SONGWRITING COMPETITION - SWC065 January 2023 - Winners announced

[OrpheusXL]

Ooops, I misunderstand the end time for voting to be end of the 2. February. Damn!

But as I put so much effort in this tonight, I'll post it anyway.

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Critics for the Song-Contest

Well, to write some critiques for the works of others seems to be a harder thing for me than creating a song.
First, as you might have noticed by my entry, I’m not „up-to-date“ with the modern music styles or trends. I even cannot say which genre my own music would fit in, so I use „electronic“ to describe it.

But well, I will make a „favorites“ list and try to explain, what I like in the songs and what not.

1) Esteve Corbera
2) Arelem - Gone
3) György Becsei - Adlibs
4) cotmm68030 - matrioshka brain neural dessynchronization
5) VCA-089 - Machine Heart


Esteve Corbera - Magica Cosmica

Really calming and nice to listen. My impression is, that the melody is created by using an arpeggiator and it sometiomes seem to get out of the beat. But as there are not drums, this is negligible. My favorite one anyway.
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Arelem - Gone

+++ The overall mood fitss very well with the lyrics. the „piano“ chords could be reduces sometimes a bit. And a nice voice. I wish I could sings in tune like this, ;-)
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György Becsei - Adlibs

Very interesting compositions with a lot of changes which keep it exciting to listen. Nothing ore to say.
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cotmm68030 - matrioshka brain neural dessynchronization

++ I think it could be a perfect sound for a science fiction film about an alien planet in the dark. I specially like the „shakers“.
Although for a „song“ contest, I’m missing the music, but anyway, a great soundtrack.
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+ VCA-089 - Machine Heart

A successful interpretation of a huge driving machine. And a nice varied topic. I love the part before the end and I imagine it could be intereting to slow down the heart beat for a „sleeping phase“ and then go into dreams. But what is a machine dreaming of?s
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Mellow Browne - Fight Your Demons

It has a good drive and I like the overall sound composition. I only miss some more variations, but I guess this depends on the intentions if it’s for listening or for dancing.
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Tinnitus- Severe

I have to admit, that the first part is way to fast and somewhat chaotic for me, but then! The second part is wonderful!
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GMoneh - Grains of Sand
Interesting sounds. Some variations in the first 120 seconds would be refreshing. The melody instrument is a bit to loud for my ears, but my ears are already old. ;-)
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LifeLoop byThe Exponent would have been in my farorite list for sure.

What I learned during this contest, is as the most important part, how to level the loudness. I’ll have to go through some of my soundcloud uploads to change them to balance the loudness for all songs.
Second, I was using a sampler plugin for most of the tracks and discovered some new features which I will use in the future.
Now, good luck to all participants!

[Mister Fox]

It's the 03rd February 2023, 03:40 (UTC+1/CET) - the extended Voting Period has officially ended as well.

Please no more edits/adjustments to your posts.

I will now collect all points and read your feedback again (I really like the interaction this month) to determine the bonus points. I will post the results and Winners Podium by the end of the weekend.


Please have an eye on this thread

[Mister Fox]

Ladies and Gentlemen, here are the results of Songwriting Competition 61

The winners podium consists of:

1. @VCA-089 (39 pts)
2. @becsei_gyorgy (38 pts)
3. @tinnitus (35 pts)

Apologies for the waiting time, this is not an automated process.

<4 participant rule is not in use (staff comments and votes, my vote would count as bonus)
We have 1 disqualification (due to lack of feedback)
We have 1 withdrawn entry (but counts as submission within the deadline)
We have 1 users still in the game that tied

• based upon pure participation votes: OrpheusXL acquired 10pts -- Alex Banks acquired 6pts -- OrpheusXL therefore scores higher. The tie happened due to the offsets with the bonus point mechanic
• no (more) users that tied

"Sole (License) Winner" rule does not apply - 3-position Winners Podium (>= 9 participants prior to the deadline)


STATISTICS SHEET:
Overview of Submissions (PDF - updated: 04-FEB-2023, full sheet)

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Bonus Info

Short info: I am using Wavelab 10 for batch analysis, then I manually port the CSV export to a Microsoft Excel/Open Office Calc sheet with custom layout (this is not an automated process). As pointed out in this post from SWC047 / July, Wavelab has different tolerances for dBTP max analysis compared to tools like iZotope RX, Youlean Loudness Meter, NUGEN Audio VisLM, etc. To find a common ground, I've implemented "allowed tolerances" (just like with the Mix Challenge). These are based upon allowed offsets mentioned in the white papers for EBU R128 and ITU-R BS.1770-4. Since no measurement tool is the same, to be on the save side, please export at -14,1 LUFS ILk max, and -1,1 dBTP max. As usual, I did list/analyze alternative releases (MP3s and FLAC). If you've submitted your entry in multiple file formats, the statistic sheet will focus on the uncompressed material first (WAV), then FLAC, then MP3. The higher the quality, the less possible loss on bonus points for "Loudness Specs" due to offsets introduced by a used CODEC. In this case, FLAC and MP3 are merely for information purposes.

Here are the results as chart in image form:



Thank you so much for your participation.

⚠	Moderation Message from Mister Fox
	INFORMATION: While we're technically no longer testing the overhauled feedback and voting mechanic, I am still fine-tuning things. I eventually have to put this into proper words. However, I am now officially adapting the same voting mechanic as most other International Songwriting Competitions utilize, including the KVR One Synth Challenge and the Great Guitar Build Off (by Ben Crowe). All of these games use(d) a 01 to 05 points system (top 5 entries). The main difference to our game: these ones don't offer bonus points or penalty points, neither are they tiered (depending on the participant amount). I hope to get that fine tuned within the coming weeks. For transparency: We have a tie on the chart above (two users being at 12pts). Going by the points from participants alone (which are always used as basis for breaking up ties), @OrpheusXL (10pts) would have scored higher than @AlexHyper-EZBanks (6pts) by default. The draw results due to the "general bonus points" mechanic (filename, loudness specs, documentation). This is a prime example of how your position on the chart can shift depending on how much attention you pay to the details. Speaking of: there are two additional columns on the chart this month. One for "Bonus Points" related to this game (extended feedback for everyone), and one for "Penalty Points". I try to find a better visual solution in follow-up months. To get an idea on the Penalty Points: @tinnitus didn't reflect on his experience this month. So in fairness to everyone else, I deducted -1pt from his final score. For @Mellow Browne and @JeroenZuiderwijk I actually knocked off -2pts, because I had to go back and forth several times to find out what the most recent entry was (the original post wasn't edited). This added extra work on my end, please try to prevent that in the future by using the forum's own edit feature. @OrpheusXL sadly submitted his feedback after the deadline, and that always results in a -5pts penalty. And technically, there was no need for points for @A Future in Noise's entry, as this one was withdrawn anyway. But at bar minimum, it would have resulted in -5pts for not being at least 1:30min of runtime. Most of you actually opted to go for +2pts bonus for giving feedback to everyone. This had a huge influence on the final score sheet for some of you. The exception being @OrpheusXL (who only gave feedback to 9 entries, technically even only 8 from the main game), and @AlexHyper-EZBanks, who kept things down to a bare minimum. Regular Bonus point wise, there is nothing special happening. If your entry is outside of the allowed loudness limits, you'll loose out -2pts each (Loudness max in LUFS ILk, maximum signal strength in dBTP), or if your file doesn't use the known filename template (-1pt). Overall - I am really happy about this month's participation and interaction. I hope we can continue this in the months to come. Also, thank you very much for the positive response regarding the "Community Scramble" game as a whole. Unfortunately, if we were to do this game twice a year, we would also need to collect suitable sample content multiple times. But I'll think about this request.

License selection:

We'll now perform with the usual. Selecting licenses is handled in public. Please select one license/company out of the pool (in order of the winners podium) and mention it in this thread, then (important) please get in touch with me (via PM) with your full name, email address and your license selection.

As usual - you're not forced to pick up anything. You can pass and therefore offer more to select for the next person in line (if there is a spot existing / not available for "sole winner" mechanic). Just let all participants/winners/the staff know in a timely manner (within 5 days). Once one company has been selected, it's out of the pool for the next person on the podium.



I re-open the field for talking some more about each others' productions. If things drift a bit too off-topic, please use the General Gossip thread, or Discord.



See you in in the next challenge!


Songwriting Competition 066 (February 2023) is still in full swing. There is currently 1 entry.



UPDATED: 06-FEB-2023 16:10 UTC+1 -- forgot one participant, re-uploaded chart, overhauled "final words".

[Mister Fox]

I am temporarily locking the thread. Apologies for the inconvenience.

Turns out I did a huge mistake on the score chart and missed one user. Thanks for the PMs to inform me of that.This of course might have an influence on the final results. I will get this sorted out ASAP.


EDIT 06-FEB-2023 16:15:
Thread is now re-opened. I triple checked all entries, updated the Score Sheet and the "final words". The Winners Podium shifted slightly (so close this month!). I sincerely apologize for this oversight and will be more thorough next month.

[Mellow Browne]

Great entries this month, it was fun to participate.
Congratulations to the winners!

[VCA-089]

That was a cool round! Great work everyone!

I'll pass...

[becsei_gyorgy]

Hi,
thank you all for participating, great things have been created. Well done.
Congratulations to everyone, especially VCA-089 and tinnitus.
I pass.

[tinnitus]

Taking a careful listen to everyone's entries during review time was the most fun.

For license, I'd be very grateful for IK Multimedia Bass Modo 2

[Mister Fox]

Alright everyone - all licenses have been addressed.

Thank you for joining SWC065 - I'll leave the door open for additional feedback for the entries.


See you in SWC066 February 2023