Judging a Model Comp

Unless you are entering out of box AND the organizers require them, instructions are the only thing you HAVE to bring. The rest is icing on the cake, a way for the builder to let the judges know how much work he/she's done. Typically, I compose a bulleted description of modifications and import that into a downloadable entry form or print it out nad attach that to the form at registration. The longest was one page with a very large font. All the documentation in the world won't be worth the paper it's printed on if the execution of that work doesn't show basic modeling skills: well applied paint, i.e.no brush strokes, well aligned parts, no seam lines, all tires level on the surface, no silvering of decals, no glue marks. Mess up on these and the likelihood of making the first cut goes down dramatically. In most cases, this will bring the judges down to a very few models.

Depends on the competition really.

Never entered anything into comps like IPMS or similar but have entered so far about 25 kits into various competition formats(all of which exclude previous winners).

Most just ask you to fill in a form stating scale/kit/maker/etc they also got one block where you need to write down what your goal/aim was with the kit.

My prefered comps are those where the judges are the visitors as it allows me to get a feel on how I am doing in the eyes of Mr. and Mrs. Average.

Said that need to start working on 2 entries for a competition in August. Out of the 2 entries I will need to choose as we are only permitted 1 entry per category.

The way it was explained to me was "we aren't mind readers, if you did something write it down" Include a pic and write about any modifications you do beyond the OOB kit.  OTOH, a few times I have judged I had to remind my fellow judges to READ THE MODEL ENTRIES (sorry for the caps).  When judging it is very easy to get caught up and go right to looking, inspecting and "judgeing" the models and completely forget to read the stuff the modeler wrote.  Don't write a novel.  The bulleted list like suggested before is best, short and to the point.

Thanks for the info guys, it's really appreciated and very common sense.

I learned a heck of a lot just from watching the judges I was with go about their business.  One thing I have decided though is that dioramas would have to be the hardest category to win/judge, because of the fact that it's a heck of a lot more subjective than the other categories, IMHO anyway.

Cheers