Steampunked

My good friends at CGSociety have announced the winners for the big Steampunk CGChallenge. It was my honour to write the Press Release ...

Steam Powered Beasts Battle for the Greatest Prize: CG CHALLENGE XXIII, 'Steampunk - Myths & Legends'

The greatest stories ever told get the Steampunk treatment. Almost 2000 digital artists created steam powered monsters and mayhem to win over $220,000 worth of prizes.

Adelaide, South Australia, February 22, 2009 – The winners of the CGSociety's CGChallenge XXIII: 'Steampunk - Myths & Legends' have been announced. Digital artists, from many nations, battled to claim the biggest prizes ever offered. Over US$220,000 worth of software and hardware were available in many categories, including Video, Animation, Modeling and Illustration. To win, CG wizards had to give a Steampunk edge to famous stories and legends - to create a future that could have been; an age when steel and steam propel machinery, men and monsters.

Steampunk is a thriving fantasy genre, which merges advanced steam age technology with a modern or science fiction setting. It also covers works set in an era where steam power is still widely used, such as 19^th century Victorian England. Think Jules Verne, H.G. Wells or Kashuhiro Otomo's 'Steamboy'.

The winners of the three main prize categories all showed outstanding technical ability along with world class storytelling skills, and a complete understanding of the genre.

The Image (Individual) Master was awarded to Fabricio Moraes for his 'Steamnocchio', a reinterpretation of Pinocchio. “This image just totally nails the steampunk theme,” said judge Leigh van der Byl. “The technical quality is simply fantastic too.” The excited artist replied, “I felt so great and could never imagine I could possibly win this competition, actually I still can't believe it. I got inspired by so many great artists.”

The Video (Team) Master award went to Bonsaininja Studio for 'EMET', a film that was “inspired by the legend of the Golem; telling the story of Rabbi Loew, who created an animated being entirely from inanimate matter to defend the Prague ghetto." “Epic,” exclaimed filmmaker Anthony Lucas, while Simon Dominic, his fellow judge, said that he felt “like I just stepped out of the cinema.” Philip Straub, from EA, simply said: “Outfreakinstanding!”

The Individual Video Master was awarded to Tyson Ibele's 'Hemlock'. Judge Michael Dashow said the film had a “great mood set throughout the entire piece. The lighting, camera-work, and sound were wonderfully effective, and the ending was terrific.” The winning artist said “the competition was very close due to the large number of high-quality entries... this challenge theme allowed for a lot of creativity, and since I've wanted to do a film set in the steampunk universe for a while now, it was a perfect motivator.”

"We now have digital artists of diverse skills working together to create astounding works of art and entertainment that are world class," summed up Mark Snoswell, President of CGSociety. "This is how it should be – it’s not how you create a work, it's the quality of the finished work and its impact on viewers that is important."

Prizes were also awarded in Video, Animation, Art Direction, Best Character, Compositing and Editing, Concept Art, Digital Painting, Landscape Matte, Lighting, Modeling, Sculpture, Texture, VFX and Illustration categories.

CGChallenge XXIII was proudly sponsored by BOXX, Autodesk, NVIDIA, Wacom, SOFTIMAGE, Luxology, Pixologic, Craft Animations, SideFX, e-on Software, Corel, Stash Media, The Gnomon Workshop, ImagineFX, Ballistic Publishing, Esperient, and CGSociety.

A full list of winners and their winning entries, can be viewed at The CGSociety website (link to 'winners' article).
Previous CGChallenges can also be viewed at The CGSociety website (http://features.CGSociety.org/challenge/).

Judges
The judges came from the game, film and illustration world, and included masters from Blizzard, EA, and the Jim Henson Company. Judges were Michael Dashow , Anthony Lucas , Grzegorz Jonkajtys, Simon Dominic, Brom, Coro, Phil Straub, Brajan Martinovic, Mark Snoswell, Kerry Shea, Leigh A. van der Byl, and Anton Fletcher.

About CGChallenge XXIII
CGSociety, one of the internet's largest computer artists' communities, holds regular competitions with many of the world's best digital artists competing. This, the 23rd CGChallenge, exceeded all past challenges in the quality of entries, number of contestants and the prize pool. 1,966 challengers submitted 9,410 submissions over almost 3 months of collaborative competition. The CGChallenges are work in progress competitions, in which entrants are required to show their work as it develops from concept to completion. They are hosted within the CGSociety online community, attracting enormous attention and feedback from the world's digital arts community.

About the CG Society:
The CG Society is the most respected and accessible global organization for creative digital artists. The CGSociety supports artists at every level by offering a range of services to connect, inform, educate and promote, by celebrating achievement, excellence and innovation in all aspects of digital art. The CGSociety, along with its sister organisation Ballistic Publishing, is a division of Ballistic Media.

http://www.cgsociety.org
http://www.ballisticpublishing.com
Press Contact: andrew@ballisticmedia.net