The rules are simple:
1. No nudity, or excessive gore/violence. Keep it PG-13.
2. Run time may be anywhere between 1 minute and 6 minutes. This will be strictly enforced.
3. Each entrant is permitted a single entry per category.
4. All entries must have been completed and/or released on or after August 1st, 2010.
5. Acceptable footage includes Anime and Japanese Video Game footage. 'American' anime such as Afro Samurai, Animatrix, etc. is accepted, so long as it is animated by a Japanese Animation Studio.
6. Audio must be primarily music and may not include excessive dialogue/narration. The exception is videos that qualify as "trailers."
7. Entries will be sent through an upload site such as Megaupload, Rapidshare, or through the AnimeMusicVideos.org catalog. With the exception of AnimeMusicVideos.org, one should not have to register or pay anything to be able to download a video. If we find it's behind a registration wall/paywall, we will ask for another link. If you do not provide one, you will be disqualified.
8. The categories will be Action, Drama, Upbeat/Dance, Romance/Sentimental, Comedy/Parody. Trailers should be entered in the category most closely related to subject matter. Categories that do not receive enough entries may be merged with their nearest counterpart.
9. The contest will be screened at a resolution of 720x480. Entrees not in this format will be scaled appropriately, so it is strongly encouraged that entrees submit in this format. In addition, please ensure that your video is flagged for 4:3 playback. If it is flagged in 16:9, then everything will appear stretched out when we play it. We highly recommend you letterbox the footage ahead of time. We will do what we can, but we can't promise anything.
10. Videos will be played back as either MPEG's or MPEG-2's. Videos that are not submitted to one of these formats will be converted into MPEG-2's. Entrants are strongly encouraged to submit in 720X480 4:3 Flagged MPEG-2, at either 29.97 fps, or 23.976 with 3:2 pulldown selected (see Scintilla's guide link below for the best way to do this). If you are encoding in MPEG-2, please encode your audio as MPEG-1 Layer 2 or AC3. MP3s, WAVs, and others will not work and we will be forced to convert them.
11. We accept the following frame rates: 23.976, 24, 25, 29.97, and 30. If your submission is not in one of those, it will be rejected outright.
12. We accept the most file formats and methods of compression, however, we will not accept .wmv files. If you are using Windows Movie Maker, please output to AVI. If we are unable to convert to .MPG, we will attempt to contact you. There is a filesize limit of 2 Gigabytes.
13. No studio bumpers or official logos. If we can't remove it, and you can't get us a backup, the video is disqualified.
14. No audio from the official English dubs.
15. Entrants who knowingly attempt to circumvent these rules will have ALL of their submissions disqualified.
16. We reserve the right to reject any video for any reason whatsoever.
This guide might be useful for making your video MPEG-2 for conventions: http://www.aquilinestudios.org/mpegforcons.html (Yes, link to the AMV App on that page is outdated as hell, I know. You can find the most current version here: http://www.animemusicvideos.org/guides/avtech31/.
Send your submissions to anime@cnu.edu with the subject line "AMV CONTEST ENTRY." If you do not submit it with that subject line, there is no guarantee we will enter it. Videos should contain either the studio name or the name you want to appear on the ballot, followed by a dash and a video title, like this: "Studio name - Video Title.mpeg"
In your email, include a link to download your video, and a text file containing the following:
Name (Please use your real name)
Video Title
Source Anime
Song Used
Song Artist
Category desired (we reserve the right to change this)
Email (again, this is in case we have to contact you. We will not give away your email for any reason).
Address (so we may mail prizes out, should you win)
Are you attending the con? (Y/N).
We will email you when we have received and tested your entry to play on our system. The later you send your entry, the later we will get back to you. If you send at the last minute, you will NOT receive confirmation until after the deadline has passed, and you won't be able to resubmit if something goes wrong, so get it in early! THERE IS NO DEADLINE EXTENSION, BECAUSE THERE WILL NOT BE ENOUGH TIME TO TEST NEW ENTRIES!
Contestants found to be falsifying information will be disqualified.
Awards include first place in each category, Best in Show, and Coordinators choice.
Each category winner, along with Coordinators Choice, shall receive a $5 gift certificate to Best Buy, with the Best in Show receiving a $20 gift certificate. There shall be no prizes for runner ups this year, however, if this contest is well received and the convention is successful enough, expect prize value to increase in the future.
NOTE: PRIZES SHALL ONLY BE AWARDED TO UNITED STATES CITIZENS! If you live in the US, we'll mail it to you. Cost and legal issues prevent us from mailing it elsewhere.
Finalists shall be determined by a panel of four judges, including myself. Entrees will be examined based on originality, editing skill, video/audio output quality, and entertainment value.
If I forgot anything I'll add it as soon as I remember it. Remember, if you enter, as long as you follow the rules, your chances of getting in are pretty strong. This is a brand-new contest, and we hope to make it a grand tradition, so please help us forge that tradition! Thank you and happy editing!
Oh, and
Our Executive Council just had a meeting regarding CNU Con. Due to the recent hurricane interrupting a critical week of planning, with projected hurricanes in the immediate future, along with an unexpected lack of communication during said week with previously interested parties, we have come to the extremely difficult decision to alter the date of CNUCon to Spring of 2012. This is not something we planned to do and the decision is a hard one for all of us, but we feel that if we were to proceed with the originally planned date, we would be unable to deliver a well-organized convention.
The AMV contest will still be a part of it, so here's what we're going to do! If you are one of the three people that entered, you will be contacted. Whether or not you wish to remain in the contest will be up to you entirely, though we hope you will remain, and/or choose to take advantage of the multiple category submissions rule! Contest submissions will remain open, but the actual date is still up in the air. I should receive information on when the rescheduled data is next week sometime. The one-entry-per-category rule will still remain. As soon as I know it, you will too. The upside is that this will enable us to get significantly more entry's, with the value of prizes and amount of awards presented increased. Other rules will remain the same.
I just have to go through my videos and pick out a few that would be appropriate, lol.
