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Apologies if this topic is covered somewhere, but have searched the site and not come up with any answers yet. The question is: What is Dakka's policy on the rating of images 1-10. that is how are we supposed to rate images in the gallery. What does it mean to give and image 3 or 5 or 7 or 9 points? As a new user I'm a bit hesitant to give votes, or even comment, without a frame of reference. I don't want to be voting images too highly and annoying top-class painters but don't want to be giving medium or low ratings and make people feel bad about their work. Giving average ratings to everone doesn't seem like the thing to do either. (I noticed that Cool-mini or not has this policy: Voting Guide: Pretend you're a Golden Demon judge. Painting skill, imagination and style are key! 10 is amazing, 8 is a great job, 5 is tabletop quality.) Dakka users seem a little more generous that this, but maybe we could have a similar guide? It looks like a lot of questions have been asked why more people don't vote in the gallery. Maybe some kind of voting policy would help that too.

Also why not post a general thread in the P&M forum asking users to disable voting on their WIP images. I didn't realise the massive problem this was until people started voting on my WIP images, most of which I have now blocked. I would have done this from the beginning if I known the policy, I'm sure others would too.

The problem with a thread like that is it would need to be a sticky. The people who can't be bothered to disable voting on images that clearly have nothing to vote on would likely ignore it. Nothing really to do but tag it "disablevote" or something like that and let Kid_Kyoto take care of the rest. However there are some great WIP images out there sometimes showing off a nice sculpt someone has done or some cool conversions, for that its vote N/A for the painting and just vote on the coolness.

It usually ends up on the preference of the voter most probably have their own. Some may vote down because it's a faction/colour they don't like or vote up if they do. Some people even vote on their own images, maybe it's just for them to reflect on how well they thought it went, maybe it's to boost the score.

For me Table top quality is 4. This way I reserve the 10 for the very best of the best. An example of a 10/10 for me is this.


Don't be worried about voting though, most are grateful for any votes on their images (I know I am ) as it helps them get an idea of what level they're at and if they're ready to go out and try some new techniques they may have though of as too hard for them before. Comments also help out that way as well.

In the same way I save 1/10 for the absolute worst, the ones that look like they were thrown at a bucket of paint of left to hibernate a year in one. I think I may have one or two votes that low as like the 10/10 it takes that special something extra to reach it.

I'm by no means a harsh marker, I just like to leave something extra for the truly great stuff. If there was an 11/10 I'd use it for the same thing.

Personally I usually use a four-point scale from 6 to 9. Anything worse than that I probably wouldn't bother voting on. Tens, as might be expected, are reserved for the exceptional.

It is a 10 point scale, so for me, 5 is an average model that has all the basic techniques and looks good.


Painting
10 - Golden Daemon winningly good. Has many techniques applied to it and is master level.

9 - Would be a very good Golden Daemon level model. The kind of model you would paint to put on show.

8 - Excellently painted show quality model with lots of advanced techniques.

7 - A very good model that is on the border between tabletop and show quality. Has some advanced techniques.

6 - A good tabletop quality model that is well painted. May have some advanced techniques applied.

5 - Slightly better than standard tabletop mini. Uses all the basic techniques.

4 - A tabletop model. Uses some basic techniques.

3 - A sub par tabletop quality model. Generally has no techniques applied to it to make it look better. May have thick paint, etc.

2 - A very poor model. Will almost certainly have blobby paint, bits miss-painted, brush marks, etc.

1 - Model looks like it has been used as target practice in a paintball match.

0 - The model has been dunked in house paint or is utterly offensive to the eyes.


The modeling/coolness scores are similar, although reflect modeling skill and technique - posing, removing flash lines, sculpting, conversions/kit bashes, etc.

Thank for the replies everyone, I've a bit more of a clue now. I'm actually a bit of a shy person so that makes me a bit more hesitant about these things.

Wazzdig Dagga wrote:Thank for the replies everyone, I've a bit more of a clue now. I'm actually a bit of a shy person so that makes me a bit more hesitant about these things.

I hope you feel good about voting in all cases...don't worry about what people think about your votes, as long as you feel happy with your system that's what counts.

The reason that we haven't implemented an 'official' voting scale is because as soon as you do that people get angry and insulted by votes on their models. They think stuff like: 'my model is WAY better than table top quality and that guys is nowhere NEAR golden demon level!'

Of course, people get hurt about scores regardless of what the scale is, but in general we want people to vote how they feel it applies to them as opposed to a set scale that is still ultimately going to mean a different thing to each person voting.

What I constantly try to impress on people is that the voting system is not just a random excuse to judge people's work (although it is that too). It provides a really valuable tool for the search engine to pull up good images first and sort poor images to the bottom.

That means we need people to vote as often as possible and vote for both good AND bad images...and especially on images you think the score is way off. Those are usually images with very few votes that got voted on by somebody intent on screwing around. However once you and a few more people cast your votes it will help get the image more in its proper place in the gallery.