CiA #58 - score: 5.5 out of 10

Mongi:
Cia is often rated as one of the top groups, but lately the quality have been on a downslope. This pack they have recruited a lot of new members, though. Many of them quite talented. There are quite a lot of good stuff, aswell as horrible art.

Blue Devil never ceases to bore me with his hirez pics. It's always that damn blob (UFO?) and a Bryce-rendered landscape. It isn't advanced, and it isn't artistic. There haven't been much done by himself manually in the pics I believe. Even IF they were entertaining in the beginning, I'm tired of them now.

I've said it before and I say it again, DaBonehead can't shade properly. The chick looks flat! You have to dare put more colors to it. Make the light parts really light, and the shadows really dark, vary the colorshades more. And why he has released two almost identical pics in the same pack is beyond me.

When I first saw inc0gnito's work I didn't like it at all. His style is pretty much the same now, but still he have improved so much in shaping and shading! The work now is simply great. It's semi-abstract art at its finest. Why I say semi-abstract is because you can always see what the pic is about, yet there may be something deeper in the pic, and you have to think some before seeing everything. The color contrast and balance give depth to them.

I don't understand Ikarus' photomanips. You can't see what they are, and they don't look good. There always seem to be multiple layers of photos, some coloring and really high contrast. There isn't any substance to the pics. I'm sure there's a lot of work and thinking behind the pieces, but it's sadly a failure. Have a look at Remission and FireFromHeaven.

Raptor must be one of CiA's better renderers. Even though there isn't much detail in the pics (both polygons and texture) he has succeeded in capturing the feeling. It's simple, yet functional. You can really see the ship moving etc.

The rest of the pack have quite good quality, nothing unusually good or bad.

score: 6.5

Root88:
Incognito's pic IO_DANCE.JPG highlighted this pack and Dirty Dog's was pretty good also. I'm sorry to say that nothing else really sparked my interest. This pack was led off with 2 Bryce pics. If you are going to use Bryce, at least make a few models in it, or better yet make them in another application and import them into Bryce. If I see another island in the middle of an ocean that looks like it took 5 minutes to model and 5 hours to render, I'm going to be sick. A lot of pics were in this pack that just looked liked like photo's with about ten filters on them. It even looked like the same ten filter were used on a few of them. One last gripe I have is the use of horizontal black lines covering images. Lots of artists in the scene are doing this these days and I can't figure out the need to make your artwork less visible. Don't get me wrong CIA is a fantastic group, and last months pack was great, but I think this was really an off month for them.

score: 4