Yet another judging, with some small pointers before I start.
As you all know, this round the contestants had to make blogs. And accordingly, I believe a good graphician thinks of what he or she is making when he or she makes it. Therefore, I will also make small pointers of the function of the blogs; sets are used as sets and they should be usable for that cause, blogs are used as blogs and they should be suited for that use. Still with me? Good.
bluehawaii19: Amazing blending I must say *applause*. The colors are dreamy and soft, can't complain on anything there either. Not to the minus part. First of all, you need to work on your borders. This particular one jumps right at me, destroying a lot of the feeling in the blog. It is way too strong and thick, and doesn't match the rest of the serenity one bit (kind of like placing a white fluffy rabbit inside a solid concrete box.. okay okay, I think you get it.). Definitely an improvement regarding the fonts, though you should have placed the "Welcome" above the box.
Darklegendary: Groovy purple, though using only colors like that fail to give the blog features that would make it interesting to the eye. By this I'm not saying you should have mixed in some orange, green and a bunch of other colors, but you could have put more contrast to the image and made some parts darker etc. I'm not too keen on how you turned the image, gives the set a messy feel. Borders still a bit too strong; don't be afraid to use lighter colors for them.
Starchaser: Interesting, and also daring putting the box straight onto the image borders themselves. It works though. Good blending and great color effects, they really make the blog stand out of the crowd. If I were you I would have added a lighter border as a contrast to the main border, like it is now the border falls too much into the image.
watericecage: I don’t really get the feeling you have done that much to this particular blog. The image quality is not very good, and the “welcome” text seems a bit rugged (it could have used more anti-alias, unless the image quality made it “worse”). Your border is too thick and plain as well, one pixel with some gradient colors would have improved it a whole lot. The image placing itself is fairly good though. Good blog for a beginner, however, to be the PPTTG you need you train your skills more, add image effects etc.
moogie: VERY original moogie, this is a great blog. I love how you placed the “be cool” text on the wall, making it look like graffiti. Also nice that you did not make the text area for the blog lighter, but instead gray scale. A problem as I would see is the border, although there’s nothing incredibly wrong with black and white, colors matching the colored parts of the blog would have been better in my opinion.
Scholastic: Sorry to say but I really don’t like this blog. It is way too blurry and nothing at all stands really out from it. I can hardly work out the image, and after a while I got rather tired of trying to figure out what the images were all about. I can’t say justice has been done to the original image. The borders don’t really work either a long with the text. Good idea at the beginning, bad result.
Shadowfare: Nicely done, I adore the colors, they give a calm and dreamy look to the blog. If I were you I would have made the text box a bit smaller, so that the welcome text could have been placed above it without touching the box-border. Also, you should have made the color inside the box a bit more darker, thinking about if the blog would come to practical use. As it is now, it would be hard to find a suitable color for the font inside to make it clearly visible
Dawn2: Small yet sassy, I like it. Though there are some things you should have worked on a bit more. First of all, I see that you have some trouble removing the white around the image, as there is still some “leftovers” of that visible around the girl. You need to be careful with things like that. The image itself could have used a bit more contrast, as I see it now it is a tinsy winsy bit too blurred out (sometimes resizing can cause this). Chosen font is very good, but the borders are too rough. Last but not least, the box for the text is way to small, the girl should definitely been placed more to the right, making the box more wider. As a conclusion, you made a very good start but got only halfway there.
Amethyst: First problem I saw was that things in this blog blend way too much into each other. Box should have been made lighter as well as the font. As it is now it just seems like one big mess. Not all bad though, trust me. You placed the image well on the blog as well as the rest of the parts. Good work with gradients and image effects, though you could try to be a bit more eccentric.
Kyra: Neat one! I have a thing for rainbow color-combinations, and this one hits the spot. Great job with mosaic effects on the image as well as other effects. What I would like to point out is the text you have in the upper part of the blog, next time, watch out to it doesn’t tough the blog border, and make it a bit stronger with perhaps a border of its own etc.
Koku: Interesting choice of style, with a wonderful result. You seem to have an eye for the image effect parts, because as I see it now you have chosen the perfect combination for this blog. They all fit together nicely. I don’t like the placing of the pixel font though, it seems like it has floated on its own adventure, a better placing for it would have been perhaps straight above the “spiral” text. Nevertheless, keep up the good work.
Sunnie: Reminds me very much of the blogs I used to make when I was just starting out with my graphic making with more advanced programs such as photoshop. Nothing bad with it really, just the basics, which sadly makes it lack personality in form of graphics. It falls into the crowd, if you know what I mean? Many small improvements can be made, but I know it is about experimenting your way to the top. What I can point out though is that the text could have been placed a bit lower, making it rest on the box-border. You also used a non-suiting image effect with the larger pixels (2x2), try testing other styles next time.
Sakura: OMG I can’t believe you made something that awesome from the original image! Whoah… ahem, alrighty, back to the more serious judging. I can’t really find any flaws with this one, except yet again the practical part. Next time try not to narrow down the lighter area that much, so that the text-area will be easier to place nicely onto the blog.
polarbearpop: First of all I want to point out the obvious problems. The text does not work at all with this blog. You’ve chosen a bad font and put bad colors on it, what more can I say really? The text area is quite a mess as well, it need to stand out more with a lighter background and clearer and better border. This blog simply doesn’t appeal to me, I’m sure you could have done better giving it a bit more time, effort and thought.
hellyer: Refreshing was the first word brought to my mind. Nice job done. Simple theme, which I appreciate you kept simple without any extra fuss around. You’ve managed to make the image quality better as well with well-working light image effects. The main flaw is the welcome-text, you should have made it a bit smaller placing it closer to the box.
Optimus: I can’t say I have that much to point out about this particular blog. Mainly I would just like you to be more careful with the cut-outs next time, there is still some white left here and there, a good graphician considers the blog being but on a light as well as a dark background. If text would be placed in the box meant for it the main text would definitely be a problem, try to take that in consideration next time.
Kitten Medli: I think my main thoughts for this blog are the same as for Sunnie’s blog. To repeat myself: it reminds me very much of the blogs I used to make when I was starting out with more advanced graphic programs. You do not seem to have any obvious problems with image, text and box placing though. The next step for you should definitely be that you experiment a bit more with colors and effects, I’m sure that will bring good results.
ScottNak: Good start, though there are many details that bring down the quality of this blog. First of all, you should not have placed the sub-text where it is now. Its colors are way too strong, to be honest it just looks awful the way it is now. Moving on, you should have been more careful when cutting out the wolf (looking mainly it its legs). However, the rest seems to work fine, and I really like the fog-effects you have added.
DM was on fire!: Yet again, another example of what I call beginner blogs. Not too shabby, but lacking personality with details that could have been made better. The image you cut out got quite rough around the edges in the process, plus that the placing of it alongside the text and box is a bit off track. Summa sumarum, if I were you I would have placed the image a bit behind the box taking it further away from the blog-border and concentrated the text above the box. Colors are very nice though, and I’m not saying that just to be nice.
meowth1982: Great work with the text box as well as the borders, they fit together nicely (with the image too, of course). I feel that the image effect considering the darker stripes is not as good though, mainly because an effect like that seldomly works with any image. The font is most off-track though, you should definitely gone for something softer with more suiting brown-ish colors.
xerai: Good job with the chosen image, though I must say you could have chosen something more interesting. I’m just getting the feeling that you could have worked a bit more with the one you picked, as it is now I see an image pattern pasted onto it and that’s all… it’s just… grass. Considering it is grass, something more elegant would have been better when talking about the font, colors are very good though. Text box would have been better if it was a bit lighter.
...Alex: First of all, just by looking at the blog quickly I had a hard time catching where the text box was. It should definitely had a more lighter color as well as more visible borders. For the moment all I see is a bit more reddish tones and a weak border. Good image placing, same goes for text, but I believe the Harry Potter font would have made it even better (downloadable at for example dafont.com).
Apricus: Yet again quite amazed by the result, looking at the original image. Well done! Original idea as well, I appreciate such things. Next time try using thinner border, thick ones don’t really work in that many occasions (regarding both blog and its textbox). No, nothing else to yap about.
fzun: Gah, makes me really want to be wherever that picture is taken. This blog has a fun and crazy summery feel to it, good job, considering it’s hard to capture feelings in images. The only think I really feel I need to point out is the font: it really needs more strength and perhaps some color of its own instead of just the transparency. The text box looks good, but I’m wondering if it would have needed to be a bit lighter… ah well, I’ll just leave this one now.
Neko: Geez, how do you people manage to make these great creations out of all those small original images? Anyway… The background area to the right would have needed some texture; it does not look good with the plain green color. I myself would have probably also placed the font behind the box and made it a bit bigger, I think this would have been more suitable for the blog.
timkhj: First of all, good cutouts, it looks like the two images you used have always been “together” like that. Nice placing of image as well. Now to the less-fun part. You really should not have put the text on the bottom of the box there in the first place, it ruins a lot of the blog’s looks even though it’s such a small detail The clear red border is a bit too clear, it would have been better given a darker red color. The image quality itself is lacking, the blog needs more contrast and darker shades.
paola: Amazing work, and as you used to image to start with that’s even better. The only thing I want to point out is that you went a little overboard with the borders. In my opinion the darker area in the middle of the two other border-like creations could have been left out. And to end this, I must compliment you on how you managed to make the image look so glittery, just by skillful color (and perhaps brush?) use.
My votes go to Scholastic, polarbearpop, timkhj and watericecage.
Edit: No, I can't spell ![Cheeky Tongue :P](./images/smilies/icon_tongue.gif)