St. Petersburg, Russia, every year hosted a convention similar to the Paper Modelers Convention before the pandemic. Once I visited this meeting of modelers and saw everything with my own eyes.
The main difference from the American convention is that in the gathering of Russian modellers a competition is held between them. There is a referee committee. After the competition is held prizes are given to winners. All types of models, including paper ones, take part in the competition. They are combined into class C7. This is a class of paper models.
A few words about the name. Why the convention of modelers and their competition is so called, I still do not understand. Most likely, this name comes from the fact that annual meetings are held at St. Petersburg University. In one of its halls. There are no students from different universities among the participants in these meetings.
I took part in this competition with my French longboat XVIII of the century. The formula for evaluating the models implied comparing all the models participating in the competition with one of the most complex ones. I didn’t like this approach. I believe that he only estimates the complexity of making a model, but does not at all concern copying. That is, the reproduction of the spirit of the model, which does not directly depend on the number of details. In general, I no longer participate in these competitions.
I think that modelers from other countries will be curious to know about this competition, which is held annually. However, the date of the next Universities Cup is still unknown. It all depends on when the pandemic ends.
Here you can see some photos from the Universities Cup 2014.
