First off this has been an absolutely incredible round! It was a pleasure to watch and a nightmare to judge, with so many incredible builds from both contestants. It's hard to believe everything was built over the course of a single month! I think that the seed part was relatively easy to integrate this round - small size, a simple shape and a neutral colour, but that places pressure on the contestants to use it in original and unexpected ways. Both builders should be incredibly proud, and pushed the bar to new levels! But there can be only one Iron Builder! (In this bracket)

Legopard:

I was blown away by both the quality and quantity of your builds. Throughout the contest you covered everything from micro-scale buildings to larger than life household objects, demonstrating a wide variety of building styles and techniques. In spite of the amount of models that you built, your quality never slipped, and almost all of your builds used the seed part in a creative and worthy manner.

Building skill: 18/20

Some of the standout builds I especially loved include the Drill and Key, which used the seed part in surprising ways to recreate textures I wouldn't have thought possible to make with LEGO. The Church Organ, London Eye and Gov. Swann show an inspired attention to detail, drawing out specific elements of the seed part that work perfectly for the subject at hand.

Presentation: 15/20

Your presentation is professional and always communicated the models well. There was a nice variety between isolated models and immersive environments, however a few builds such as the Survivor and the Mad Max bike feel like they could have used more environment builds to add life to the photo. I'd love to see you experiment more with presentation techniques, but I respect that you keep the focus on the physical brick assemblies!

Use of mystery part: 15/20

You definitely pulled lots of mileage out of the seed part with amazing uses that I've already mentioned, but occasionally the seed part didn't seem necessary, such as in "Room between the Iron Builders" and Space Chefs. In the ISS, the Starcraft Siege Tank and the District 9 Exosuit I feel that other pieces could have better recreated what the seed part was being used for, even though they are all incredibly well-built models regardless. Even though you used hundreds of the part at times, usually the piece was well integrated and felt like the logical choice anyway. I liked the way it was used in the Survivor, where I found myself imagining stories for why the survivor was wearing that odd metal frame.

Total: 46/60

Overall I was blown away by your performance in this round - you stepped up to the task and responded to your opponent's pressure without dropping the quality of your builds. Good luck with the other judges, but you have my vote!

One More Brick:

I have an enormous amount of respect for your dedication and skill in this round. 52 builds is quite frankly insane, and I pity anyone that tries to beat that number in future Iron Builder rounds! However, I think that your quantity came at the expense of quality, and I found myself wishing that you had focused in on the best of your seed part ideas and given them more time and attention to truly shine.

Building skill: 15/20

You show in the Gigabyte motherboard, Choo Choo micro-build and Bicycle that you have Iron Builder worthy skills for high quality builds that utilize creative techniques and interesting details. However, so many other entries lacked polish or refinement beyond the core concept. Several of your first and last seemed very rushed and used photoshopped labels or backgrounds to make the model passable before moving on to the next. It takes great skill to build as fast as you did, but speed can be countered by dedicating an unreasonable amount of time to the contest, while building skill cannot.

Presentation: 14/20

Your photography was always clean and showed the models well, but several of your photoshopped backgrounds didn't blend well with the LEGO models in the foreground. I think your presentation suffered from moving so quickly between entries, and it could be difficult to see what was happening in some scenes. "Are you thinking what I'm thinking?" is a great little scene, but the paper background took me out of the bustling nuclear factory it could have been set in. Chemistry would have benefited from a brick-built setting and perhaps some clever science shenanigans taking place.

Use of mystery part: 11/20

There were several very creative uses of the seed part. "Don't you Fret" is a genius usage of both your current and previous seed parts, while Cloud 9 blew me away with two independently strong applications that combined to make something truly astounding. However, I think there was a mismatch between your best uses of the seed part and the size of the model that showcased them - Often your bigger models used the seed part in familiar ways such as a long metal stick, fancy light or gun chamber.

Eiffel Tower, Snowed In and Forbidden Fortress were all awesome builds that (to me) had just the right amount of detail, brought something new to the contest, and had enough interesting things going on to stand up on their own. I really loved Back and Forth, and wished that you had built more of an arcade cabinet to frame the awesome interpretation of the seed piece. Equally the function and concept of the Plinko board was great, and a little extra attention for the frame could have added a lot.

Total: 40/60

You're undoubtedly worthy of being an Iron Builder champion, but I think you strayed too far into quantity this round. Many of your builds are excellent, but they're not as good as they could have been if you had focused more on less. That said, you've done more in one month than a highly active builder does in a year, a feat that should surely be remembered, and that you should be very proud of!

Legopard
Building skill: 18/20
Presentation: 15/20
Use of mystery part: 15/20
Total: 46/60

One More Brick
Building skill: 15/20
Presentation: 14/20
Use of mystery part: 11/20
Total: 40/60

Firstly let me start by saying this round was (well you all saw what it was), totally awesome and relentless. Choosing between these two guys was not easy, so many good builds, so much to take in. The level of moc and variety has been quite the nightmare to evaluate and judge. But in so saying, it must be done, so here goes...

BUILDING SKILLS

You both display very competent talented usage of the brick and involved many genre and themes in your entries. Loved Tim's flowing use of the part on the Eiffel tower and Cloud nine, that excellent pushbike. What's cooking was so sweet and life-like, and that nostalgic neat fire truck, and well, 55 mocs, not naming them all, except to say, they were a delightful set of mocs to browse through.
But Jonas, though with less mocs, built my personal three favorites of the match; the Drill press - loved the way he made the drill bit, LotR Pinball - it's a working pinball machine + Lord of the Rings, and the Kraken and ship - that turbulent water was just brilliant, and like Tim, just so much else that warrants comment.

JONAH - 20/20
TIM- 19/20

PRESENTATION

Overall I found both you guys presented your mocs quite well, neatly framed with good clarity. Tim's were a little more polished, plus some interesting use of 'shopped in backgrounds - and I'm assuming such abilities are encompassed in the idea of presentation.

TIM- 18/20
JONAH- 17/20

USAGE OF PART

Again, you guys made my work hard, you both took a good grasp of that part and beat it into a lot of different roles, some I'm sure had the part itself looking with wonder. Starting with Jonas, masterful usage with the drill bit getting it to look so nicely swirled, and that cute steampunk bug. The typewriter with it detailing was brilliant. But on the other hand, the racetrack and controller, the Fish, and Deadpool; I felt ones like these aren't quite in the ballpark as IB entries, not hating on them, they were good, just not really on track.
Tim, with those fluid mocs, the Tower and Cloud 9, excellent use of the part, and very prominent, the pushbike and fortress too. Loved the use in that Kitchen as well. But, with greater number of mocs come greater number of mocs not on track; the micro cannon,holepunch, that little nuclear bomb scene, that choo choo, awesome build, but it was just the two liquid container cars, I felt there may well have been a different train on there prior to the comp start.

JONAS - 19/20
TIM - 18/20

SUMMARY

You've probably noticed I didn't have a fun time with this, but it was a fun match, there was no loser, just that I can pick only one winner, and that would be Jonas.

One last point, I'd not want to take either of you on, too much talent.

Jonas - 56/60
Tim - 55/60

Well, it seems IB rounds keep getting crazier and crazier. Really Tim, 52? I don't even...

I honestly really dislike this parts, it's hardly versatile and the color doesn't help at all. That didn's seem to stop the two of you in any way. So congratulations on a spectacular round.

One More Brick

Again, 52? Are you kidding me? Despite the number of entries, there's no loss in terms of quality or presentation. Absolutely insane.
In terms of building skill, you're simply at the top. I don't think there's any style or scale you can't succed at.

In terms of part use, the were brilliant moments (the watch, the frets, the beehive to name a few) but there was also quite a bit of repetition (which is not really surprising at this number of builds); there were quite a few builds where the part was used as a metal rod/frame.

You're also one of the few builders that manage to do some proper editing job, they're rarely distracting and never seem forced.

Highlights (yeaaaah, it's so easy to choose just 5):

Tools of the Trade - The realism here is off the charts, the use of seed parts simple and perfectly blended in. Just gorgeous.
Study Time - Beautiful, polished and classy; one of my faves this round. Also very inspired use of part in the drawers.
MP4-29 Mixer - Surprise, another object replica in my faves.
Snowed In - I'm not sure how the color works for the tree, but the angles are so catchy here, I don't even care.
What's Cooking? - Perfect all around.

Building skill: 20/20
Presentation: 20/20
Use of mystery part: 17/20
Total: 57/60

Jonas

I've always been a big fan of your work, so glad this made you build a ton of stuff in such a short time. :)

You have a very unique style; I really like how you manage to keep a perfect balance between simplicity, cleanliness and detail.
Almost everything you place in your scenes seems to belong there, without seeming like you've added detail for detail's sake or just filling up space. I absolutely love that.

In terms of part use, you've had a bit more variation than your opponent and there were more stand-out uses.

Highlights:

LotR Pinball - One of the round's highlights, you've managed to make it functional without any sacrifice to the aesthetics. And I rarely care about functions.
I found a key! - This is absolutely perfect and the scale is impressive.
PotC - Governor Swann - A great looking bust with one of the most ingenious part use this round.
Church Organ - Brilliant use of the part gap in here and you've definitely captured the ave inspiring feel of a real organ.
Typewriter - The detail level you've included in here is beyond insane.

Building skill: 20/20
Presentation: 20/20
Use of mystery part: 18/20
Total: 58/60