Anime Central AMV COntest Due Date

[dwchang]

I still suggest an FTP be made available. I guarantee the # of entries (or at least on-time-entries) will increase since it's so much easier.

[outlawed]

If I had the bandwidth to run the ftp off my home machine I would do it however ... what happens if one of my hard drive fails and I lose all submissions? If I were to personally supply this service then it would have to be of high quality as far as bandwidth and reliability goes. Unfortunately I cannot provide that right now.

As an example let's think about an average video size at 400 MB with 100 people who desire to upload. This requires a good chunk of space. The only server I know that has done large volume con submissions is the old otakuvideo server Quu ran (if others I don't know them). Another issue is if a 3rd party hosted the submissions it would have to be a trusted party by us because they would have to mail me the entries so that I can handle conversions and other tech stuff before con.

[Brad]

Could somebody answer my question? I need to know whether or not I need to plan to send this in so it gets there by April 1st, or do I just need to plan to mail it out BY April 1st?

All entries must be in the hands of the contest coordinators by April 1st, 2005.

I'm taking that literally, and keeping in mind that an extension is under consideration - maybe.

This is correct. That is NOT a postmark date.

*sigh* ... I was afraid of that :\

[Corran]

If I had the bandwidth to run the ftp off my home machine I would do it however ... what happens if one of my hard drive fails and I lose all submissions? If I were to personally supply this service then it would have to be of high quality as far as bandwidth and reliability goes. Unfortunately I cannot provide that right now.

As an example let's think about an average video size at 400 MB with 100 people who desire to upload. This requires a good chunk of space. The only server I know that has done large volume con submissions is the old otakuvideo server Quu ran (if others I don't know them). Another issue is if a 3rd party hosted the submissions it would have to be a trusted party by us because they would have to mail me the entries so that I can handle conversions and other tech stuff before con.

You would only need a fast download connection. I doubt you would need to upload the videos somewhere after they were uploaded to the ftp site. Also you could include some kind of giant warning banner that there is no redundancy for the hard disk. Even with this risk I'm sure a lot of people would still use the ftp.

[trythil]

If I had the bandwidth to run the ftp off my home machine I would do it however ... what happens if one of my hard drive fails and I lose all submissions? If I were to personally supply this service then it would have to be of high quality as far as bandwidth and reliability goes. Unfortunately I cannot provide that right now.

As an example let's think about an average video size at 400 MB with 100 people who desire to upload. This requires a good chunk of space. The only server I know that has done large volume con submissions is the old otakuvideo server Quu ran (if others I don't know them). Another issue is if a 3rd party hosted the submissions it would have to be a trusted party by us because they would have to mail me the entries so that I can handle conversions and other tech stuff before con.

You would only need a fast download connection. I doubt you would need to upload the videos somewhere after they were uploaded to the ftp site. Also you could include some kind of giant warning banner that there is no redundancy for the hard disk. Even with this risk I'm sure a lot of people would still use the ftp.

Actually, the upstream bandwidth is what matters in this case.

Additionally, handling files in the hundreds-of-megabytes range is not a trivial task with the kind of bandwidth available today. (If we lived in Japan or Korea, it probably wouldn't be a problem, but we don't.) Quu was able to provide such services only because he had a T1 line dedicated to the FTP server, which isn't cheap.

Finally, people don't understand risks. They don't understand what a big fat
WARNING: THIS FTP SERVER IS NOT RELIABLE; YOUR DATA MAY BE LOST AND YOUR DOG MAY BE FUCKED BY DISK FAILURES sign means. They don't understand that "best-effort" service implies the very real possibility of failure with a "eh, what are you going to do about it?" consequence in the case of failure.

(Given the extremely short notice on which this FTP would be brought up, it'd have to be both unreliable and best-effort...)

[dschlag007]

However I still need to find out how the HELL I make a VCD and how to make a MPEG-2 format vid (sad...I know...but I have never done it before )

Uh... why would you want to make a VCD? It's not on the list of accepted media. Just encode an MPEG-2 file and burn it to a normal data CD-R.

(I've done up a <a href="http://www.aquilinestudios.org/mpegforcons.html">guide to encoding your AMV to MPEG for conventions using TMPGEnc</a>, in case it helps anyone.)

Because I need to send one into Anime North as well and this is what they want.

You do know that DVD video is essentially a bunch of MPEG-2 files, right?

Just make a DVD-spec MPEG-2 and burn it twice if you're that concerned about making two different encodes.

Anime North needs DVD-movie discs "that can be played on a standard DVD Player". They're not taking "digital", not in the sense of simple files.

What dschlag007 needs is something to author movie DVDs...and a drive to write DVDs. Without a DVD writer, some software to create a VCD would be the next best thing.

Either Ulead MovieFactory or Nero 6 Ultra will do the job, although it's usually better to have TMPGEnc do the actual encoding rather than either of these programs.

Doesn't Nero have a DVD author software with a 30 day free trail on it?
DVD drives are dirt cheap now... buy a samsung 16x Dual layer at Newegg.com for $59 ;p Best performance and quality you can get at that price.

Wow...all this discussion for me

Well, I think I have everything worked out. I just finished sending 2 CD-R's down to ACEN. 1 with a MPEG version and the other a MJPEG (since I didn't figure out the huffy thing before then...not going to post everything I tried )

And as for the DVD to Anime North. I do indeed have a DVD burner and the software needed to burn it. I also made a test DVD the other day testing different codecs and seeing how they played. I will just use my huffy encode and copy that directly over to the DVD and let it encode they way it wants to (looked good quality to me when watching on my TV and the sound was good too).

So I think I am all set. Now just need to actually finish any small fine tuning on my Challenge AMV to anime north...then I am done with contests for a short while

Thanks for everyone's advice though.

[TaranT]

...
Well, I think I have everything worked out. I just finished sending 2 CD-R's down to ACEN. 1 with a MPEG version and the other a MJPEG (since I didn't figure out the huffy thing before then...not going to post everything I tried )

And as for the DVD to Anime North. I do indeed have a DVD burner and the software needed to burn it. I also made a test DVD the other day testing different codecs and seeing how they played. I will just use my huffy encode and copy that directly over to the DVD and let it encode they way it wants to (looked good quality to me when watching on my TV and the sound was good too).

You may be DQ'd if you send a Huffy-on-a-disc. Check the Anime North AMV Rules:

Please submit entries on CD-ROM or DVD in a format (CD-V or DVD) that can be played on a standard DVD Player (such as a Panasonic DVD-RV32).

And I hope you sent MPEG2 to ACEN. They don't want MPEG1 or MJPEG, although I suspect they're a bit more flexible about formats than AN. (ACEN AMV Rules here)

(edit: M-JPEG is allowed; see next reply)

[outlawed]

And I hope you sent MPEG2 to ACEN. They don't want MPEG1 or MJPEG, although I suspect they're a bit more flexible about formats than AN. (ACEN AMV Rules here)

Actually M-JPEG is an accepted AVI codec. You are correct about MPEG-1; it is not an accepted file format. Your confusion about M-JPEG may be because the true abbreviation is M-JPEG as opposed to MJPEG.

[TaranT]

And I hope you sent MPEG2 to ACEN. They don't want MPEG1 or MJPEG, although I suspect they're a bit more flexible about formats than AN. (ACEN AMV Rules here)

Actually M-JPEG is an accepted AVI codec. You are correct about MPEG-1; it is not an accepted file format. Your confusion about M-JPEG may be because the true abbreviation is M-JPEG as opposed to MJPEG.

No, the problem is that I didn't read all of it. My mistake.

[MistyCaldwell]

Is the contest still low on entries? I finished a video a couple days ago and I don't know if I'll be able to attend any conventions this year....so I'd rather submit to a con that needs entries.

It's a drama video by the way.