Sakuracon 2010 AMV Contest

So after reading on the forum a bit, I've come to realize I was not the only one that had a problem with the AMV contest this year. It also helped me realize what my big problem with the "Best in Show" winner was: It wasn't an AMV, and according the the rules of the contest, shouldn't have even been allowed in the contest.

An AMV is an Anime Music Video. While Ginta Reviews a Movie was certainly hilarious and well lip-synced, it wasn't an AMV, because there was no music. According to the rules of Sakuracon's AMV contest, 70% of a video must be video with music playing in the background. Let's face it, when people voted for Ginta Reviews a Movie, they weren't voting for the video itself, they were voting for the sound clip associated with it. It could have just that sounds clip with a still image of a random anime character and still won. How can you really say a video is "Best in Show" when it was nothing more than admittedly well done lip-syncing? I saw several videos that did an amazing job of showing a clip or even a still image that captured the particular part of the song that was playing at the moment. Ginta Reviews a Movie had little to no "interaction" between the video and the "song", something I consider essential to a good AMV.

I almost want to say that comedy videos should be ineligible for the Best in Show prize, or there should be some kind of weighted judge vote to counter the audience in situations like this. I say this because the video that wins Best in Show is almost always the one that won the Comedy category, at least in the years I've watched the contest. Now, this is mostly because the majority of people really don't care for "serious" AMVs at all, so a lot of them only vote in the comedy category.

I also think that when the videos are shown to be voted on, they should not display the name of the person that created it. This would be to avoid people voting for their favorite creator as opposed to the best video. In the re-showing and showing the winning videos there would be no issue with this, as votes are already in.