery Contests. Credits are useful, but from my experience since FM2 the collectors of designs has gone away but was a core thing to the community.

Maybe Bounty Hunter contests where designers create a design for X car and the racers who hit the laps get that design as a special gift?!

The Other thing is way back in Forza 2, Unicorn cars existed that had designs on them (Lotus Exige Espionage) If there is a way to bring this back with the support from the community of painters to make the prize cars more sort after and collect able again. That's something that been missing for years! Thing it will ignite the interest in the Monthly contests again!

Overall, Painters NEED more exposure in the game, we spend our gaming time buried in paintcans so would love to see the painters showcased better to the masses.

Drop me a DM if want to pick brains further!

[AB]

Not sure this could be a Complaint or Improvement. but...

I felt Livery contest is kinds biased onto complicated designs
Since this, there are too less chances to winning with Classic car style liveries and Replicas. kinds it's unfair that less-complicated liveries are less chance to win even it's (almost) perfectly accurated Replicas.
Sometimes, when i see (looks) 10+ hours creation losing to 1 hour creation, it hurts my feeling...

I feel Photo contest is kinds unfair or unpredictable judges' taste
I'm not saying this because i lost photo contest twice with spending 5 hours total for taking photos.
I mean, i saw some people keep winning Photo contest multiple times. it's pretty okay thing. i pay respect to winners. But since there are only 10 winners per week, there is no motivation to new participants.
Add more winners slot for Photo contest or add Honorable mentions or something. it would be nice.

More rewards
Such as Dodge Challenger SRT8, VW Scirocco and others.
They're not appeared since first appearance in Forza 7.

Entry to contest without Sharing paint
Maybe it's only to me. but i really don't want to share my paints for some reason.
I know it's difficult. but it's really thankful to me.

and here's the new contests ideas.

Short clip contest or Replay contest
Upload less than 30 seconds clip, then T10 decide winners.
Multiple categories (such as Fun, Serious and others) would be nice.

Art contests
Title says all. but this would be difficult.

Edited by user Thursday, June 28, 2018 5:18:06 AM(UTC)  | Reason: Not specified

I have been playing Forza since the first one. So I have seen how we got to this point over the years and what people have always hated or always liked.

I am in favor of reinstating the no back to back rule. But all that does is make sure that those ten photographers don’t enter the contest right after a win. Those that will win often will win again. So all it does is give them an odd table for entering. Win one week then wait two weeks to enter. That’s it. I don’t think that is the answer. The people that take good shots will keep taking good shots.
You would have to go with a win once type thing. Then once everyone has won start again. But at that point it’s no longer a contest.
I think what should happen is open up for community judges. You pick ten winners each week just let some of those people that win every week judge. Now I am not saying they pick ten photos and those are the winners. What I propose is have a guest judge each week and let them pick a photo, any photo they want to win. (Yes I understand that sometimes friends will pick friends.) but honestly giving up ONE of the ten spots for that to happen is not asking a lot. And at the same time you get the community giving back to the community. And it also takes the whole this is not fair thing off the table. Community picking community is pretty fair to me. As for the community judge of the week, that person is not allowed to enter that week of comps.
I would gladly give up my wins to be able to pick a photo every week to show some of the amamzing shots that get left behind.
There can be 100 what if’s, but I think this could work to help the community feel better about comps. I mainly only enter the photo comps but you could do this with liveries as well.

I understand that it’s a mix of the best and the amateur each week but a contest is a contest and photos should be held to a standard that forces people to improve. I think two shots each week should be held for amateur shots or people that have never won. Then seven picked by turn ten best of the best style and then one left for the guest judge. (Or two if you want to give them an amateur and pro shot or have two community judges one week.)

I think the thought of being a judge for some of us that win a lot would be more worth while than winning.
You could even mention the guest judge in the week in review and do a blog or show off wins or anything! Imagine the possibilities... this could help bridge the gap that’s getting way to big between the community and turn10.

I love the contests and all the uses it gets my paints. Keep up the good work. I'm not so much about the actual contest rewards. I want all the work I do to be on cars all over the track. And winning the contests achieves that. I love seeing thousands of downloads and uses on my shares. It's cool when someone sends me a message complimenting my work they found because it was Turn 10 Select. I have some people I regularly interact with online as a result of it and one person's feedback helped improve some of my work.

My only suggestion is to keep the list of previously offered cars that we can win updated. I want the Chevrolet Super Sport Sedan, haha.

In regards to what Erina said, I do agree that in the past simpler replicas tended to be over looked but I've had a couple of more simple designs win in FM7. It seems to help a simple design win when a pic of the real car is included for reference. I did that with my Kohr GT350R and it was selected. One additional suggestion for replica makers of simple designs, if it is an extremely simple design extreme attention to detail is VERY important. Use of a stock font that isn't quite right is kind of killer. Again, referring the the Kohr livery. The letters in KOHR look basically like one of the game fonts but they were a much bolder version. So, instead of using the game font I made the letters out of shapes for perfect accuracy. This is a simple livery that was selected as a winner. The game font R's are almost never a good match for anything.

I hope you continue to recognize detailed replicas that might seem simple. As much or more work goes into accurate small contingency decals as big elaborate base livery designs. I hope attention to detail in logo work continues to be rewarded. I think you guys have done a good job with this in FM7.

In my opinion there are some replicas that are so incredibly simple that they really don't deserve to be recognized as Turn 10 Select regardless of accuracy though. For example. I have created the 1959 LeMans winner as a replica. It's just a green Aston Martin with white circles and a custom made number 5. I'm not going to enter that in the livery contest. I made the 5 perfect but there's not that much work there to deserve a Turn 10 select.

Edited by user Thursday, June 28, 2018 8:42:36 AM(UTC)  | Reason: Not specified

There's this thread for the livery contests, but they stopped updating it months ago.

I agree with Brokenvegetable about the no back-to-back wins. There's alot of talk that these contests are one of the only ways to get locked cars, but people feel it's always the same people winning. Maybe this can draw in some fresh faces.

Edited by user Thursday, June 28, 2018 9:57:29 AM(UTC)  | Reason: Not specified

[quote=UPRPRC Erina;934987]Not sure this could be a Complaint or Improvement. but...

I felt Livery contest is kinds biased onto complicated designs
Since this, there are too less chances to winning with Classic car style liveries and Replicas. kinds it's unfair that less-complicated liveries are less chance to win even it's (almost) perfectly accurated Replicas.
Sometimes, when i see (looks) 10+ hours creation losing to 1 hour creation, it hurts my feeling...

I agree with your statement here and I have won quite a few livery contests and the ones I lost were straight up as good as the real car design, and I looked at the ones that won and had to wonder if it is a popularity thing.

Hello team Microsoft's turn10. I would like to thank each of your employees for their great games Forza.

I would like to see in the photo contests the themes of photos. For example, it sounds like this:
Take a picture of the BMW M5 on the track Nordschleife in motion or take a picture of the Nissan 370z Suzuki.

Thus there will be a motivation for the contest participants and to choose the winner will be easier ) let your team make a prize of 1 000 000 CR winners deserve such a prize) I would also like that you would add a sharpness slider in the photo editor it will allow to give the photo realism cars. And in General, all your rules of judging are satisfied. Thanks. All participants of victories in new photo contests )

I was about to basically say the same thing so I'll just say + 1,000,000
I also remember that a few of the gift unicorn cars were tuned by community members as well. (FM2-FM4)
I also noticed that the Photo comp winners always have there pics showcased a crossed a multitude of social media out less while it seem as if the painters get a lot less exposer... :(

Edited by user Thursday, June 28, 2018 2:11:17 PM(UTC)  | Reason: Not specified

I have a few suggestions:

---

For Livery Contests we currently have 2 categories, Race and Fantasy.
I wonder if Race should be split into two, with Race (Original) and Race (Replica). Replicas would need to post the reference image in addition to their entry pics.

---

For photo contests I'd like to see them be themed instead of a free-for-all.
One week could focus on cars from the latest Car pack, another could be "Black and White" only etc..

---

Would a Vinyl Group contest be worthwhile?
There are many talented creators out there of both replicas (of real logos) and original creations (Fantasy art).

---

This may complicate matters, but would it be possible for us to nominate a person we could have receive the gift car instead?
Let's say I won a Livery Contest but I don't want a car; could I nominate that somebody else gets the car in my place?

---

I'd also like to see theme Photo contests in addition to open-ended photo contests, or maybe bonus rewards for hitting a theme within the open ended contest, similar to ladder challenge rewards:

Base reward for the open Photo contest
+ Bonus reward for also matching the week's theme
+ Bonus reward for sharing the pic on social media with hashtag

Some theme ideas:

• Take a photo of one of last week's winning Liveries
  
• Take a photo of a car in stock trim and paint to be used for a Car List page from the Games dropdown menu (which never appeared for FM7)
  
• Take a photo of a car eligible for next week's Leagues to help promote them
  
• Take a photo of a car or livery that will be used in an upcoming real world event (Indy 500, Le Mans etc)
  
• Take a photo of a ForzaRC competitive team Livery, or car being used in an upcoming Wednesday Showdown race.
  
• Division of the Week
  
• Manufacturer of the Week
  
• Decade of the Week
  
• Country of the Week

Edited by user Friday, June 29, 2018 8:35:00 AM(UTC)  | Reason: Not specified

Ditto contests for video creators, including ones edited outside the game and uploaded to YouTube and social media. Some themes:

• Edited cinematic replays, fan "trailers" etc
  
• Short GIFs, Play of the Week
  
• How-To (tune, paint, Forzathon, drift, custom race setup, track overview) instructional videos
  
• Real history profile of car models/makes included in the game
  
• Community profile of players or teams

Themed photo contests and bringing back the no back-to-back wins rule get a big thumbs up from me!

👍 <-- imagine this thumb except 10 times bigger.

The following two aren’t too much difficult to implement in the photomode contest if you think they are a good idea. First who ever wins isn’t allowed to enter the following week or the one just after. Secondary I feel everyone should be restricted to just one entry instead of three shots per person.

Now what about other things. Since I have seen my share of bland or average shots being entered with a few decent winners each week. In my view the judges should be looking at more of a shot. The reason I say this, is the base of any good shot and above will have an interesting/well thought out or decent layout as the base. Now where in the pecking order is lighting. Well it is what rounds off a decent shot with good composition or layout.

Anyway what if a shot only has just a decent layout, but something like a bland layout where the car is in the center and the aperture hasn’t been used. Well beautiful lighting can’t fix a shot or make it fabulous, if more thought isn’t put into how the shots composition or layout has been setup. Look at every famous and modern greats in the art world for example. They will use composition to tell a story or think outside of the box with the layout to make it stand out.

Lastly can a decent shot have the car in the center of the frame. If anyone wants a good way to make more people pay attention, then scenery or object/range of objects should be used to offset the car being in the center. Still in the end, if people still struggle to adapt. My suggestion is read up on some articles or guides on rule of thirds and depth of field, while for people who are afraid to experiment to add a bit of panache, all I can say this this. Don’t be afraid to experiment. :]

____________

Update

Just remembered something. Since I want to see more thought put into entries or the judges to take a bit more time to decide, which is why I suggested one entry per person, can’t enter a following week if they have been selected or both since it free’s up more time for the most important bit of the PMC’s. I am hoping we might see more variety each week. Including close-up’s or abstract shots hopefully.

Reason being, there is a good portion of the community who have the skills necessary to create a nice variety of shots and exceed, even plenty of people have dabbled with offering a range of different shots.

Edited by user Friday, June 29, 2018 3:29:29 PM(UTC)  | Reason: Not specified

We in Forzatography Central @ Facebook have done some of those ideas. Last comp we had was a themed comp. As it was a Le Mans weekend we celebrated that with our own themed comp. so it’s not a bad idea.
As a painter I love the idea about taking a photo of one of last weeks winning liveries.
Overall I completely agree with ManteoMax. Really great ideas and we had a similar photocomp in FM6. Celebrating Lamborghini if I’m not wrong. I think we had three weeks, three comps which we had to shoot a lambo. That’s
what he suggested by Manufacturer of the week.

Also I want to add some ideas of mine.
All of those above of course and maybe color of the week or weather of the week. Basically shooting a photo in a rain themed comp or in a sunset.


And regarding to livery comps we don’t have the same exploitation as the winner of photocomps. Like in social media you update the winning photos at both FB and Insta etc but with the winning liveries you are not that quick to update.
I know there’s a lot of painters here in this community and what I understand many of them struggle with downloads. We spend many hours to do a basic replica or an extreme fantasy paint and at the end of it we maybe get like 10 downloads. That’s something you should maybe consider improving.

No back to back wins seams like a no brainer

I personally wouldn’t like to see themed comps as I don’t like to be pinned in on what I end up taking a photo of, I like the freedom
Shooting for a purpose would take the fun out of it for me and would become forced

I think 3 of the 10 selections should be community voted via a poll of even in game likes, if you enter you must cast 3 votes
At least then the photographer would feel a sense of pride because it does appear that the photocomps aren’t judged by people who really know or care about photography
Like pebb said a lot of the winning shots are missing fundamentally important basic set ups that to the trained eye show that those people know nothing about how to set up a photo
And a selection from your peers instead would feel like you were judged more fairly by like minded people who understand

Maybe the people who can’t enter because they were selected the previous week could get a vote on the following week sort of like guest judges

That’s it for now
🙂

I love the livery comp set up , I don’t do them very often but I do like the fact even a novice painter can win it

I love the fact we can pick a hidden car to receive as a gift

I do think it would be good to be given set cars though each week you pick a selection of say 3 cars and we choose the one of 3 we want to paint and when and if we win that car and livery get gifted to the community for their bounty hunter winnings

If people want themed contests, maybe it could happen once or twice a month. Also the PMC community voting or judges on some shots could also be applied to having guest judges from time to time, who are professionals in the following careers:

*Professional Car and Magazine Photographers
*Modern Day Artists and Artists who gained fame in the 70’s, 80’s and 90’s.
*Film Cinematographers or Directors
*Concept Artists
*TV Actors or People who work on another area of TV series.

Edited by user Saturday, June 30, 2018 6:47:04 AM(UTC)  | Reason: Not specified

I agree with many comments here and think letting us have the opportunity to be a judge would be fantastic . I for one would love the opportunity to be able to judge as it would give me a greater feeling of accomplishment that just winning a photocomp. This weeks July car pack should be a forzatographers dream with the McLaren 720s and by the looks of things on the week in review the new 2018 Ferrari superfast.

For those forzatographers that want to win either their frist or next photocomp win here is my tip from experience. "BE BOLD BE DIFFERENT "but always remember to also keep the photography fundamentals and with this you should have a good chance at winning.

Thanks guys and thankyou to Co-Pilot for letting us forzatographers giving some feedback and some well needed positive change to the photocomps.

Nasser

I will have to agree with the more seasoned painters here, reinstating the no back-to-back participation rule, giving winning liveries more exposure and giving out some awards more interesting than just a wad of credits and a choice of locked cars (which won't be a viable option anymore after today's update, as they will be available for everyone through the in-game dealer!) would go a long way to make participation in the contests more enticing.

Also, I remember back in the Xbox 360 days the Forza Idol competition saw a lot of involvment from the community (and is also, I believe, part of the reason Super Taikyu liveries are more popular here than everywhere else!). Likewise, themed photo contests organized by the various photo crews often drew in dozens of entries. Having similar competitions organized by T10 or by the Community managers could perhaps breathe some new life in the content creators subcommunity, with credits prizes and increased exposure encouraging the painters and photographers who have fled to Twitter to come back to the forums...

If they want players to be judges after winning or from time to time, I think they might need to find a way to trim down what shots are looked at by the community judges. The problem with doing this is it can be a bit tricky, while looking through hundreds of shots is time consuming on the other hand. Now what do I think is a possible solution. If there is a shortlist process used by T10 to decide who makes it to round 1, then that could be used to come up with one possible solution.

The solution in my mind is this. The community judges get together in a discord chat and discuss the shortlist over 3 days to come up with their own shortlist. Once a shortlist has been drawn up, the judges can then start to draw up their own seprate shortlists, featuring their two favourites over 1-2 days. After the second shortlist process is over, the judges combine their picks for a final shortlist and then they decide what wins with a 1-2 day vote.

Right how such an idea be made fair. Well before the judges submit their suggestions for the final shortlist & voting process they will have to do one important thing. Make sure each shot is by a different person.

Edited by user Tuesday, July 3, 2018 7:52:52 AM(UTC)  | Reason: Not specified