Hi All, while I was at IPMS Nationals , a chap came up to the stand and armed with a dentist mirror one of those on a shaft and a mini torch .He started to examine the underside and internal details of tanks and cabs on vehicles.
I asked politly what he was about .
His reply was and it stunned me . I have to check that what I am looking at is perfect and all traces of the makers logos have been removed.
I told him in no certain terms to P*** off as the underside was used as a testing area for paint colours .
As for checking the model was perfect . I told him no model could ever be perfect due to limitations of scale .
He muttered well you will never win when I judge .
At that I politly pointed him the dirrection of the doors and told him to take big steps . What a B***** nerve
. I told my mate about this and he had seen him doing it to other models and was told he is known for winding up modellers at shows . What are your thoughts on this . cheers ian

This Sort of character has haunted the hobby for years,some time back when i was a member of the BMSS,i saw a judge with a magnifing glass peering at a fig i had at the comp,i did as you also did i asked him politely what he was doing,"looking for faults,says he"i in turn informed him that i don't paint with the implement he was using,and did he know the story of where the monkey stores his nuts,it was his good fortune that another judge knew the story and led him away muttering in his ear,and saved him from a very painfull experience,unfortunately these peeps will always be around sad B*******s that they are.
Arthur

Lol -sadly no more than I would expect. Personally my experience with IPMS was never positive either...Jim

Ian i have met similar people too
often very ignorant and impolite
i often also found when i made a comment about thier behaviour they often said "well i'll make a note of your name if you like and make sure you never bl**dy win when i'm judging?"
thats the skinny on why i dont compete any longer!

Yep, know this people all to well , I would like for them to put thier heart and soul in to a model only to have one worse nit picking Judge to pick apart their model. We had this discussion a few months back . And thats not the only reason why i don't compete either, enough said

And that's exactly the kid of person that made me leave the IPMS many years ago, and I haven't been back or competed since.
My models are good enough for me, and the guys on Armorama ,and the commission customers that have paid good money for some of them over the years. If some sad guy with a magnifying glass tries to look underneath them he'll be sticking a toothbrush somewhere painfull in order to clean his teeth.

hey joseph did you know your swear word is a link ? :-)

Who is is going the first one to try it Kenaz,LOL
Arthur

hey arthur i did ! :-) its just a dud e-mail link though! shame that thoiught it was going to lead to a picture of the B@#^%D :-)

hey Ian - this guy is an [auto-censored]

When I took at your model display at the IMPS I was mightly impressed.

This hobby is about enjoyment, not nit picking over detail. We all try and improve but that is a judgement against our own personal standards.

I am a newbie (just returned from a long lay off) and the 1/72 Hurricane that I completed just a month ago looks crap against my recently finished 1/72 Spitfire.

I don't know how or what happened, but that was my e-mail account. All fixed now.

Its guys like him that made me quit competing on any level. In fact I got out of the hobby for almost 8 years and it wasn't untill I found a great forum like this that I returned. What finally did it for me was when I saw one of these so called experts reduce a Junior level (12/13 year old) to tears over some nit picky crap that wasn't even important. I'm sure it was the kid first and last experience at having his model judged. We all do this because its FUN!!!

Good thing he was not an actual IPMS judge then.

And.... just a reminder but please watch the language and even masked (H%%b*r) bits. Not allowed as we are a family site.

Thanks,
Jim

I apologize to everyone as i won't do that again.

It would have been fascinating to have seen some of this geezer's work.......these types probably all paint like Stevie Wonder wearing boxing gloves anyway. We all know how easy it is to nit-pick at the work of others rather than try and 'do better' ourselves.
To be honest I steered well clear of doing Napoleonics for about 10 years because of these types. 'Oh they NEVER wore That uniform! Those insignia are all wrong!' etc etc. How does HE know, was he there? Because these people are generally fairly talentless, they have to bring others down.
Youngsters ought to be encouraged and fair constructive criticism is what we all want, I certainly do as I model in isolation really. Having said that, I wouldn't fancy judging Euromiliatire!

Those guys are sad!
What right have they to judge other peoples wokk when they could not even paint a wall? Those guys should be banned or something.

cheers

Philip

p.s What is IPMS and where is the next one?

youve put me off comps

im 15 and have been modelling all my life and i am still terrible
if i go to one i wish not to meet 1 of these guys!!! (:-) merry xmas

At the IPMS Nats this year we had our club stand with a theme of 100 years of the RR partnership, models of all sorts and types as long as they had a RR as a power unit.
In duty fashion we were waiting for someone to comment on the types of engine and if they were correct to the vehicle etc, so we had a standard line for any smart alecs.
Went along like this, 'scuse me mate, do you mind waiting there for a minute 'til someone who gives a BLEEP comes along!!
Only had to use it once and we never had the problem again!
I can't say I have ever entered a model, but I am not sure if I would let these people put me off, at the end of the day I would enter so other people could see my model, not so much to win prizes. If I like it then thats good enough for me!!
Sam

Next time they try a stunt like that put a mini mag light or similar next to his ear and give iit a quick look . can always use a whitty reply like just checking to see if any detail in there or were you too lazy to finish off/build the interior soon send them on their way and like most people say they dont build much if at all!

G'day mates
My first visit to the Armorama UK site, and one of my favorite topics......... :-) :-) :-)
I use a flashllight to help me see.....
some places the lighting really is poor, and the older you get well.... lets just say I don't see as well as I did when I was half my age.
I'm also a member of IPMS/USA..... now before you throw stones..... The last time I judged, I had one of these people (I would use a different word for a particular part of the body but being a family site, I'll let you fill it in) with me, I told him he had two choices.... stuff the mirror in his pocket, or I'd stuff it somewhere else, if he was going to be on my judging team.
That was about ten years ago, it was also the last time I judged, the last time I entered an IPMS contest, and unfortunately it seems to now be becoming much more fashionable. Of course 90% of the oldtimers, don't use a mirror or magnifying glass. But also unfortunately the oldtimers are dying off, and now instead of maybe one on the team of three judges, you are now ending up with two on the team, with their little mirrors and magnifying glasses.

As I said, I'm a member of IPMS/USA but I don't agree with everything they do, I've always been a big avocate for the OPEN judging system, not the category system.

Hi

Ian should have told me I was just in the right mood as you know to give some body a mouth full.

It is reason why i dropped out of IPMS ,

Now i know what to put on the base of my last master.
It will make him blink twice.

James do not get put off about competitions why he says.

I have been entering since i was 15 long time ago
I go with a certain Attitude which allot of people i know & have posted on this site may agree with me in that.

I enter competition not to win, i go with the attitude that i am not going to win but might get my model in a magazines or i would get some constructive comment from a fellow modeller. But so other modellers my piers can appraise my work.

Back to the subject in hand i call them Anoraks i have great pleasure some times of waiting till they have made their point and proving them wrong.

This will make you all laugh.

Ok when i was part of the restoration team at Duxford i was working on my old tank 11BA 46 Centurion AVRE 165mm. When this man came along with his friend saying that it was a Challenger and that it had a 120mm he went into great depth about what it could do or not do.

When he finished i politely asked him if he knew what fuel it took. He promptly said Diesel.
I shout out to somebody on the tank next to me.
Hey this guy says this Centurion AVRE 165 takes Diesel and it was a Challenger, shame it takes petrol.
I took one look at him and said well it was a Centurion AVRE 165mm when i drove it in the 70’s, 80’s & now the 90's and it takes petrol. One should think before opening ones mouth, BYE.
We had a good laugh and his mate was even laughing.

These sorts of people spoil the hobby and need to grow up and go into the real world or if they can stomach it join up & really find out what it is all about. I would love to have had him on my tank.

Ossie

I AGREE WITH OSSIE WHAT HE SAID ABOUT THAT BLOKE SAYING THAT THE CENT AVRE WAS A CHALLENGER SINCE IT WAS ME HE ASKED.
THAT WAS THE GOOD OLD DAYS AT DUXFORD.

hi pete

nice to hear from you.

ossie

by the way.

TANKI always needs a Armoured Engineer somewhere.