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CGSociety Launches 24th CGChallenge

The CGSociety is offering a challenge, should you choose to accept it, in its mission to track down the best Secret Agent inspired art!

The 24th CGChallenge calls for entries based on the shadowy world of spies, secret agents and their evil adversaries. Who do they work for? What secrets do they know? Who do they protect? And, most importantly, what cool and curious gadgets do they wield?

The CGSociety is issuing a deniable mission to reconstruct the great stories of secret agents of the past, and imaginings of tomorrow's agents. Will they be International Men of Mystery or Intergalactic Personages of Persuasion? In either case, the Secret Agent Challenge boasts a collection of prizes that would make Q envious, and a select group of individuals with a license to judge.

To help spur imaginations, The CGSociety has included inspirational images and short stories to jump-start entrants on the trail of espionage, underground lairs, and gore-mongering henchmen! These dossiers can be accessed here http://features.cgsociety.org/challenge/secret_agent, and extracts from some top-secret agents follow:

"Fortunately, Agent 0069 had a plan. He had prepared for this. Three years of study at the great 007's Confidential College of Secret Agents, majoring in Miraculous Escapes, had sharpened his mind to the brink of self-harm. No situation was too pointy to disable the formulation of an improvised escape plan. He thought back to the very first lecture he had ever gone to, where 007 himself, the oracle of secret agent knowledge, spoke three ever-relevant truths: "When you're in a near-death situation, you've got to act and think quickly. Secondly, learn to be good at cards and pouting -- these skills combined will get you surprisingly far -- and thirdly, be resourceful, often the answer to your present quandary will be right in front of your eyes."

"Everything was bathed in red. She needed to return to base soon, or she would be unable to move, let alone escape with the chip. She concentrated hard, and could hear the stomping of boots on the fire escape to the roof. One more level and they would be up here. There was nothing for it. She had to jump. She leapt, and hoped that even with her low energy levels, her inbuilt emergency landing mechanism would still be functional. In a matter of 3 seconds, she had left the rooftop, and government agents had flooded the car park where she had previously been standing."

Challenge Sponsors:The CGSociety is once again proud to be partnering with the CG industry's sharpest masterminds, including: BOXX Technologies, Autodesk, WACOM, NVIDIA, Luxology, Corel, Stash Media, SideFX, e-on Software, Craft Animations, MAXON, The Gnomon Workshop, Pixologic, ImagineFX, 3DVIA and Ballistic Publishing. There's an exciting array of digital gadgetry and other prizes on offer, which any self-respecting artist would love to have up their sleeves, or even, in their studios!

Challenge Judges:This year's Challenge judging panel includes the cream of the CG crop who have worked for the likes of: Ubisoft, Electronic Arts, Atari, Sony Online Entertainment, Microsoft, Origin, Wizards of the Coast, and Fantasy Flight Games, on game and film titles such as "Garfield 2", "Superman Returns", "Night at the Museum", "Underworld: Evolution", "Tomb Raider: Underworld", "Tomb Raider: Anniversary Edition", "Gun", "Lord of the Rings: Return of the King" and "Star Wars: Revenge of the Sith."

The judging panel consists of: Hal Milton, Sasha Ciolac, Marcin Jakubowski, Vasile Brovcenco, Thiago Pires, Arthur Mirzoyan, Tomasz Jedruszek, Marc Mordelet, Martin Kohler, Yap Kun Rong, ru bonsaininja, David Luong, Don Seegmiller, Jon Rush, Todd Widup, Bryan Silva, Boaz Livny, Roger Cusson, Mark Snoswell, Leigh A. van der Byl and Anton Fletcher. Entrants will need to gather the best of their artistic arsenal to impress these CG luminaries!

The challenge has commenced! Image and Video categories will run for different periods of time:

* The Image category will run for 8 weeks. Deadline: 13 July, 2009.* The Video categories will run for 12 weeks. Deadline: 10 August, 2009.

Entries must be made in one of the following categories:

* Image: Individual* Video: Individual* Video: Team

All entries will also be eligible for any of the following awards:

* Modeling* Texturing* Animation* Lighting* Visual Effects* Landscape/Matte Painting* Art Direction* Compositing and Editing* Best Character

For more information on previous Challenges go to http://features.cgsociety.org/challenge/.

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