Otakon AMV Contest Pre-screenings

hackerzc · Post by **hackerzc** » Sun Jun 11, 2006 5:00 pm

Castor Troy wrote:
dwchang wrote:Wow only 4 tapes? I remember years when we had to watch 6 - 8 tapes
Maybe because of the deadline...

Because of the deadline, because of no ftp, because people are unhappy about how things went last year (there is a trickle down effect in response from the previous year that effects # of entries this year).

The contest is still trying to recover from the year Geoff was running things, and the inclusion of problems from last year (late finalist announcement, technical issue playing the contest Friday). It all tends to push people away from the contest.
This is really upsetting me, and I will be speaking seriously with Antonio about all this stuff (I just don't like how things are going, and a lot of peoele are telling me about issues they have).
Expect a lot of changes/improvements next year. As for this year all I can do is ask you guys to hang in there. Aside from not having as many entries as we usually do and only having 1 (possibly 2) prescreening locations, there haven't been any problems with the contest. The worst thing that's happened is me having to wait to get everyones entries from Antonio so I can do my work.

MousePotato · Post by **MousePotato** » Sun Jun 11, 2006 11:50 pm

so who's doing the contest intro??

hackerzc · Post by **hackerzc** » Mon Jun 12, 2006 3:49 am

Black Sun Productions wrote:so who's doing the contest intro??

Right now... me
All the "Welcome to Otakon" blah blah blah and warning stuff is pretty much done, but there is no big flashy visual opening for it yet.
I have a couple ideas but they all seem fairly stupid.
There is still a LOT of time for this though, so I'm not worried about it.
Feel free to shoot ideas my way though (PM it please lol). The theme for the con this year is "Good Luck".

A plan is in the works for next year, which would allow you guys to send in your own intros (the best one would be picked to be used for the contest). It may even become a new contest itself. We give you the background graphic and the rest is up to you.
Hm, Yet another of those changes I keep speaking of. I keep giving away all the secrets

MousePotato · Post by **MousePotato** » Mon Jun 12, 2006 6:40 am

hmmm. i seem to remember a poll for people who wanted to do it. o well...

hackerzc · Post by **hackerzc** » Mon Jun 12, 2006 6:57 am

Black Sun Productions wrote:hmmm. i seem to remember a poll for people who wanted to do it. o well...

Yeah I made that poll to see what the interest in it is, so we would know if it was a good idea for next year or not. From the results we got, you can most likely count on it being part of the contest next year.

hackerzc · Post by **hackerzc** » Wed Jun 21, 2006 10:35 am

There has been a change in the Prescreening plans for UMCP.
After putting everything together I was only able to get two tapes (DVD's actually) out of it.
This just means that everything will be shown three times, so you won't miss anything if you are unable to come on any one day.

MousePotato · Post by **MousePotato** » Wed Jun 21, 2006 12:11 pm

wow, creators are really starting to lose interest in this contest it seems. We really need to sit down and figure out how to make it more appealing for next year. FTP perhaps? Posseble "Actual" awards ceremony for this event?

hackerzc · Post by **hackerzc** » Wed Jun 21, 2006 1:05 pm

Black Sun Productions wrote:wow, creators are really starting to lose interest in this contest it seems. We really need to sit down and figure out how to make it more appealing for next year. FTP perhaps? Posseble "Actual" awards ceremony for this event?

There really isn't anything to figure out. The main reasons are the deadline, no ftp, and mistakes that have been made since Matt left that have caused some people to loose confidence in the staff.
While I think no FTP is the single largest thing inhibiting entry numbers, I freely admit I've screwed some things up over the part two years and I'm sure that's caused it's share of damage. That doesn't sit to well with me, but you accept it and move on (hopefully learning from it).

Next year the deadline WILL be closer to the con (perhaps as much as a month), I will personally be looking into setting up an FTP server, and hopefully nothing will go wrong for people to complain about.
I wouldn't hold my breath on that last one though as there are a few people out there who will be actively looking for things to complain about or want things to fail.

But going back to the number of entries, having fewer this year is a two edged sword. On one hand there are less entries than usual (though still more than enough for the contest). On the other hand having fewer entries is what's making it possible to switch over to DVD for prescreening and overflows this year (a decision was handed down that all con programming this year would be DVD based). Also, those entering the contest have the best chances of making it to the finals than they've had in years (I know that sounds like a spin, because it is... but it's a good thing for creators).
The contest will still be run from a computer though. I even went out and got a Netstream 2000 just for the contest and gave it to Antonio along with the software, so there shouldn't be a repeat of the tech issue from last year.

Oh well, I have to get back to compiling the prescreening stuff for this weekend (for the 4th time).

MousePotato · Post by **MousePotato** » Wed Jun 21, 2006 2:16 pm

haha! that "tech issue" was halarious for those in the crowd. Watching the Windows start-up screen come on display was classic!

hackerzc · Post by **hackerzc** » Wed Jun 21, 2006 2:53 pm

Black Sun Productions wrote:haha! that "tech issue" was halarious for those in the crowd. Watching the Windows start-up screen come on display was classic!

I was there Friday sitting in the audience with another staffer (Jason Marin) when the screen went black... then stayed black. I walked out of the room in disgust and just walked around the con aimlessly for a bit, so I never knew what happened until I heard people talking about it in Vid Ops later that night.
I thought the contest was being played with a Netstream 2000 and MCI Player... turns out it wasn't.

But yeah... things like that do not help the contest any.