Myself, I pretty much build for the love of bulding. I used to build all my stuff, with my Dad's standards in mind. And then one day he said, Why are you worried about whether or not I like it? It's your model, build it how you would want it if you had the real car. Once that was said, I started to realize that the biggest critic I have to please is myself. You're not gonna see my builds from your living room, so I guess when it comes down to it, my opinion is what matters, and that of my family since they have to look at em everyday also. I've only ever entered two contests. I've won top honors at both of them. The first one I entered was in 1994, and the model was finished a whole two years before the contest ever took place. So in no way was it built to please the judges. The only other contest I've ever entered was this year's GearZ/Revell contest which my build was done specifically for. But I still built it the way I would've done for myself if it wasn't being entered into competition. The one criteria I tried to stick to on this build was using 50% of the kits original parts. If I didn't have that guideline to go from, it would've gotten the full aluminum paneled interior, and bigger roll cage. That's the only thing that held me down as far as the way I built it. So if I wouldn't have had those guidelines to follow, it would have been totally based on mine, and mine own opinion of what should and shouldn't have been. So, I can see both sides of the story.
Corey