[PXFIRE] Season 2: Judge Applications

[Neo Emolga]

https://i.imgur.com/I3gHnYY.png

PXFIRE SEASON 2 JUDGE APPLICATIONS

INTRODUCTION

Feel like being a section Judge for PXFIRE Season 2? You've come to the right place! If you're not quite sure what it all entails, you can find all the details in the PXFIRE Season 2 Information and Rules (http://www.pokemoncrossroads.com/forum/showthread.php?17561-PXFIRE-Season-2-Information-and-Rules-%26%239733%3BREAD-FIRST%26%239733%3B) thread!

Becoming a PXFIRE Season 2 section Judge will mean you will have total control (ooh!) over the section for as long as it runs. You decide the rules, you decide what themes and parameters the contestants will work with, and how things run for the section. If you want to challenge your contestants in ways such as the Drawn Art Judge declaring contestants can only use shades of blue, you can do things like that!

As a reminder, these are the sections we need great Judges for:

Role Play
Creative Writing
Humor
Caption Contest
Drawn Art
Graphic Art
Pixel Art
Comics
Showdown

JUDGING CREDO

Just a few things to bear in mind if you want to apply and you become a Judge:

Be civil, be reasonable, be fair. As a Judge, you can still be part of a PXFIRE Team and you'll be earning that team points by submitting results on time (though you don't have to be on a team). Your teammates will also be submitting entries. PLEASE be neutral and objective in judging and don't fall into the temptation of giving your teammates more points just because they're on your team. We're trusting you here!
Be kind about judging. Some contestants may be trying new things for the first time and might not be rock stars at it. Be careful with your criticism, keep it constructive, and always be on the lookout for things you can suggest for others to improve. Even if a particular submission isn't that great, it feels better for the contestant if you say at least something nice or positive about it in additional to giving them advice for what to improve upon. It's something they could focus more on and target as something to build upon.
Please submit results on time. It helps keep the section moving along nicely and it overall helps keep PXFIRE running like a well-oiled machine if each section is running along and in sync with all the others. Plus you get rewarded points for it!

SUBMISSION FORM

PART 1 (Only need to fill this out once)

Name: It's YOU!
Section you'd like to Judge: Pick the one you'd like to do and/or think you'd be good at handling. You don't have to limit it to one choice, though you will only be selected for one at max!
What is your availability like from now through July? If you have vacations planned or foresee some time where you might not be active, please let us know! We may need to factor that in for scheduling.
If selected to be a Judge, would you like your section to be run during the 1st half of PXFIRE or the 2nd Half? This is mainly done on a first come, first serve basis, though it has the potential of being changed if member availability becomes a factor. Excluding Caption Contest, four sections will be active during the first half and the other four will swap out with the others during the second.

PART 2 (If submitting for more than one section though you can only Judge one section at max), please fill out the bottom questions for each section you're applying for)

Please note any experience you have with judging/grading things or with giving constructive criticism that would help your judging: Are you applying for Comics and have done comics before? Sure, let us know! We may be looking for people who have a bit more experience in the field to be Judges, but don't let that deter you if you think you can handle judging a section.
Please outline an example challenge or something you might do for your section You don't actually have to use this exact example challenge if you're selected, we just want to get an idea of what to expect from you if you were to be the Judge for this section.
Include about 3-5 sentences about how you'd like to run the section and what kinds of ideas you have for it. You don't need to spoil everything and you're totally free to keep your more secretive curveball challenges hidden, but just a general idea of how you would decide to lay things out would be great.

That's it! Thank you for offering to help support PXFIRE Season 2!

[Nekomata]

Name: Nekomata

Section you'd like to Judge: Comics, Drawn Art, Spriting

What is your availability like from now through July?
- Gonna have a busy summer class, but should have enough time in the week/weekends to judge. Only trip is in mid-August. Will have my tablet then in place of my laptop.

If selected to be a Judge, would you like your section to be run during the 1st half of PXFIRE or the 2nd Half?
- No preference!

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PART 2 - Comics

Please note any experience you have with judging/grading things or with giving constructive criticism that would help your judging:
Experience Judging/grading: I'm a Teaching Assistant and grade papers on a regular basis. For Constructive Crit, I'm in an art-based major where we spend a lot of time giving each other critiques.

Experience in Comics: As of last week, I've been working on PRS for 5 years. (And comics in general even longer!) I've learned a lot about making comics through both my own experience as well as the many published series I've added to my read list over the years.


Please outline an example challenge or something you might do for your section .
Example One: Have the members of each team collaborate to create one short comic story. (Scripts, Layouts, etc.)
Example Two: Have individuals create short comic strips.

---

PART 2 - Comics

Please note any experience you have with judging/grading things or with giving constructive criticism that would help your judging:
Experience Judging/grading: I'm a Teaching Assistant and grade papers on a regular basis. For Constructive Crit, I'm in an art-based major where we spend a lot of time giving each other critiques.

Experience in Drawing: I'm in an art based major and have spent many years drawing and studying various forms of art.

Please outline an example challenge or something you might do for your section .
Example One: Pokemon Variant Challenge! Have members take a Pokemon and redesign it to suit a different environment/ecosystem.
Example Two: Midform Evolutions - What if evolutions were gradual? Design a Pokemon that is midway through the process of evolving.

[EmeraldSky]

Name: EmeraldSky

Section you'd like to Judge: Caption Contest

What is your availability like from now through July? For now, I think I'm good time wise.

If selected to be a Judge, would you like your section to be run during the 1st half of PXFIRE or the 2nd Half? This is mainly done on a first come, first serve basis, though it has the potential of being changed if member availability becomes a factor. Excluding Caption Contest, four sections will be active during the first half and the other four will swap out with the others during the second.

No preference.

PART 2 (If submitting for more than one section though you can only Judge one section at max), please fill out the bottom questions for each section you're applying for)

Please note any experience you have with judging/grading things or with giving constructive criticism that would help your judging: Are you applying for Comics and have done comics before? Sure, let us know! We may be looking for people who have a bit more experience in the field to be Judges, but don't let that deter you if you think you can handle judging a section.

I have ran captioning contests before, to some degree of success. I'm also good at writing reviews

Please outline an example challenge or something you might do for your section You don't actually have to use this exact example challenge if you're selected, we just want to get an idea of what to expect from you if you were to be the Judge for this section.

Caption story challenges (where a few screenshots might all be from the same episode, the challenge would be to create some kind of coherent story from the shots and the captions)


Include about 3-5 sentences about how you'd like to run the section and what kinds of ideas you have for it. You don't need to spoil everything and you're totally free to keep your more secretive curveball challenges hidden, but just a general idea of how you would decide to lay things out would be great.

The rules for the caption contest would be mostly the same from last year--there would be bonuses for creative captions (and you could actually lose points for using the same lame joke we've seen a million times)

This time, I want to experiment with using multiple screenshots--creating a kind of story out of the caption or a funny "dialogue" between two characters with the captions, to name a couple examples.

[LKWayvern]

PART 1 (Only need to fill this out once)

Name: LKWayvern

Section you'd like to Judge: Creative Writing

What is your availability like from now through July?: Should be free the entire time.

If selected to be a Judge, would you like your section to be run during the 1st half of PXFIRE or the 2nd Half?: No preference.

PART 2

Please note any experience you have with judging/grading things or with giving constructive criticism that would help your judging: First and foremost, I judged the Creative Writing category last year. In addition, I have been writing fanfiction and stories in all variety of mediums for several years, and have been a voracious reader for even longer.

Please outline an example challenge or something you might do for your section:
Example Challenge: Write a story with the theme of Light.
Guidelines are that character in the story must create something else, the story must contain the line 'It would have been impossible to know, but that was no excuse for the results.', and there must be a point of view shift at some point in the story.

Include about 3-5 sentences about how you'd like to run the section and what kinds of ideas you have for it.: Similar to last year, I'd like to judge the competition with a few different categories, such as Character, Plot, Spelling/Grammar, etc. I intend to have the categories weighted, depending on how important I feel they are to the overall story.
I am unsure how many challenges there will be as of this moment, I'd like to see how many weeks my section will last before I make a decision. At maximum, there will likely only be two.

[K'sariya]

Name: K'sariya
Section you'd like to Judge: Pixel Art
What is your availability like from now through July? It's looking good for judging! I should be able to judge things even if I'm on one of my short vacations.
If selected to be a Judge, would you like your section to be run during the 1st half of PXFIRE or the 2nd Half? 1st half would be best for my vacation schedule!

Please note any experience you have with judging/grading things or with giving constructive criticism that would help your judging:
I'm a (once Graphic Design, now) Interactive Design senior--we give constructive criticism and friendly critique on colleague's work every day! My art education has helped me not only be able to point out what makes a piece of art work, but also how and why it makes it work! I'm also an Expert Curator over in URPG--I curate member-submitted art pieces of all skill levels over there, and I really enjoy doing it. All of my curations can be found listed here (http://forums.petalburgwoods.com/showthread.php/6156-Log-Thread?p=126548&viewfull=1#post126548), and here's an example of a curation of pixel art that I did there! (http://forums.petalburgwoods.com/showthread.php/13221-Cash-Rapidash-bard?p=135976&viewfull=1#post135976) One of a curator's job is to try to curate the work objectively, without making unfair judgments based on their preference of art style, so I have a lot of experience with that, too. I appreciate all art and art styles, and love looking at them and analyzing them. I love showing examples to give my advice context and a visual reference. I love leaving artists with new techniques to try the next time they sit down with a work! I'm a really positive person, and I try to balance what worked and what didn't in a way that keeps artists feeling good about what they did well, and giving them a clear but flexible path on things they can experiment with moving forward!

Please outline an example challenge or something you might do for your section.
- I've always thought a "create your own Mega" sprite for an existing Pokemon that doesn't have one would be awesome
- Environmental spriting - wouldn't have to be large-scale, but maybe small chunks of a scene or an environment, just so people can flex a bit of sprite art beyond figures!

[Bulbasaur]

Name: Bulbasaur
Section you'd like to Judge: In order of preference, Caption Contest, Showdown
What is your availability like from now through July? I will be less available during my Summer class from July 15th to August 15th. I've never taken a class like this, so it might not be too demanding. Other then that, I'm pretty much free.
If selected to be a Judge, would you like your section to be run during the 1st half of PXFIRE or the 2nd Half? 1st half, please.

CAPTION CONTEST
Please note any experience you have with judging/grading things or with giving constructive criticism that would help your judging: I was an assistant instructor at Taekwondo for a few years.
Please outline an example challenge or something you might do for your section: A basic challenge would simply be me posting a picture, and the competitors captioning it, of course. I'd give specific judging criteria; for example, simply give me a caption that makes me laugh the hardest, or give me the wittiest caption you can offer.
A different challenge would be taking a random comic strip, and taking out all the words and making the competitors fill them in to make something that makes sense. Again, I would give specific judging criteria.
Include about 3-5 sentences about how you'd like to run the section and what kinds of ideas you have for it. My main idea was making the pictures not only anime related (even though the description says they have to be anime screenshots), and have a bigger variety of screenshots. I don't think it's fair to only do one specific genre of pictures, since some people don't watch anime. For example, it could be some animal making a funny face, or some historical picture, or even just an anime screenshot!

SHOWDOWN
Please note any experience you have with judging/grading things or with giving constructive criticism that would help your judging: In addition to the experience shown in the caption contest application, I ran a Showdown mini-event as part of the Winter Carnival that saw great activity and resurrected the Showdown community.
Please outline an example challenge or something you might do for your section: My first thought was simply a tournament, but if we have a person from Australia battling a person from the US, it might be tough to see that battle actually happen. So my idea is to a more Winter Carnival-esque style, where you can get up to three wins in a day. I might also add a limit to how many battles can count towards PXFIRE in a day/other time period (for example, if the limit is six battles a day, you can only use wins in your first six battles that day. If you get a win in your seventh battle, it won't count towards your wins. To monitor this, the battlers will declare at the beginning of the battle whether it will count towards PXFIRE or not. Also, I'll have a better server running.).
Include about 3-5 sentences about how you'd like to run the section and what kinds of ideas you have for it. Like in the Winter Carnival, the battles will be a specific tier (probably OU.) Also like in the Winter Carnival, I'll give bonuses for doing special themes, like winning with a lower tier team, or a monotype team.
If I do a tournament, I'll try to match people based on time zones, to make it easier for them to meet.

[Chakramaster]

Name: Chakramaster

Section you'd like to Judge: Drawn Art and Graphic Art

What is your availability like from now through July?: No plans as of yet. Other than work I should be totally free!

If selected to be a Judge, would you like your section to be run during the 1st half of PXFIRE or the 2nd Half?: First (if selected for both, swap out for 1st AND 2nd)



PART 2

Please note any experience you have with judging/grading things or with giving constructive criticism that would help your judging: Criticism is harder to give out than judging for good qualities, but sadly when it must be done it has to be handed down. I try to equate it out so that the one that actually did the best gets what they deserve, but not while completely ignoring the others great works either.

Please outline an example challenge or something you might do for your section: A short outline would be to create a scene of mystery. A Pokemon that may have found something one could call "beauty in the eye of the beholder."

Include about 3-5 sentences about how you'd like to run the section and what kinds of ideas you have for it. The idea of it is to make sure everyone has fun. So that everyone will have a chance to show off their skills on a more equal level. A way that everyone can have fun and express something amazing in their own way and showcase their unique skills as an artist.

[Neo Emolga]

THIS IS YOUR LAST DAY TO APPLY!

Role-Play and Humor have not gotten any Judge applicants, so if no one applies for them, they're going to be removed from PXFIRE Season 2. As for the others, scheduling and Judge selection will be happening tomorrow. :3

[LKWayvern]

On the one hand, I'd like to see a Roleplay section go up, and would be willing to make an attempt at judging it.
On the other, I'm the only one to volunteer for judging Creative Writing, and while I have run RPs before, I'm hesitant, and don't feel physically capable of accurately judging players in them.
So, not going to volunteer to judge that. Apologies.

[Neo Emolga]

On the one hand, I'd like to see a Roleplay section go up, and would be willing to make an attempt at judging it.
On the other, I'm the only one to volunteer for judging Creative Writing, and while I have run RPs before, I'm hesitant, and don't feel physically capable of accurately judging players in them.
So, not going to volunteer to judge that. Apologies.

Yeah, that's understandable, especially since one, Roleplay is one of the harder sections to judge and you stepping off Creative Writing would just mean that one goes out instead. But thanks for giving it your thoughts and consideration. :3

[Bulbasaur]

THIS IS YOUR LAST DAY TO APPLY!

Role-Play and Humor have not gotten any Judge applicants, so if no one applies for them, they're going to be removed from PXFIRE Season 2. As for the others, scheduling and Judge selection will be happening tomorrow. :3
I can do Humor if you give me a day to make the application. I just got home from band practice at midnight and need to sleep. :[

EDIT: It appears I have the only judge application for Showdown. If that's the case, I'll just run Showdown, I guess.

[Shruikan]

Oh don't mind me, just sliding this in at the last minute like Indiana Jones. :P

Name: Shruikan
Section you'd like to Judge: RP
What is your availability like from now through July?: Barring unforseen circumstances, I'll be 100% free the whole time.
If selected to be a Judge, would you like your section to be run during the 1st half of PXFIRE or the 2nd Half?: No preperence.


Please note any experience you have with judging/grading things or with giving constructive criticism that would help your judging:
Though I have little to no experience on judging things, due to the fact that 90% of the tie I'm entering them instead, I have spent at least the last 5 years researching writing & storytelling, picking apart TV shows to know what they did right & how they would have fixed plotholes, etc. Plus I've also ninja-read through just about every RP on PXR.

Please outline an example challenge or something you might do for your section:
Does the whole "Running a RP" thing count? :P
Ok, more specifically, maybe have an each team be a SHIELD like organisation which send the characters on various missions, for example, there's a grand ball being help, and the players are sent as bodyguards for a VIP, or to steal something of value from one of the guests, or an ancient artifact has been uncovered at an archaeological dig that hold great mystical power, and the players are sent out to aquire it for their respective teams.

Include about 3-5 sentences about how you'd like to run the section and what kinds of ideas you have for it:
I would have a single RP running through the 2(?) weeks. I was thinking of having the story as a series of shorter missions, like a monster of the week cartoon, as opposed to one overarching story, to allow more closure when the event ends. So depending on how long it take, it can potentially end right after the first mission.
Also, each participant would be judged on spelling/grammer, how much they interacted with other players, how central they were to driving the plot forward, number of posts that week, and how consistent their post are continuity-wise.

[Neo Emolga]

#NoSectionLeftBehind FTW

PART 1

Name: Neo Emolga (the Delibird thing is only temporary, of course!)
Section you'd like to Judge: Humor
What is your availability like from now through July? Pretty free, I shouldn't have any issues keeping on top of things. I work fulltime, but then so do a lot of people.
If selected to be a Judge, would you like your section to be run during the 1st half of PXFIRE or the 2nd Half? I'm thinking I'd rather do 1st half.

PART 2

Please note any experience you have with judging/grading things or with giving constructive criticism that would help your judging: This would actually be my first time judging humor, but I've judged other sections like Creative Writing, RP, and stuff like that before. This would actually be quite fresh and new! But yeah, usually I'm pretty detailed and thorough about reviews and things like that.

Moreover, I've done all kinds of silly, ridiculous, and delightfully moronic ideas before. Squawkers, the parody version of the Stalkers RPG, is definitely one. Same thing with the Pikachu Survivor Game. And the April Fools Electric Rodent Regime. I can do silly and loony.

Please outline an example challenge or something you might do for your section One week might feature something like with Mother Nature. There's plenty of grounds to make something funny out of that whether it's about insects trying to crap your day up to allergies turning your nose into an automatic shotgun or just the weather killing anything fun you had planned with snow, rain, and heat to toasty yourself. Plus topics like these are things you can work into writing, pictures, songs, and funny stuff like that. I'll definitely keep the theme in mind flexible enough to be used across many different mediums so whatever floats your boat works!

Include about 3-5 sentences about how you'd like to run the section and what kinds of ideas you have for it. Each week would get a theme. I'm cool with images, writing, music, just about anything that would fit the theme. However, anything submitted would need to be original content, which means no fetching someone else's memes and just copying and pasting them here. Make your own memes! Or silly rap songs! Or draw/Photoshop your own silly images!

[Neo Emolga]

Eh heh, so you might have noticed judges weren't finalized yet. Turns out I don't have every section covered like I thought I did.

The problem is when it comes to Graphic Art, Drawn Art, and Comics, I can cover two out of three of any of those sections with the current judges, but not all of them. I tried reaching out to Sarah to see if she would be interested in taking that last section, but I think she's pretty busy at the moment. So what I'm going to do is exchange my role in judging Humor and I'll be going with one of those instead. I honestly think covering those three sections are more important than Humor anyway.

If there's someone out there that wants to judge humor, I'm totally cool with that, but please let me know before the end of Friday. If I don't get any responses, I'll just drop it from the schedule.

[Neo Emolga]

Okay, here is the unofficial judging schedule:

https://i.imgur.com/V3cjenh.png

If you have issues with be able to work with this, please let me know right away and I'll try to work something out! There's still a little bit of time to change things if you think you might not be able to work with this.

Thanks for being a Judge and hope you all have fun with it! :3

Shruikan LKWayvern EmeraldSky Pokemon Trainer Sarah Chakramaster K'sariya Nekomata Bulbasaur

[K'sariya]

Okay, here is the unofficial judging schedule:

https://i.imgur.com/V3cjenh.png

If you have issues with be able to work with this, please let me know right away and I'll try to work something out! There's still a little bit of time to change things if you think you might not be able to work with this.

Thanks for being a Judge and hope you all have fun with it! :3

Shruikan LKWayvern EmeraldSky Pokemon Trainer Sarah Chakramaster K'sariya Nekomata Bulbasaur

Ahh!! Thanks so much. I'm super excited. This is my first time judging something, but I'll do my best! If I have any questions about what I need to do that isn't answered in the information already in the threads, who's the best person for me to chat with? @NeoEmolga

[EmeraldSky]

Thanks again for letting me take part--I look forward to seeing what sorts of captions I'll get this year!

[Neo Emolga]

Ahh!! Thanks so much. I'm super excited. This is my first time judging something, but I'll do my best! If I have any questions about what I need to do that isn't answered in the information already in the threads, who's the best person for me to chat with? @NeoEmolga

ME! No, really, feel free to ask me anything and I'll try my best to answer it. I know you're judging Pixel Art and while that kind of thing isn't my forte, I know a little and can guide you in terms of ways you can set up your event thread and such. Heck, if you need ideas for themes too, I've got plenty.

And hey, if I get stuck, I know a few peeps I can reach out to, also. So you're in good hands. :3


Thanks again for letting me take part--I look forward to seeing what sorts of captions I'll get this year!

No prob! Enjoy and have lots of fun with it!

[Nekomata]

Just a heads up- I know I don't have my section up- thought it started tomorrow. A bit tied up with class- will get it up ASAP. MY BAD.

[Neo Emolga]

Just a heads up- I know I don't have my section up- thought it started tomorrow. A bit tied up with class- will get it up ASAP. MY BAD.

No worries, thanks for the heads up about it! :D

[EmeraldSky]

Just reporting that my thread is up!

[Neo Emolga]

Just reporting that my thread is up!

Cool, thanks for getting that up and going!

You guys are great, I was just about to send out a reminder to anyone that didn't get stuff set up yet and everyone's already accounted for! I wish people at my job were like this!

[Nekomata]

Neo Emolga

It's up! Sorry for the lateness. I never forgot- just kept procrastinating until I realized I got the first day wrong. WHOOPS. My bad. xD