Thank you for confirming, Aequorin!
I just wanted to come here and talk a little more about my experience with festival contests too.
I see two demographics of people frustrated with the apparent unfairness of festival contests. The first demographic is beginner artists intimidated by the apparent skill barrier. Here’s the thing: you don’t need to make “UMA” quality skins to win festival contests. Many of the most prolific festival winners don’t make UMAs at all! And many UMA artists aren’t prolific fest winners even if they do enter. As Myth noted in her loss analysis, a lot of skins that do fine as UMAs just don’t work for festivals. And that’s the second demographic I see getting frustrated about fests: if they’re successful skin artists on the UMA side, why aren’t they successful on the site contest side?
Me and Myth have been talking every month since February with the goal of analyzing how festival winners are picked. I hope anyone who’s confused or curious about our winstreaks gets some interesting information out of it! I’ve won 15 skin contests so far. I only really started actively trying to make an entry every single month during January of this year. Let’s take a look at some of the things I’ve learned during this time:
1. You don’t need to be a pro to have a chance at winning!
I’m someone who makes skins in pretty much the exact opposite way that Myth does - I don’t render, I have pen pressure off most of the time, and all of my skins could’ve been done on trackpad instead of tablet if you gave me a few extra hours. I’m never going to be someone who makes endlessly detailed, beautifully rendered skins. But that just means I had to get very, very good at shapes and colors. Luckily, staff seem to favour a cleaner, simpler style.
Here’s the very first skin I made. Do you see how simple it is? Let me turn off the lines and shadows. Most of the shading wasn’t even done by me, but the fae template itself. There’s 5 colors total, and 4 entire objects on this skin. It won because it was simple, readable, colored in the flight’s theme - and yes, because there weren’t any other fae entries that month.
2. This is a skin contest for a FLIGHT festival. Show you understand what the flight is about!
Every month, there’s people disappointed that x gorgeous entry by their z favorite artist didn’t make it into the winner’s list. (Sometimes, I’m right there mourning with them because I thought that entry was a sure pick!) But a lot of the time, I saw the entry in the thread and knew right away it wouldn’t get picked. These beautiful ‘fest rejects’ go on to have very successful UMA print runs, so clearly the issue isn’t aesthetic appeal. Why didn’t it get picked?
Because it had nothing to do with the flight at all. It’s no accident that submission threads have an entire section dedicated to the location and theming of a flight. Remember, your skin will be an official item for a flight festival! It had better tie into that flight’s theming and lore. Staff put a lot of work into shaping the world of Sornieth. So pretend like you’re taking a test. Prove that you’ve been paying attention!
Five of my skins have been very explictly modeled after or based off familiars, canonical flight locations, or scenes from the site. And remember, it’s not always what your own lore says the flight is about - pay attention to what the site says the flight is about. (Plague isn’t zombies, Earth is!) And try to make skins for that flight’s representative breeds.
3. Pick a breed that hasn’t been picked yet!
This is my simplest advice. Go look at the thread and see which breeds are being done a lot this month and avoid it like the plague. I’ve been seeing aether every single month since they released, and let me tell you - doing a skin on a really popular base isn’t going to help if you’re not confident about your chances. Picking a breed that almost never gets entries will help your chances.
Actually, just browse the submission thread in general. Even if you’re not an artist. ESPECIALLY if you’re not an artist. People complain every month that x breed didn’t get a skin, and it’s somehow… bias staff have toward consistent winners? And not because nobody bothered to enter a skin for them that year?
4. Markings and modifications, not apparel!
This is a really easily missable line in the submission thread every month.
Both me and Myth prefer to do composition rather than markings, so we didn’t talk about this a ton. You might think most of our wins don’t follow this guideline. But it’s very important to remember that body modification is different from apparel. Myth likes to do wings, I like to put scenery on a dragon, but the important part is we are changing what the dragon itself ‘looks’ like when you imagine it as a character - we aren’t simply putting clothing on a dragon!
When good-quality, fullbody ‘marking’ or ‘modification’ skins are available, they are almost always a sure pick. Simple, appealing markings/tattoos themed after the flight are good bets too!
This one’s a bit trickier and you only really gain a sense of this by entering a lot and looking at what wins each year. There’s some things staff really, really don’t like picking. There’s exceptions to every rule, but they are rare!
Modern references/meme material.
Things the flight explicitly is NOT about. (I can’t remember who did the stillborn snapper hatchling one for Plague, but… why?)
OCs/Original worldbuilding/Fanlore. (The Southern Snowfields aren’t Celtic, even if your Ice dragons are!)
Certain real-world cultural influences or cultural objects.
Extensive bodymod, or too many animals on a dragon.
JUST silks or other UMA-bait.
Really, just avoid making a skin that has got nothing to do with the flight. I personally almost never print my fest rejects, because they’re so flight specific I can’t see them doing well. Likewise, if the skin is clearly so mass-appeal that it could work for any element of any dragon if you recolored it a little, you’re probably on the wrong track.
6. Enter for the right reasons!
Finally, remember that fest contests aren’t all that. The 2000g + a 5 pack blueprint prize means absolutely fucking nothing if you have the option to print your skin instead. A single run (10 copies) of a single skin priced at 850g a copy will get you 3500g in profit. That’s AFTER subtracting blueprint costs.
So don’t enter fest contests because you want money, or attention, or to prove to yourself that you’re a 'real skin artist’. Enter to get practice, to have fun, because you love the flight, or because you’ve got a friend egging you on. If you find yourself getting really frustrated after a while, it’s time to take a break. (I didn’t enter at all for a good chunk of 2021-2022 and it was great for my mental health.)
And finally, enter so we can get some variety in there. I’ve talked about what works for me, but it’s my sincere hope we get to see more non-standard skins win too. Maybe this post will be immediately outdated as staff reads it and changes how the festival decisions are made. I hope it was a fun read either way :P
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