Results of the artwork contest 2016 – Places 26+
└ posted on Sunday, 21 August 2016, by Novil
Our yearly Sandra and Woo and Gaia artwork contest ended last Saturday. The extension of the submission period paid off: The number of sumissions almost doubled to 67 in total! I really didn’t expect that and am very grateful for it. Today, I’m showing you all the entries that didn’t make it into the top 25. There are some really nice drawings among them, so you should definitely check them out as well. I will create two other news posts for the places 11 to 25 and the top 10 later this week.
The following list of submissions starts with the eight submissions placed on position 26+ which I liked the most, in alphabetical order. The subsequent submissions are then ordered alphabetically again. The artists’ names are colored in red if a link to their personal website is available. Show your support by visiting the artists’ websites and/or writing a comment in the comment section of this blog post!
To our gold and diamond patrons: I will offer a convenient download archive containing all submissions in their original size after the end of the contest.
 by Ihuoma Ohanaka I like the cutesy art style. Unfortunately, the lines have noticable aliasing artifacts. |
 by Matthew May [Artist’s comment: Taken inspiration from classic Noir movie posters.] |
 by Maximiliano Penna The quality of the individual drawings varies a bit too much in Maximiliano’s entry for a spot in the top 25. [Artist’s comment: I dressed up Cloud, Sandra, Larisa and Woo like characters from the Ace Attorney video games. I thought it would be a fun crossover because I love both franchises!] |
 by Oliver Barber Oliver’s drawing shows that a good drawing technique doesn’t secure you a spot in the top 25 when the general idea for the picture just doesn’t work with the depicted character(s). Since Oliver’s other great drawing of Sandra and Woo is high up in the top 10, he should be able to get over the low placement of this one fast. There is also an alternative version without blood. [Artist’s comment: I really wanted to help bolster your number of entries in any way I could so I drew this rather upsetting image of Lilith. Lilith is stuck inside a mirror looking on at her friends beng slaughtered. That was the idea, the broken glass is where a spell or a piece of shrapnel broke it. I drew it because It was how I felt when my friend died (like a useless spectator).] |
 by Philippe Philippe’s nice pencil drawing would have profited from scanning it properly. |
 by Thomas Sem Frisli Thomas submitted three entries, and this is the best one in my opinion. [Artist’s comment: Combining 2 things I love, Legend of Zelda and Sandra and Woo.] |
 by Elin Ståhl Another nice traditional drawing that would have profited from scanning it properly. I like the triangle symbol on Viviana’s hand. [Artist’s comment: A picture of a slitghtly older Viviana in all her queenly-glory :). Painted with ProMarkers and watercolours.] |
 by Sandy Tanudjaja This is a seriously cute drawing. [Artist’s comment: Here’s Sandra and Cloud cosplaying as Final Fanatasy VII: Advent Children Tifa and… Cloud.] |
 by Adam Chastan |
 by BluePringlez I’m quite fond of the idea for Larisa’s dress, especially of the happy, burning sun. But the execution of the idea is just not good enough for the top 25. |
 by Brooklyn Beck The magic effect looks interesting. [Artist’s comment: The picture was done with acrylic paints.] |
 by David Friedman |
 by Elin Ståhl I expected even more Pokémon themed submissions. [Artist’s comment: A picture of Sandra as a Pokémon Go trainer :).] |
 by Erilin-Neptunus Butterfly with butterflies. I like the idea and I’m always happy to see fanart of Butterfly since she’s one of my favorite characters. But the drawing is a bit too simple for the top 25. |
 by Evan McKinley While the idea for this submission is certainly good, the final result also comes with at least one glaring problem: The goddess of the raccoons, the animal species known for its mischievousness and bandit mask, is depicted as LAWFUL good?!? No, Sir, I don’t think so! (If you remember, in her first apperance she ordered Woo to steal Sandra’s cake.) [Artist’s comment: My entry, “Our Valued Employees”, depicts a plaque in Elysium.] |
 by Genevieve Rose |
 by Genevieve Rose |
 by Hafeth Wadi |
 by Julie Kohler This is a nice drawing of a real raccoon. But it doesn’t look like Woo at all. |
 by Julie Levy Pokémon fans may appreciate this one in particular. I like the matching tails. |
 by Kara Russell |
 by Kes von Mauseohr This is a very cute drawing of a baby raccoon. But it doesn’t really look much like Woo which is always a particular issues for drawings featuring just one character. [Artist’s comment: This is what Woo may have looked like as a baby.] |
 by Klara Stock After several years of these fanart contests, I’ve come to the conclusion that oil on canvas is an incredibly tough choice of medium for depicting cartoon characters. [Artist’s comment: On the one hand, we’ve got Larisa who’s determined to save Sandra (and playing with fire… again) and on the other hand there’s Sandra who I’m pretty sure would be horrified by what Larisa has gotten herself into again. I tried to stay with a colour scheme for each but also mixed the main colours (red for Larisa, blue for Sandra) up a bit when drawing the hair because I guess I’ve always seen Sandra and Larisa as kinda two sides of the same coin; because as different as they are they do have lots of stuff in common. It also seems that it’s pretty hard to get skin colour with a blueish undertone, resulting in Sandra looking a bit ill. But I mean she’s basically dying so it seemed appropriate. Also, mixing blue and red for a proper purple is not as easy as one might think but it think kinda worked for the eyes.] |
 by Kuin D |
 by Laura Nungaray |
 by Leo Capella Since reading a story actually takes some time, I have to caution you against reading this short story of a meeting between Gradus and Salacea from Gaia. The writing has several severe issues that overshadow the interesting story idea. [Artist’s comment: Here is my entry for the artwork contest 2016 which is a short piece of fanfiction for Gaia: “Blooding a Queen, Making a Monarch”. I wrote it because having read pages 25 to 30 of Monster, I was intrigued by the rainbow knife of Asram and also Jael Bara’s path to the throne. As a politics graduate, I also like an interesting debate too.] |
 by Lily She-Yin This entry reminded me of Riley Hulick’s drawing from the artwork contest 2014 which also features a body switch between Sandra and Woo. [Artist’s comment: ARTIST_COMMENT] |
 by Mackenzie Stricklin |
 by Marcia Wilson This drawing mimics almost exactly the last panel of the Sandra and Woo strip Larisa vs. Sushi. [Artist’s comment: Sandra takes Larisa out for sushi. I love the idea of Larisa having a Zippo Lighter, but she would probably think it was too tiny, so I made a Zappo. Plus, I love the idea of her dressed as a Riverboat Gambler. Sandra is, in the meantime, wondering what in the world she was thinking and hoping the chopsticks are made out of pawlonia – you know, “The wood that doesn’t burn.”] |
 by Meadow Mcgalliard |
 by Mohamed Iddeen Shah Ishak |
 by Saul Watson |
 by Saul Watson The sky and the birds look great, but the drawing quality of the characters just can’t keep up with that. |
 by Scott North I failed to post this submission by Scott for last year’s contest. So here it is. |
 by Scott North Scott also submitted a new entry for this year’s contest. Just like in the submission above, the environment looks better than the characters. [Artist’s comment:I present this year in the contest: “Moonlight Walk”. Hand drawn and digitally painted in Photoshop.] |
 by Stuart Green This drawing is based on the Sandra and Woo strip If you miss an update, you may at least insult your readers. [Artist’s comment: I only really draw with pencil and never ink, so this was challenging.] |
 by Thalia Blackney |
[VIDEO]  by Thomas Sem Frisli Woo certainly would not agree with Sandra here. Garbage is a very touchy subject among raccoons. [Artist’s comment: This is my cartoon animation made with flipaclip.] |
 by Thomas Sem Frisli [Artist’s comment: This one is inspired by the posters of my favorite movie series, Lord of the Rings.] |
 by Victoria Jackman [Artist’s comment: For my piece, I decided to draw what Sandra and her friends would look like as teenagers. Larisa is even more rebellious than she was before; as seen by her hair, tattoo, and a bag that may or may not contain a flamethrower. She would also be an activist for children with terminal illnesses. Sandra is still the bright, caring, enthusiastic girl that we all know and love. I think she would have a career in forest conservation, thanks to Woo, or mathematics. Sandra and Cloud are still together; he’s still an adept swordsman and video gamer and he’ll probably be an ambassador for Burma(Myanmar) and Sandra’s husband sometime in the future.] |
 by Wesley Hunt |
I actually planned to recreate the “Night Under The Highwind” scene, but due to a number of factors like Tifa’s original outfit being too fanservice-y and real life matters reducing my time to less than 3 days I had to cut corners and settle with it. Ah well, life goes on. Thank you for the opportunity and best of luck for the contest. Btw, there’s a typo. “Final Fanatasy”?
I think Novil is being a litttle harsh on some of his reviews. Then again, if all you recieve is compliments, you won’t really improve. Anyway, keep up the good work on both comics!
I’m the only one posting in a sketchbook!!?? *hilarious* :D… all of the art is very nice, cant wait to know the top 10… :3
Well, better luck for next time, congratulations to all the winners!
Wow! So many good ideas! SO much hype!
Wow, the review of Leo Capella’s story is very mean-spirited. Saying “writing is not one of your talents” is just bullying…it’s awful to hear that from the creator of something you love. While some of the other reviews could be seen as constructive criticism, this review can’t be seen that way, really, because it doesn’t say what exactly was wrong with the story or how it could have been made better.
Novil, you’re the creator of something people love, and people are creating things based off of it. You’re talented at your craft, and it only makes sense that you’d be better at writing your own story than other people. I’ve written fanfiction myself, and I automatically assume that the original work is better than my own…that’s just how it works. Here, you have an aspiring writer who cares enough about your work to model their own writing after yours. And rather than fostering their creativity, you decided to mock their work and discourage other people from reading it.
Leo, since Novil didn’t give constructive criticism of your story, I’ll give you some. Firstly, I thought the complexity of the conversation and the intertwining of different plot points were the best parts of the story, distinguishing your story from most other fanfiction. I also liked your word choice throughout the story. I’d say the story’s greatest weakness would be that it’s sometimes difficult to attribute dialogue to characters—especially the italicized thoughts; it was hard to tell who was doing the thinking. Also, a few lapses in punctuation are somewhat distracting and break the flow of the story. But other than those two things, the story has a lot of potential, and I really like your writing style. If you work a bit on dialogue and punctuation, you’ve got a lot of potential to be an excellent writer! Don’t let Novil’s negative review get you down!
And to anybody else reading this comment, please read Leo’s story—it’s quite interesting.
I forgot to include my deviantART page in my email, but you can get from my comments….
@ Kara Paravel:
I, too, was struck by the harshness of Novil’s comment on Leo’s work, so I took the time to read it and see if there was any basis for the negativity. So, Leo, here is my two cents if you are interested:
1) I think that the punctuation does hinder the piece and makes it feel like it was put together hastily. I know that with my artwork, if I work on a piece for a long time and submit it as soon as I am finished, I find errors in it the next day that I regret not taking the time to find and fix. In the same sense, improper punctuation suggests a lack of care and finesse.
Moral: Proper punctuation polishes a piece and makes it look sharp.
2) I personally didn’t care for the thoughts of the characters walking alongside the spoken dialogue. It felt like they were sentences in the waiting room of the conversation — completely formed and structured thoughts that never had the chance to be spoken. It’s probably fine to have one or two of these, briefly, — Old curmudgeon, Salacea thought — for example, but the frequency of the characters’ thoughts in your story adds an extra layer of conversation that distracts from the spoken dialogue. I think this could be fixed in at least a couple of ways. One, consider telling us about the characters’ thoughts in third person, without them having to do it themselves, or two, incorporate their thoughts into the dialogue as best you can. I think that would really help this piece shine!
Moral: Too many levels of conversation spoil the broth.
3) I think another thing that hung me up was the sentence (or small paragraph) between every chunk of spoken word. For example, Gradus might speak, then a short sentence mentions something about Salacea before she speaks, then another short sentence about Gradus before he replies, and so on. It felt like the characters were passing around a microphone that only let them speak when they were holding it. Don’t be afraid to drop these sentences and let the dialogue flow immediately from one person to the other! If it’s absolutely necessary to describe what a person is doing at the time, you can leave a transitional sentence in there, but I think you’ll find that you can really live without them most of the time, which is really quite liberating.
Moral: Transition sentences in dialogue can disrupt the flow of the conversation.
That being said, I hope my comments were helpful, and I want to encourage you, Leo, to keep writing! Practice, study, and diligence are your friends, and I wish you the best of luck in your writing endeavors!