Anime Music Video Contest
Welcome to the 2019 Anime USA AMV Contest.
The AUSA AMV staff welcomes you to this year’s AMV Contest! The last four years have been a blast with our AMV Halloween themed contests so we will continue to do it as we have! This year the convention theme is the Past, Present and Future! It is our hope that you enjoy creating your videos for our contest, as we look forward to viewing them! This document describes the contests, events, rules, entry process, video and audio specifications, and panel submissions for the 2019 convention. Welcome to this year’s contest!
This year’s events are as follows:
The Main AMV Contest: This is your standard AMV contest, and any AMVs submitted to this should be for a general convention audience. I would say be aware of the potential for people under the age of 15 to be in attendance. Any AMV disqualified due to content will be shifted to the Nightmare and Naughty Contest or an After Hours showcase depending on the editor’s wishes.
The Horror Contest (18+ content allowed): This is the new face of our Halloween/Horror contest from the last two years. Try your hand at being naughty or giving nightmares! Violence, gore, nudity and language restrictions will be lifted. Please note rule #2 covers the lessened restrictions.
AMV Showcase: AUSA AMV Staff will choose videos that did not make the final cut. If an AMV is disqualified but it falls within the rules of the main contest, it will be shown here time permitting. You may also request to have a video go directly into this showcase. The AMV staff will determine what content will be placed in this panel. Videos going directly into the showcases will not count against the amount of videos allowed for the submission in the contests.
AMV After Hours: 18+ content allowed, allows for more violence/gore, some nudity and some offensive language but not in extreme amounts. This is not a contest but a place where you can have your videos shown if you wish if your video(s) contain mature content. We will automatically shift any video submitted to the main contest that cannot compete to these showcases unless you wish to enter them into the Naughty and Nice Contest.
AMV Panels: Do you like AMVs and want to share thoughts you have about them? Do you make AMVs? Are you an AMV Judge at another con? If you wish to discuss AMVs then apply for a panel spot! The AMV Coordinator will inform anyone of accepted panels, and the panel times. These panels are for anything to do with AMV’s, your top 10, your best editing tips, your best tips to have AMV’s judged well in contests. Also if you wish to have 18+ content please inform us on your panel submission. You do not need to be an editor to present a panel.
Fan Parodies: We will show some parody movies at AUSA again this year, we will update this section with the ones we will show as we make those selections. If you know of a fan parody you would like to have shown or you made one yourself let us know!
Anime USA 2019 AMV Contest Rules
Submission deadline has passed.
1) Each person/studio may submit up to 3 AMV’s in total for the Main AMV Contest. 2 AMV’s in total for the Horror Contest. No matter which contest you submit you may only have one AMV per category.
*NOTE*: If you are part of a studio, you may submit AMV’s either as yourself or as the studio. You are still limited to the submission limits of each contest no matter which association you apply to each video
2) The Main AMV Contest (The Main Contest): No nudity, offensive language or excessive violence or gore. The audience for this will be a general, all age audience! This will be evaluated during judging, if it is noticed before the submission window ends, you will be contacted to see if you can edit the video for submission here.
The Horror Contest (18+ Allowed): The rules are relaxed somewhat, still extreme amounts of gore, violence, nudity, sexual content or language can be cause for disqualification from the contest.
3) Videos may not be more than 1 year old upon the date of its final submission to the contest, not have been submitted to this contest before, nor have won 3 or more category or best in show awards from separate contests. We must keep new ideas coming forward and give everyone the best chance to enjoy winning or participating in a contest. (Specific judge awards are not considered).
4) Ensure your Video is between one minute and six minutes in length, exception is the trailer/parody category where the minimum length is 30 seconds.
5) You may use footage from video games, anime, Japanese live action or any other content as well as you may even use stop motion footage you created yourself*. Your AMV must contain at least 75% content from works inspired by Japanese video games or Japanese anime. You must conform to the general audience rating with all footage no matter where you get it from. Some examples of such animation that is inspired by Japanese anime or video games would be the new Netflix Voltron, Avatar the Last Air Bender and Korra, this list is not complete and videos will be judged on a case by case basis. This rule does not apply to non-competing videos.
*Exception is the Live Action Category where you may use any sources of live action content and not just Japanese live action content. To qualify for this category you must have more than 60% live action content.
Special Note: Live Action AMV’s will be looked at hard for content due to the realistic portrayal of blood and violence, Please be aware that any disqualified Live Action AMV will be shifted to the 18+ contest.*
6) Dubbed audio from licensed content is not allowed. You may record your own dialog but you cannot take the script and read it!
7) Do not include any subtitles from your original sources. You may however add in your own as long as you do not just copy the subtitles. Game footage and live action content are included in this; you must have a clean capture.
8) Do not include any bumpers or credits for your video, Title cards will be made by the AUSA AMV Staff to introduce your video, even if it does not make finalist as we may be showing it in our overflow showcases. I want you to get the exposure if possible. If you want to place a buffer at the beginning or very end of the video of 2 seconds or less in total, you may only do so with black screen; these 2 seconds will not be considered part of the video length.
9) Do not use any commercial studio logos or other forms of watermarks that you did not create yourself as a parody of said logo or your own logo. NO FORM OF REFERENCE TO THE MPAA ITSELF WHAT SO EVER; you may however parodies of the formatting of the screen are allowed, just do not name the MPAA look to the following video for an example of how to do it correctly: “http://www.animemusicvideos.org/members/members_videoinfo.php?v=197392”. Do not try to cover up watermarks with your own, we do see these, and repeated violations of this rule may be enforced in any way the AMV staff and Coordinator deem appropriate, up to and including permanent banning for contest and/or showcase submissions.
10) With the exception of the parody/trailer category, excessive narration or dialog could be grounds for disqualification.
11) Submissions should not contain unaltered video from your audio selection’s official music video. If this is seen even in sections of your AMV it may be grounds for disqualification.
12) Attendance to the Convention is not needed to enter, our request to know if you will be at the convention is for our informational use only. We love calling people up and handing you your prize in recognition of your hard work! Please come to the convention if you can!
13) Anime USA is not responsible for Lost, damaged, misdirected, or stolen submissions or prizes if one needs to be shipped.
14) AUSA AMV Staff and any Judges are precluded from entering this AMV contest. (This means AUSA staff can submit to this contest if they wish).
15) We reserve the right to reject or disqualify any entry for any reason; all rules here are subject to change and will be applied equally to all submissions once posted. An FAQ will be posted if it seems that a rule is ambiguous. Some AMV’s may be disqualified from the contests but may show up in a showcase and this is at AMV staff discretion.
16) All submissions must be attributed to an entry into the Google Docs form for submissions. The File name MUST match exactly to the name submitted in this form!
17) All submissions become the property of Anime USA and will not be returned and may be used in panels or showcasing subsequent to the actual contest airing, proper credit will always be given to the editor if it is used in any form what so ever.
18) Anime USA AMV staff may alter the rules at any time. Any change that is enacted is retroactive to the beginning of the submission window and any video affected will be communicated to the Editor(s) at that time.
19) All decisions by Anime USA’s AMV staff are final.
If you have any questions please feel free to ask, as I strive to answer any question put to me no matter how trivial it may seem, by emailing: Jon.Webb@AnimeUSA.org
The Main AMV Contest categories:
- Action
- Comedy
- Drama
- Parody/Trailer
- Upbeat
- Romance
- Live Action
- The Horror AMV Contest: (separate mature/18+ content contest)
- Nightmare (horror)
- Naughty
AUSA AMV Staff will judge the entries to determine the finalists, and then the finalists will be presented to the audience to vote. Awards will be given to AMV’s in first place of each category: Best in show, Director’s choice and Judge’s choice. Second place will be announced and recorded. There may be other awards given at the discretion of the AMV staff.
This year we will be accepting submissions in the following forms:
- Digital delivery (delivery via Internet, preferred way)
- Optical (CD/DVD/Blu-ray) — Please contact the AM/V Coordinator if you wish to submit this way.
- Flash Media (all SD card sizes and USB flash drives) — Please contact the AMV Director if you wish to submit this way.
**Please remember that these devices may not be returned to you.**
Submission deadline has passed. AUSA is not responsible for lost, damaged, stolen or incorrectly delivered submissions; you MUST take all precautions to protect your media if you ship! It is recommended that you use Digital delivery for material submission. Extensions will not be given unless the AUSA AMV Staff decides it is warranted, please let us know if there are problems and we will inform you if there is an extension warranted.
During judging of the submissions if there is an issue with your submission we will contact you to allow you to address or dispute the issue, and if you are able to correct or submit a different video, in place of the video with the issue, by the submission deadline that will be accepted. Please keep this in mind depending on how you submit your video(s) as some submission vectors may limit how much, how fast or how often we can download your videos. We recommend the following: Direct share via drop box or e-mail attachment if possible.
All submissions must meet the following standards:
Video Format:
- MPEG 1
- MPEG 2
- M2TS (MPEG2 Transport Stream)
- AVI (DivX or XviD for lossy codecs, UTVideo or Lagarith for lossless)
- HuffYUV avi
- MP4 (h264)
**NOTE: We will not accept .MOV and .WMV so if you are using windows movie maker please make sure to set your output to .AVI.**
Audio Format:
- Uncompressed wav (PCM)
- MPEG audio (mp3, mp2, etc.)
Resolution:
- Full Screen: DO NOT LETTER BOX these entries or we will have to strip that and resize your work.
- 640 X 480
- 960 X 720
- 1440 X 1080
Wide Screen:
- 720 X 480 *
- 848 X 480
- 1280 X 720
- 1920 X 1080
* This particular resolution happens to be the default DVD resolution and the actual footage is either 640×480 or 848×480. Should you resize appropriately that is acceptable, if you choose to keep the resolution we recommend that you submit as MPEG-1 or MPEG-2 with a frame rate of either 29.97 or 23.976 flagged for 3:2 pull down. As stated above letterboxing is NOT accepted, please flag for 16:9 if that is the native aspect ratio of your footage.
Frame Rates:
- 23.976
- 24
- 25
- 29
- 97
- 30
- 60
Any deviation from these listed rates and your video will be rejected (you can re-submit if time allows).
Submission information:
Submissions will be required to have the Google Doc form filled out with the corresponding file name. We recommend that editors use the following AMV naming convention “Editor’s Name – Video Title” this is for ease of knowing what file belongs to whom. You will be able to send an upload link in the Google Doc, choose to share via drop box, or you may send the file via e-mail (Jon.Webb@AnimeUSA.org). Please do not mark VARIOUS when you have multiple anime/song sources, please list all sources up to a minimum of six sources. We will list various in many cases, but we need to confirm sources for judging. Use the following links for your submissions:
AMV Submission Link for Main Contest, Horror Contest and Showcasing:
Panel submission will be accomplished through the normal AUSA programming portal as well as via email submission directly to me (Jon.Webb@AnimeUSA.org). The AUSA Programming portal will be through the following link: (Click Here)!