The entries for CG Whiz 2011 are in and the judges are now hard at work reviewing this year’s crop of talent. We’ve had over 200 showreels entries, making 2011 the biggest CG Whiz yet!

The judges spent a long time watching each one in turn and debating their merits. The result is a shortlist of the standout entries in both the Amateur and Young Pros categories. The judges will now consider each one of the shortlisted showreels in more detail, before meeting to argue the cases of entries. If the discussions of previous years are anything to go by, it promises to be a heated debate, but at the end of it we’ll have the winners and runner ups in both categories.

We’ll be revealing all at our London HQ on 14th December, but in the meantime you can check out the shortlisted entries below. Thank you to everyone that entered, and congratulations to those on the shortlist – good luck for the next stage!

Amateurs Category

• Elizabeth Muhm: VFX Demo Reel
• Angelo de Witt: Visual Effects Reel
• Shaun Seong-young Kim: Ballet of Unhatched Chicks
• Leanne Towers: Enid
• Jean Bennamias: Showreel
• Daniel Danielsson: Still Motion - Autumn Reel 2011
• Arnoldas Vitkus: DemoReel 2011
• James Tomlinson: Showreel
• Jason Huang: Lighting Reel 2011
• Kaine Van Riel: VFX Showreel 2011
• Jaume Creus: Demo Reel 2011

 Young Professional Category

• Silvia Bartoli: Modelling and Texturing Reel
• John Beckers: Showreel 2011
• Jose Manuel Linares Lopez: Modeling Subdivision works
• Nathan Rule: 2011 Showreel
• Oliver Kentner: Olika 3D showreel 2011
• Stefan Susemihl: Stefan's Reel
• Yunsung Cho: 3D Generalist YunC
• Dominic Edwards: Lighting Showreel 2011
• Gilberto Gavidia: Astrotrain
• Dean Wright: Animation Generalist
• Mathias Herbster: Demoreel 2011

But what do you think? Have we missed your favourite? You can put us right by voting for any entry, whether shortlisted or not, in the Users Choice Award, and see how your choice compares to that of our panel of judges. 

Remember, this is the first time we’ve ever opened our entries to the public vote, and we’re offering some great prizes for the public’s top choices. You don’t have to be a CG artist yourself, you just have to have an opinion on what makes great CG art, so we want as many people as possible to get involved and get voting.