The Armorama Staff are please to showcase the entries into the 2011 Model of the year Contest, made up from the last 11 months winners.

Please take a few moments to view before choosing your winning entry

Link to Item

If you have comments or questions please post them here.

Thanks!

WHAT a choice of models

Well this will be a REALLY hard choice

cmon, just give everyone a small prize

Vote cast, I must say that is a very nice collection. Winners all for sure!


cheers

Vote cast. Way too hard to pick one with any certainty, these are quite the lot.

If I may offer one tiny suggestion, (perhaps for 2012 ), I'd split these into some basic categories... Dunno, allies, axis, modern. The sheer number of entries, let alone their quality, just leave me with the impression the lot is too large to do justice to the talent displayed here.

Just a thought.

Best of luck to all contestants, and congrats to all for these fine models.

JV

Sorry Guys but its meant to be a little difficult is after all the "model of the year"

cheers

Keith

I heartily endorse all of the preceding sentiments, but 44 is just too unweildy a number to judge. (And why 44, by the way? 12 x 3 + 8 ???) As JV suggests, for the coming year why not divide them by period and side, or by category as you do the photos (Tanks, AFVs, Softskins, Artillery and/or "Other"). Perhaps a separate category for Dioramas, too, which I greatly enjoy, or "Best Historical Vignette." I realize such a system would be more difficult to arrange, but for members it would make selecting the winners less bewildering, and hopefully foster more awards, too.

Voted!

I will agree with everything said thus far. With this many entries the voting will most likely come down to the voters favourite type or era of vehicle rather than taking the time to evaluate each and every one.

And have you included the top three for each month? Just the first place winner I think would have been more appropriate, hence 12 entries.

I do mean this to be constructive and I do appreciate the work put forth to make these contests happen, thanks for putting this together!




cheers

A lot of nice choices, too bad I can only pick one. Voted.

Voted. Some superb work there.

As others have said though, this should just be made up of the first place winners.

I totally agree! All of them would deserve it!

Well, I voted, but the choice was incredibly hard

4 entries from each month went into finals. I think the subdivision is not necessary since some of the categories would be simply not filled (only 1 artillery piece f.e.)

Another thing that came into my mind - maybe at the end of the year there should be a round up like at the end of campaign - just showing the winners of each month with 2-3 images without voting for best of the best? And make badges for users in the same manner as campaign badges.

And I wish next year we follow the submission rules strictly - no bases with groundworks, no figures.

I don't wish to be obtuse, but I'm afraid I don't follow.

Every month has a gold, silver and bronze winner, for a yearly total of 36 winners. Who chooses the fourth model to compete, and on what basis? And if every month had four entrants, there'd be 48 to choose from at the end of the year, not 44.

As to the failure of categories to be filled, it all depends on how you define each category. For example, if artillery includes self-propelled as well as conventional tubes (and missiles as well), then this year has at least a dozen qualifying entrants in that category. (In fairness, I'm sure a little huddle among those who so capably run this fine website would probably arrive at better and more equitable categories that the ones I threw out off the top of my head for discussion.)

Your concept of an end-of-year round-up showing two or three images of each of the 12 monthly winners is an excellent idea. Among the 44 we have to choose from this year, several are in my judgment not portrayed to their best advantage. Image 28, for example, has a blue fabric background that appears to fascinate the figure in the halftrack, who has his back to us; meanwhile, image 41 alone has two views of the very detailed model. Multiple views of all competitors would tend to level the playing field.

Finally, I agree with that dioramas or models with figures and backgrounds may enjoy an advantage (among some modelers, at least) over a model alone, just as the setting can enhance a fine gem in a beautiful ring. However, I disagree that submission rules should be followed strictly. Rather, such submissions should be categorized and considered separately. Many (most?) modelers, certainly including myself, enjoy a diorama that tells a story even as we appreciate a well-rendered vehicle alone, and we have plenty of both to enjoy this year. The key is to judge apples against apples, and oranges against oranges, not to eliminate either one.

If Dragon, which very generously supplies the models that have long been the fine prizes in this competition, would rather not do so for dioramas, Armorama has many other fine supplies of figures, decals, photoetch and diorama-related aftermarket items. I'd imagine one of them might be interested in backing an annual award for the best diorama, don't you?

There was no contest in December, that's why 11 months x 4 models each.
As it is now - it is a single model contest and single models must compete against single models. It worked fine without subcategories since in some months we had only 7 or 8 entries.
If there will be a company that sponsors vignette or diorama contest - I don't know.

While all great models, 44 was a lot to wade through and do them all justice. I cast my vote but I have a feeling that you're going to see votes heavily diluted among so many choices and it will be a major challenge for any one entry to acheive a plurality of votes nevermind a majority and thus legitimately be considered "the best" or even the top 3 best. A run-off of some kind may be in order if that turns out to be the case?

Hi all

let me answer a few of the questions although most of the answers are available in the rules section

2011 DMOM contest rules

The DMOM runs from January to November with the December contest being the Model of the year. The entries are recieved during the month say January and the voting done the Beginning of Feburary and so on.

Now it was decided back at the end of 2010 that the top 4 voted models every month would go through to the Model of the year, so 11 month x 4 models = 44 models in the Model of the year.

This is the first year we have tried this and in hind sight (a wonderful thing) 44 models may just be to many, but these are the models the readers have decided each month as there Models of the month so this year we have 44, for 2012 we may review it and take the top 2 each month, i will decide once i see how this months results are going.

I know it will be difficult to decide which is your Model of the year from the outstanding models available but these didnt win model of the month for no reason, this could mean we have some tie siturations and if this is the case the models that tie will go forward to a seperate vote to narrow it down until we get the three winners.

As to seperate categories sorry not going to happen, we have one contest that is sponsored by Dragon Models and that is currently the way it will stay, they supply the prizes and ship them directly to the winners once we give them the details for which i am very grateful for, on top of that the current set up take up most of my spare time to sort out and produce with out adding any extra work load.

I have currenty yet to finalise the 2012 rules, but this year i will be far stricter on the entries, with no figures,or decorated bases allowed I will allow models that are presented on a plain base (i.e. plain wooden or similar). I will continue to allow picture in picture but this will be limited to only one additional picture in the same frame as your main entry.

so good luck to all the entries

cheers

Keith

My vote is in. A large, excellent field of entrants, which makes choosing one very difficult.
Good Luck to all!

My vote is in, what a stunning collection to have to select from !

I must say, as an aircraft modeler I am DEEPLY offended by the number of anti-aircraft vehicles represented though

Cheers, D

Sounds like a plan Keith, look forward to seeing the outcome of the 2011 voting as well as potential changes for 2012!

Votes in! All very impressive builds and extremely inspirational. Hard to chose just one 'but it is, what it is'.

Good luck to all of those who have participated throughout the year, hoping to see more of your work here again this year. Thanks so much for sharing your builds with all of us and for keeping our hobby a fun and enjoyable one.

~ Eddy

Fantastic range of super well made models. It is just awesome to look at.

Voted - although it was a difficult one.

Good luck to all

so, which one is model of the year?