question for those who run AMV programming at conventions

[seasons]

Over the years, have you had to change how you go about acquiring videos to show during non-contest programming?

For example, I'm talking about videos shown during action/drama/comedy-themed blocks, or "random"/free-play blocks of time? I am not referring to contests in which videos are submitted by outsiders.

And I am asking this question because, from 2000 until 2012/2013 or so (to pick an arbitrary cutoff date), I assume that all (or 99%) of the AMVs shown at conventions were originally downloaded from this site. In addition, there are other sources where you can download AMVs of note (AMVnews.ru, to be possibly the most notable example). I assume that for most of the history of AMV-themed programming at conventions, what I listed above may have covered 99% of what you were showing. Perhaps there were exceptions, private stuff you got from people you knew, etc. I don't know.

I am wondering how, going forward, you see yourself getting AMVs to show. It's possible/likely that most AMV editors today do not even make their videos available to download anywhere at all, and instead just upload them straight to Youtube. And yes, I know that a lot of those videos have technical issues that would make them unsuitable for showing at a convention anyway (subtitles, watermarks, AR problems, etc), which is to say nothing of how many of them are just not well-edited or the kind of videos that you'd want to screen, anyway. (Yes, this certainly applies to a lot of videos uploaded to the Org as well but I'm just acknowledging that obvious point to get it out of the way.)

I'm quoting this post because it's kind of relevant to the prevailing attitude around here these days:

Honestly, I think the upload feature on this site is becoming a bit obsolete. Most people just upload to Youtube and leave a link for the full version because they either do not want to go through the upload process again or the file size is too big. People are watching amvs first on youtube, not discovering them on the org, and it's easier to just drop a link to like gdrive or another service than it is to make people sign up/log in to the org. I still think the catalog function is essential, in case of youtube making our lives hell, but really just to get links to other services.

It's great when you can rely on editors to go to the trouble to upload their works onto Google Drive or Mediafire or whatever service they choose to use. This doesn't always happen, however, and a lot of editors (both here and outside of the Org/AMV Central community) will upload exclusively to Youtube and either do not wish to make their work available for download or can't be troubled to go through the effort required to do so.

I guess I'm just worried that we're reaching the point where AMVs will become an artform that's exclusively streamed and not shared, that this will kill convention programming, that AMVs will become exclusive to the Internet and disappear from the "real world." How will you get videos to show when they're not longer being uploaded by anyone?

[Kireblue]

Even though an increasing number of people are choosing to not provide download links for their videos, the org's catalog has still been really helpful to me in terms of searching for AMVs to fill my programing blocks. But as you said, not being able to download the original file is a problem that I've run into more this year than before. In many cases, the editor ends up submitting their video to the AMV Contest, and so I can get a copy of their video that way. But sometimes, I've had to resort to using a youtube downloader to get the videos. Luckily, youtube downloaders have gotten a lot better at maintaining video quality, but I'd hate for this trend to increase even further. I know a lot of editors personally, and so I sometimes just ask for it. But since I tend to show about 40+ hours of AMVs during MomoCon, it would be problematic to do that for every single video.

And for those that choose to not catalog their videos, it can be very difficult for me to even know that they exists. I'm subscribed to so many people that it can be pretty easy for a really good video to be lost in my youtube feed. And so I never even know to search for it when its time to create playlists for the con. So everyone, do us coordinators a favor and help us out a bit

[ngsilver]

My ways of obtaining material to show during convention blocks at Youmacon hasn't really changed. I use my own personal archive to basically fill the space with. The archive consists of videos I download personally, a mirror (kept seperate from my personal stuff) of the AMV Contest Archive which admittedly is 6 years old at this point and I should really look into updating the mirror one of these days, and the contest archive of submissions to all contests that I've run.

For my personal archive I basically run through the announcement forum and download every video announced. I will from time to time grab random videos as I see them, are sent to me, ect throughout the year but really what normally gets my attention is things announced both here and also now on AMV Central. I used to be a douche about downloading videos that didn't have a direct download link of some type (amvnews, akross, golden doughnut, private server, ect) but in recent years I've eased up and will rip from YT and other video sites using video grabbers (though I don't go out of my way to pull seperate audio/video and remux them, only grabbing the highest quality I can already muxed) and pull that way.

I do notice an increasing number of submissions that lack any proper download link and that does pain me somewhat. I've always said it, sometimes annoyingly so to those who don't want to hear it, that YT is NOT a safe place for AMVs due to copyright claim and the ease of restricting access to videos. I've tried in the past to upload videos of my own and more often then not it gets blocked worldwide so I don't bother. When I come across such a video blocked in my country I just shrug, go oh well, and move on. It may have been an awesome video but without any alternative way to view it I can't so that's just how it is.

When it comes time to vet videos for putting into blocks or making available to my staff to queue often times it all goes back to quality of the video. This trend of submitting only to YT and doing things like color grading, adding watermarks, pitch shifting, ect to videos to keep out of the view of copyright pings lowers the quality of the video in my eyes and can just kill a potential great video. But again, without alternatives being provided that's just how it goes. I don't really have time to hit up every editor to try to get a full quality download. I'll grab what I can from archives, submissions to my own cons, ect, but beyond that I guess we're left with what's available.

Even if people don't use the golden doughnut I love and hope people continue to use the catalog feature here on the org. It is a great help with organizing, crediting, and just sorting through entries. Right now my staff and I are in a large undertaking of cataloging and tagging every video in my archive and the resource of the org is indispensable for properly crediting and tagging videos.


I'm a digital hoarder. I have kept every video I've downloaded since the 90s and plan to continue to download as much as I can and keep it in my archive. That way at the very least I can hopefully maintain a least one copy of as many videos as I can. The org may want to be a complete catalog of videos. I want to have a complete archive of the videos themselves.

[Vlad G Pohnert]

I run a lot of contests, use the org, YouTube if need be and I do run a few AMV rooms as well.. Been collecting AMVs since like 2000 and also current custodian of the AMV Contest Archive... And I do know a lot of editors which helps...

Vlad

[seasons]

I have never ripped a video from Youtube but I've always assumed that the quality would be terrible if I tried. (This is no longer the case?) I also would feel better just having the creator's blessing to have a copy that they'd send me by choice. Although the whole concept of sharing videos like that is totally foreign to a lot of younger editors (not to be ageist but that has everything to do with it) who've only used Youtube and never actually exchanged copies of their work with anyone (and would assume that anyone asking for a copy is only trying to "steal" it so they can literally slap their name on it and upload it as their own work).

I'm sure you've all got pretty massive collections and riding those for showing AMVs in a convention is definitely an option. I will say that I recently watched like an hour's worth of AMV programming at a certain convention and never once saw a video that was newer than 2008, and that's fine if that's what makes you happy but I did sense that the audience was puzzled or even bored by the exclusively-dated selections.

[Vlad G Pohnert]

Depending on what is available, the quality has vastly improved on YouTube.

As for the rooms I run, I am very contentious on what I play and keep records for all my room. Usually I play at least 1/2 the content of year to two old with the rest being recent to classic. It all depends on the blocks and time of day. I also ensure videos are not being repeated to death during the same event (some videos do get played a lot form year to year as audiences keep asking for them).

In the end, what ever is uploaded publically or send to contests, I play in AMV rooms and I post playlists after the event with full credits. If an editor asks me not to play their works, I'll just then add them to my list of not playing any of thoer works in any room I run. I have yet to run into that in the past 14 years of doing AMV rooms though as most are happy to have their videos played. That's the whole point of an AMV room, exposing the general audience to people's creations.

Vlad

[Kireblue]

For the programing blocks that I run, I mostly show videos that have been released within the last year. Even though I have a pretty massive archive of old stuff, I rarely dive more than a year or two into it. So its actually pretty important for me to have downloads for all the newest AMVs.

[Vlad G Pohnert]

The reason I say half current AMVs is SC room runs 24 hours so I usually play the older stuff (2 - 6 years old wit some older stuff) during the early mornings...

Vlad