To dodge the two most commonly asked questions...

No, I haven't picked the theme yet.

Yes, I can be bribed. Preferably heavily, and often!

How about blackmailed? I HAVE the pictures!

Hey Dylan,

Consider any and all types of bribes covered!

Also, can we get a heads-up on the judging method, panel or entrants?

Mike

ok, here's a real wimpy question: how long can I wait to decide if I want to embarass myself and enter? I REALLY want to do this, but have no experience, old equipment, new computer and new NLE. But then this is a reason to get out there and TRY, right? Right? Wish I could be someone's crew just to see how it's done. But then I wish a lot of things!

Bottom line: how long can I wait to decide?

Yes, I can be bribed. Preferably heavily, and often!
Do you take Paypal? I lost your address. ;)

Leslie, you have until the night of Aug. 3 when Dylan posts the theme.

Note to Edward: Next year we all need to do something about your camera. No more evidence! :)

Do you take Paypal? I lost your address. ;)

Leslie, you have until the night of Aug. 3 when Dylan posts the theme.



Lorinda, yes he does take paypal and I have the address, ahh, just for ordering t-shirts though!!!!

Leslie, if it starts to fill up, too many entries, there may be a limit put on the number of entries, so keep an eye on that.

Mike

Who judges the films? And on what merits? Does the panel target specific categories or just weigh each film as a whole?

Edit: Woops. Just noticed my question is very similar to Mike's. Perhaps we can both be answered in one swoop.

Dylan,

What will be the limit on film duration this time? 5 minutes? 3? 4? 100? :)

Bill

Duration: under 3 minutes, with a little leeway.

Judging: Probably the same as DVC5, by the group, unless I change my mind. Films are judged 50% on technical merit, 50% on story/use of the theme.

Blackmail works as well, except I have almost no sense of shame, as most people learned in Vegas... :)

Did I miss anything?

What was the time limit for DVC5? I'd just like to get an idea of how much time everyone had to make those, many of which were very good.

Also, what exactly is "a little leeway?" Thirty seconds? Fifteen? One? And that running length does NOT include end credits, right? What about intro credits? Extended title sequences? Intermission?

I think we had four weeks with dvc5, so this one will be a bit faster paced.

Dylan, had a crazy idea for posting our videos. What if we create a group on youtube.com and post all our videos there? It's free as best I can tell, and if people had trouble uploading at least everyone would be doing the same thing. It'd give us a little bit of visibility outside of dvinfo too.

What was the time limit for DVC5? I'd just like to get an idea of how much time everyone had to make those, many of which were very good.

Also, what exactly is "a little leeway?" Thirty seconds? Fifteen? One? And that running length does NOT include end credits, right? What about intro credits? Extended title sequences? Intermission?

It seems if your credits made run a little over, it wasn't a big deal. I don't know if anyone has been disqualified for too long. Of course if we are the judges like last time, and someone tries to exploit overtime usage, the judges may take that into account. So keep it close...

No-one has been disqualified... yet :) Like Dylan said, it's not a big deal if you
run a bit over. Credits do not count for your running time, as long as you don't
make your credits the movie (like perhaps Pixar likes to do.... hehe)

What Rob said. If you started pushing 4 minutes (total length) I'd probably get annoyed. 15 seconds is very safe. I don't want to stifle a good story with a hard time limit.

DVC 5 was longer, but the contest took 4 weeks so...

ahhhhhhh, ooooooooo, mmmmmmmm.

Just thinking back to the good ole' days (DVC5) where we had 4 wonderful glorious weeks.

ahhhhhhh, ooooooooo, mmmmmmmm.

Just thinking back to the good ole' days (DVC5) where we had 4 wonderful glorious weeks.
LOL! Yeah, and used THREE of 'em figurin' out what the heck to shoot and crammed everything in the fourth.

This will be my first "one-week, 3-min" DVC. Just got two Dell 19" LCD monitors that are gonna work PERFECT for editing.

OH, GREAT idea on the "youtube.com" thing.

Yeah, 4 weeks of sweating in my sleep, ah sleep, I remember that...and thinking I had all the time in the world. Then that last time I looked, 3 weeks and 2 days had gone by before I got an idea that looked like a real idea and not Jell-O.

I like 1 week. It makes you think on your feet, at work, while trying to fall asleep, etc.

Makes for an interesting lost weekend too. Dylan knows about those from looking at his past entries.

Sean

Makes for an interesting lost weekend too. Dylan knows about those from looking at his past entries.



If you can't edit drunk... you can't edit.

If you can't edit drunk... you can't edit.

I'll drink to that, and often do!

Now there's a challenge I'm up for.

I have a question, in dvc5 we had 5 minutes, the official rules say 3 minutes.

How much time can we have ?

I have a question, in dvc5 we had 5 minutes, the official rules say 3 minutes.

How much time can we have ?

See message #9 in this thread. Dylan says "under 3 minutes, with a little leeway"

Bill

See message #9 in this thread. Dylan says "under 3 minutes, with a little leeway"

Bill

Yup. 3 Minutes.

Thanks Bill!

...I like 1 week. It makes you think on your feet, at work, while trying to fall asleep, etc.



Speak for yourself, add-in rotoscoping, compositing and the real fun stuff like manual matchmoving... you can spend a whole day on one scene, ugh! I wish I had four weeks!

OK, Rant over, too much coffee (my face feels like I ate too many cheeseburgers... OK, you didn't need that... Sorry, I have to get back to fusion...

my face feels like I ate too many cheeseburgers LOL, oh man is that your line? Do you mind if I use it?

Too funny. I was sitting here laboring over color correction when I read that. Thanks for the laugh, I needed it.

Yup. 3 Minutes.

Thanks Bill!

Now then, what am I going to do with my extra 10 minutes of video ? :)

Now then, what am I going to do with my extra 10 minutes of video ? :)
Make a directors cut?

Sorry if this sounds stupid, but has DVC6 started yet? and where can I sign up?

Sorry if this sounds stupid, but has DVC6 started yet? and where can I sign up?
It started about 5 - 6 days ago and I think since the theme is announced it's too late to sign up.

I'll wait till DVC7 then :P

Official end time? I lost track of when this one needs posted to the web. I know I saw it someplace but this is the official question thread. Something like 3am Sunday my time (Ohio) as I recall.

Sean

Official end time? Something like 3am Sunday my time (Ohio) as I recall.

Sean

Sean, according to Dylan, we "have until next Sunday night", as "the contest closes, SUNDAY -MIDNIGHT PST- AUGUST 13th". Humm, I guess I can pull an all-nighter and send it by Monday 8am Portuguese (that is, GMT) time.

Fun fun, less hours to sleep...

Hugo

I'll take that as 3am Monday morning thenuntil I hear different. Cool.

It will take a while to fake the destruction of the entire planet...

Sean

If I could get a little clarification on a rule that I'm sure I should understand by now, are we allowed to show the film to those involved in its creation before it's actually been posted to the entrants thread? I just got off the phone with Robin Whitmore at UCO/Lick Observatory about permission to use one of their images in my movie; then there's the gentleman who's providing music for the film. Everyone's been so friendly and helpful so far that I'd feel kind of bad about making them wait to see their own material on screen.

Are they exceptions to the rule, or will they join the rest of the internet in anxiously awaiting my next masterpiece?

It should not publically be visible before the challenge publishes the links.
Obviously people in your team can see it as long as you don't put it up
somewhere for the world to see (so give them a DVD or something?).

Disclaimer: I would wait for the final word on this from Dylan before proceeding...

Yeah, that makes sense. I'm fine with keeping it a secret until the thread goes up, I just thought I should ask, if only to know; that way when someone asks me, in the future, when they can see a film they've helped with, I have an answer for them.

Nothing to worry about, really, as I haven't shot a single field of video to date. Looks like I'll gain a true appreciation of the phrase "crunch time" in the next day or two.

It should not publically be visible before the challenge publishes the links.
Obviously people in your team can see it as long as you don't put it up
somewhere for the world to see (so give them a DVD or something?).

Disclaimer: I would wait for the final word on this from Dylan before proceeding...

You got it Rob!

You can show it to all your buddies, just no public displaying on the internet until after we display the URL here.

Dylan:

So I sent my links using the email system on DVInfo.net for you. I can't recall if that is correct or not. How do I know if you got it ?

Edit: Alright, I found the first thread, and discovered it goes via DVChallege email account. I sent again.

I used what email was provided on thedvchallenge.com. thedvchallenge@hotmail.com

If there was any other way to submit. I don't know about it.

I'll take that as 3am Monday morning thenuntil I hear different. Cool.

It will take a while to fake the destruction of the entire planet...

Sean
Isn't "SUNDAY -MIDNIGHT PST- AUGUST 13th" equal to 3:00 a.m. SUNDAY EST?? The deadline (from what I've seen) has been midnight Sunday which means you had until 11:59:59 Saturday night to post your entry.

There seems to be a bit of confusion as to what defines "midnight Sunday" on these challenges.

See #4:
http://www.thedvchallenge.com/rules.shtml

I've read the rule, hence the confusion. You're posting a deadline but accepting entries up to 30 hours past it.

I realize I may lose favor with the voting cast by saying this (not that I had a snowball's chance anyway because you've got some extremely talented folks on here), but if you're going to post rules and not stick to them, then it's really not fair to those who have been abiding by them from the beginning.

I'm not trying to be adversarial about this, just want some clarity so I can decide if I really have to bust it to get done by 11:59 Saturday night or if I do indeed have an additional day to get it done.

You haven't lost favor in my eyes, Edward, I understand where you're coming from. While I can't speak for Dylan, I believe I know the answer:

"When the theme is announced on a Thursday morning, the deadline is midnight, Pacific Standard Time, the following Sunday (10 days later) night. Sometimes we go to bed early, which makes us slightly flexible on the deadline but if it isn’t there when we check email Monday morning, you are definitely out."

There are only two twelve o'clocks that occur each day; one in the early, early morning, and one that signifies noon. To be technical, neither is really "night". And though some people refer to those wee hours as such, they are usually lumping them in with the previous day, not the one that's just starting. "Man, I was up late last night, I didn't get to bed until three AM!" No, three AM was not technically part of that person's "night", but that's how people speak.

I suppose all that's a little insulting to one's intelligence, and I apologize for that, but my point is that all of this leads me to believe that Dylan is using the unofficial, colloquial version of "midnight Sunday" that most people use, and not the technical, correct-though-often-unused version.

Thanks, Robert. Your answer makes perfect sense. I guess I've been working for DoD so long I take time too literally. Nice to know I can still "tweak" today if I want/need to. Appreciate your response.

Well, I've exhausted two hours trying to figure out why my Quicktime no longer plays any audio files. Unfortunately I have run out of time to play with QT Pro. I am force to submit only a WIndows File.

Still, considering I didn't start shooting until yesterday morning, I'm calling it a success!

Good luck to everyone.

Dick:

I've had the same problem, with Quicktime Pro, something is going on, but can't figure, so Window media here I come. Windows medias is working so nice with the HDV renders anyway....

Since this is the question thread, I seem to have lost, forgotten and/or misplaced the following information; what are the prizes for this DVC? Anyone have a link with it in there? I thought I saw it someplace but it isn't obvious to me now.

Thanks,
Sean

http://www.dvinfo.net/conf/showthread.php?t=71324

Dick:

I've had the same problem, with Quicktime Pro, something is going on, but can't figure, so Window media here I come. Windows medias is working so nice with the HDV renders anyway....

Anybody else having a probelm with Quicktime? I'd like to have another go at it, and post a Quicktime link too, but I'm not sure if I would be violating the rules of the contest since I didn't get a AT version done before Sunday night.

Even if I'm not allowed to post a QT entry, I'd still like to get my QT Pro working. I'm currently thinking I will have to uninstall and reinstall it. Anybody else have the porblem and able to fix it?

I don't have QT Pro, Dick, but this time I put up an mp4 link. (It only plays as a QT for me.) The mp4 is almost the same file size as a mov rendered using the guidelines posted on this forum, but the quality seems much higher. If your reinstall doesn't work you might try it. :)