Good morning, afternoon, or evening,
It’s Sunday morning and I’m about to head back out to the convention space. Before I do that I wanted to take a few moments and fill in the details that Tutter left out. I also wanted to address a few issues that occurred last night. I’m doing that now so that I don’t miss any details.
Before I list off all of the winners, I want to cover something that I feel is equally important. And I don’t want it to get lost underneath the list of winners, so I’m covering it first.
Let me start off by saying that I’m not happy with what happened last night. Those of you who were there probably already know what I’m talking about. I can go into details about it all, but I won’t. I’d rather have those in attendance describe it, if they wish, since their perspective will obviously be different than mine. In addition, my going into it would only seem like I’m trying to offer excuses for it all, and I’m not. What happened last night was unacceptable.
Everyone who participated put days, weeks, and probably months of work into their videos. They deserved to be played properly, as the artists involved intended them to be seen. I put at least three weeks of work into getting the contest up and ready to go, starting from the day the first CD-R reached my mailbox.
Like I said, I’m not going to go into details yet. I’m not going to offer excuses. For those of you there, if you have questions over what happened last night and would like answers, then please ask. You can ask me here, in public, or privately thru email. That’s your choice. I will not offer excuses about what went on behind the scenes, but I think you at least deserve an explanation.
For the most part, everyone’s video played as the artist intended it to. For the most part we were free of technical and scheduling issues once the contest started rolling. But there are three people that I wish to offer a public apology to. They didn’t ask for this and I hope this doesn’t turn an unwanted spotlight on them, but I feel the need to mention it regardless.
Thoughtsbleed –
His “Your Closest Friend” video started off the contest. Unfortunately due to technical issues started without audio for the first ten seconds of the video. This was unexpected and unacceptable. I started with his video because I felt it was a very strong lead off for the Drama category, the reaction of the audience seems to have confirmed that. And obviously I did not want to start the contest off on a mixer board issue.
Jesse & Jesse –
“Don’t Waste Your Youth.” That was their video and I don’t know what I can say. I can’t apologize enough about the way it was presented. I should have caught the audio issues, I didn’t. I dropped the ball. For those of you present at the contest, their video *did not* play the way it was intended. I should have caught it and I didn’t. I won’t have an answer for why that happened until I get home and have a chance to go through the work files, but I intend to do just that. There’s nothing that I can do to fix this, the contest has passed, the moment is gone, all I can do is apologize and try to figure out what happened so that it doesn’t happen to them again and hopefully doesn’t happen to anyone else either. Right now, the only excuse I can offer is that I had way too much on my plate and not enough time to do it all. That’s the only thing that would have let such a problem slip past me undetected.
I want to say how impressed I was with all of the entries, as well as all of the videos that were submitted this year. Last year we reached a grand total of 27 videos, I believe. All of which made it into the contest. This year we reached 51 videos, almost twice as many. 31 of them were submitted to the contest, 3 were disqualified and all of the remaining 28 played in the contest.
I will not offer any other comparisons between last and this year’s contests, except to say that it seemed obviously apparent to me that *everyone* involved seems to have improved drastically. Even after watching each video a dozen plus times while preparing the contest, I still sat through last night’s run and enjoyed them again. At least I enjoyed them when I wasn’t wincing from other issues.
My final point before I get to announcing the winners. Last night, immediately after the AMV Contest winners were announced, I resigned my AMV position with AFO. I’m making this public knowledge so that there is no going back on it. I will be finishing my commitments for this weekend and that will be all.
I have made the suggestion to management that David Violence should take over the reins if / when an AMV Contest is held at AFO5. David has already offered a verbal agreement that he would do it, but it remains to be seen whether management accepts my suggestion.
Last night (and Friday night’s) winners:
Best Adult / Hentai Video went to…
Mexican Junior’s “Moneyshot” using Bible Black to Frankie Goes to Hollywood’s “Relax.” I was somewhat paranoid about running this video, one for potentially going to jail for violating county decency laws or, two, offending our guests of honor who were sitting in the front row watching the contest. I was pretty relieved when the guests seemed to be enjoying it more than the audience was.
Best Editing went to…
Marlex’s “Together” using Vandread to Nine Inch Nails’ “We’re In This Together”
Best Technical went to…
Checkm8’s “Regrets” using Ruroni Kenshin to the Pet Shop Boy’s “It’s a Sin”
Best Concept went to…
Soul Bro Ryu’s “Somebody to Love” using Golden Boy to Queen’s “Somebody to Love”
Best Drama went to…
Tutterbutter’s “No Place Like Home” using Cowboy Bebop to Coldplay’s “Clocks”
Best Action went to…
Firedog’s “Chateau” using the End of Evangelion to “Chateau” from the Matrix Reloaded Soundtrack.
Best Comedy went to…
ZennMora’s “Dude, We’re Ninjas!” using Naruto to Sifl & Olly’s “Ninja of the Night”
I want to thank everyone for participating and later in the week I’ll post a full play list.
Thank you,
Jason
legionair@aol.com
