AMV Contest

Otakuthon AMV Contest Screening

The Otakuthon AMV (anime music video) Contest Screening will be presenting the top entries of each category of the Otakuthon AMV Contest. Come see the variety of action, drama, comedy, and special effects of these original AMVs as the winner is decided. Not only will you get to see the best of the best, but you will get to vote for the best of the best and help choose the real winners of the Otakuthon AMV Contest!

Otakuthon AMV Contest

General Information

AMV entries will be screened at the Otakuthon AMV Contest Screening on Saturday August 17th, 2013.  The AMV Contest screening will consists of two hours worth of the best videos submitted for the contest.  During the screening, the audience will vote for their favourite AMV through secret ballot in the following categories: Comedy/Parody, Action, Drama/Romance and Originality. The audience will also vote for the "People's Choice" award for best AMV. If you are participating in the contest voting, please stay for the duration of the screening to give all AMVs a fair chance in the voting.

All AMVs submitted will also be automatically entered into the "Best of Show" category for best overall AMV as well as the "Best Visual Effects/Video Editing" category.  The winners of these two categories will be selected by a panel of AMV Contest judges prior to the convention.

Due to time constraints, not all AMVs will be shown during the contest screening.

Participants may enter a maximum of two video entries total (one entry per category).

Content Guidelines

Video Content

  • Videos may not be shorter than 1 minute and should not be longer than 5 minutes.
  • The majority of the video footage must be from anime (Japanese animation) or from Japanese video games (e.g. Final Fantasy XIII).
  • Live action or other sorts of animation footage are acceptable provided that they are not a dominant part of the video. 
  • Do not include any video opening or closing credits. Otakuthon will be adding an opening credit to all entered AMVs containing the title of the music video, creator's name, source of video footage, voting category, and the music title.
  • There should be no subtitles in the AMV unless it is an important element of the music video or if they are karaoke song lyrics. AMVs that breach this rule will be automatically rejected.
  • There should be no watermarks or text credits (such as the credits for openings) of any kind within the AMV. AMVs that breach this rule will be automatically rejected.
  • Any AMV that contains hentai, full frontal nudity, explicit sexuality or other pornographic material, as well as extreme or excessive violence and gore will not be accepted for the AMV Contest.  Scenes with graphic violence and/or sexuality, eroticism, ecchi, and horror are permitted, however.

Textual/Audio Content

  • Music must be used as the main soundtrack and may be from any genre and in any language.
  • Coarse language, including music lyrics, within the AMVs must be acceptable of what can be heard on public radio, prime time television, or any film that is rated 13+.

All videos will be pre-screened by the AMV Contest Director and staff.  Otakuthon reserves the right to accept or reject any video based on the prescribed criteria or for any other reason.

Submission Rules

Anime Music Videos (AMVs) submitted for competition must be your OWN work and must be an ORIGINAL work. You may NOT submit an AMV on another person's behalf.

We will be accepting submissions via e-mail only.  Please send all contest submissions to amvcontest@otakuthon.com.  Do NOT send CDs or DVDs via snail mail.

All AMVs for the contest must be submitted by Friday July 26th, 2013 before 11:59pm.  If your AMV is submitted after this date, it will not be considered for the contest.

AMVs which are submitted can be entered into one of the following four categories:

  • Comedy/Parody
  • Action
  • Drama/Romance
  • Originality

To submit your AMV, send an email to amvcontest@otakuthon.com with the subject line "AMV Contest 2013 Submission" and provide the following information:

  • Your name
  • E-mail address and other contact info
  • (If you will not be present at the awards ceremony) Name of the person designated to pick up your awards OR your mailing address
  • Title of your music video
  • Category in which you would like the AMV entered (select one, see table above)
  • Source of video footage used (i.e. series, movies, etc.)
  • Source of music or audio soundtrack used
  • A link to download your AMV

When submitting for the Otakuthon AMV Contest, participants may enter up to a maximum of two AMVs.  Each video may only be entered into ONE category for voting. 

All AMV entries will be automatically entered into the "People's Choice", "Best of Show", and "Best Visual Effects/Video Editing" categories

To facilitate the judging process, please name your video file the same as your AMV title.

Creators may submit their videos with their submission by:

  • Providing a link for direct download via web (http) or FTP.
  • Providing a BitTorrent metafile or link where the file can be downloaded (if the torrent is seedless or cannot be downloaded, your entry will be disqualified).
  • Providing a link to the file being hosted on a free upload service such as deposit files.com (http://depositfiles.com)
  • Providing a link to the AMV on AnimeMusicVideos.org.

The following are a list of "DON'Ts" which will disqualify your submission:

  • Don't send YouTube or similar video streaming site links.
  • Don't send AMVs which you did not create.
  • Don't send IRC addresses with instructions for DCC downloads.
  • Don't send the actual AMV file as an attachment in the e-mail.
  • Don't send any submissions via "snail" mail.

Format

Please note the following guidelines with respect to video format:

  • All videos must be playable on a PC with the latest Combined Community Codec Pack (CCCP) installed.
  • Files for competition should be AVI, MPG, WMV or MP4 format and compressed using DivX or xVid video compression and MP3 audio compression.
  • DO NOT send videos in RealPlayer or QuickTime format.
  • Videos with poor video quality (ex: pixelated, artifacting, etc.) will be rejected.

Awards

Each category winner will receive an award and a copy of all submitted AMVs from this year's contest.  Awards will be handed out to the winning AMV creators during the AMV Contest Awards Ceremony to be held on Sunday August 18th, 2013.  If you cannot be present during the awards ceremony, please specify in your AMV submission the name of the designated person who will pick up awards on your behalf or provide us with a mailing address so that the award can be shipped to you.

Note

  • Otakuthon reserves the right to use any submitted AMVs, in whole or in part, for promotional purposes during and after the convention.
  • Otakuthon does not guarantee that any AMV submitted will be screened. The convention reserves the right whether or not to screen an AMV for any reason.

For any questions about the AMV Contest, please e-mail the AMV Contest Director at amvcontest@otakuthon.com.