How often do you enter AMV contests?

[Opner]

I'm fairly new to the AMV contest scenes and was impressed by so many amazing AMVs at the contests of the conventions I went to. I only entered a few videos to the conventions I went to until this year (I started to submit to other cons) and I wanted to hear how much other people submited to contests.

Do you try to submit every AMV you make?
Do you try to enter every Contest you can find?
Or do you limit your submissions and if so why?

Thanks!

[TnAdct1]

1. Outside of "short" videos that you see in AMV Hell-type projects (unless a con asks for them like Katsucon), I try to submit my AMV's to at least one convention.

2. I tend to be more limited when it comes to submissions. In particular:

• Unless I've yet to see one of my creations at a local con (or it's a video that's trickier to be shown at some contests), I prefer to retire my video after a half year.

• Unless I have a late fall/early winter video that I feel confident about, I tend to be inactive during the Spring con season, as I always try to have a video for Otakon, with its anti-troll rules resulting in me holding off sending that video to cons until June at the earliest.

[Opner]

1. Outside of "short" videos that you see in AMV Hell-type projects (unless a con asks for them like Katsucon), I try to submit my AMV's to at least one convention.

2. I tend to be more limited when it comes to submissions. In particular:

• Unless I've yet to see one of my creations at a local con (or it's a video that's trickier to be shown at some contests), I prefer to retire my video after a half year.

• Unless I have a late fall/early winter video that I feel confident about, I tend to be inactive during the Spring con season, as I always try to have a video for Otakon, with its anti-troll rules resulting in me holding off sending that video to cons until June at the earliest.

Interesting! Do people usually hold off on uploading their videos for public view to save them for contests? I feel some confident competitors would do that.

[TnAdct1]

Interesting! Do people usually hold off on uploading their videos for public view to save them for contests? I feel some confident competitors would do that.

Personally, I think that depends on the person and the contest. There are definitely some conventions (i.e. the Pro and Masters at AWA) where it is required to hold off premiering your videos until the convention ends, and I do know some creators will hold off putting their video online until it debuts at a convention.

While I have held off putting my videos online until certain conventions, I'd prefer to put them online once I get done with them, as I've seen that as more of a good luck charm for me.

[Scintilla]

• Unless I have a late fall/early winter video that I feel confident about, I tend to be inactive during the Spring con season, as I always try to have a video for Otakon, with its anti-troll rules resulting in me holding off sending that video to cons until June at the earliest.

This right here is why I'm thankful to Vic for typically having Otakon's anti-troll rule exempt AnimeNEXT, and this year with Otakon being in July (that is, earlier than usual) it will probably be the case again.

When I was just starting out in AMVs and had more time to devote to editing, I typically entered each video into a whole bunch of cons that happened to have deadlines coming up, and then everything for the year to AWA Expo once I realized that that was customary. However, that was before I started attending cons with regularity.

Nowadays, the combination of completing fewer AMVs (typically 1 per year) and attending certain conventions means I generally save my videos for the conventions I know I'll be at, plus any other convenient ones around the same time (while trying to avoid geographic overlap), plus keeping up my weird tradition of entering Animethon every odd year (when possible), plus everything to AWA Expo.

And to answer your follow-up question, I always hold off on releasing videos publicly until they have premiered at conventions. This is partly so that any judges/prescreeners are less likely to have seen it already, and partly so that the convention audiences are less likely to have seen it already (especially important for comedies, I think).

[TritioAFB]

In the past I was submitting to every contest appearing, recently decided to make exclusive videos for certain conventions. Nowadays I'm not editing but hoping to return eventually

[Tigrin]

I usually just submit to a handful of the bigger conventions around the spring/summer season, so most of my editing is done at the beginning or end of the year. If a video gets more than a couple awards I'll stop submitting it... I'll also stop submitting videos that don't make the finals more than a few times. I usually post a video online after it premieres somewhere, since people will often search for videos they've seen at a convention once it's over.

[seasons]

Not often, but then again I'm not very prolific in terms of getting more than one video done per year anyway.

I'm very selective about what I send to, have only seen one of my AMVs in a contest in person, am certainly planning on getting more than one submitted somewhere this year. I don't like to send to multiple conventions but that's just a personal thing.

[Kireblue]

For the most part, every AMV that I make tends to go to at lest a handful of conventions.And I usually have my vids circulate the con circuit for about 3-4 months. I am a little selective about what cons I enter though. I definitely enter all the big/ major ones that have been around for years. But if a contest strikes me as being disorganized, poorly managed, or just have a weird set of rules, I tend to sit that one out.

[Opner]

Thanks for all the awesome responses!