BricksWest 2002 Animation Festival and Competition
Official Rules
The
BricksWest Animation Festival was created to showcase the hard work
of LEGO fans in computer generated and stop motion animation. The
competition side of the festival was created in order to reward LEGO
fans for their time, effort and creativity. It is hoped that the
BricksWest Animation Festival will exemplify the best practices of
animation and juried competition film festivals and will showcase
some of the best examples of what people can do with a little
imagination and a few LEGO Bricks.
The BricksWest Animation
Festival and Competition is open to anyone of any age and gender.
The competition has been divided into two divisions to separate two
different styles of animation; stop-motion animation and
computer-generated animation. To learn more about the rules for
entering the competition read the accompanying materials in this
packet, follow the rules for submitting an entry, and submit the
entry form with your animation to the address provided. Failure to
follow the rules described in this packet will result in your entry
not being considered in the competition.
Stop-Motion Animation Division
The
Stop-Motion Animation Division is for entries developed using
stop-motion filming techniques to produce an animated film. Inspired
by the LEGO Studios Steven Spielberg Movie Maker Set, this division
rewards individuals who use LEGO System products including bricks,
mini-figs, and special elements to make animated films. Animated
films do not need to be made exclusively or in part with the LEGO
Studios Steven Spielberg Movie Maker Set. Any film or video
equipment, computer aided or not, may be used to make your animated
film. Computer software may also be used to add special effects, to
edit, or to record the individual frames captured by a camera, but
computer software is not required.
This division requires
the use of LEGO System products. Other toys manufactured by
companies other than LEGO may be used, but their use should be
minimal and related to the story line depicted in the animation. Any
animation entries extensively using products other than LEGO System
products or products that do not support the story line will be
considered in violation of the competition rules and disqualified
from the competition. It will be up to the Animation Festival
Committee and the BricksWest Organizers to determine what violates
the rules in this regard.
Camera pans, dollies, and zooms are
entirely appropriate filming techniques for inclusion in the
Stop-Motion Animation Division. In fact, entire sequences of film or
video maybe used in which there was no movement of either the LEGO
System products (minifigs and bricks in front of the camera) or the
camera itself. Ideally though your animation will include at least
one sequence of stop-motion animation to qualify for this division.
Should your animation only include stills of LEGO Minifigs with
faces and moving mouths painted on digitally, then your animation
best fits the next division; computer-generated
animation.
Computer-Generated Animation
Division
The
Computer-Generated Animation Division was created for several
reasons. There is a growing increase in the availability and
creation of animations using computer generated 3D worlds where
actual pieces are not used. Another motive is to allow those
interested in animation yet not possessing large collections of LEGO
Pieces to produce creative projects based upon LEGO Products. LEGO
Products may be filmed and altered using computer-generated imagery
and animation to produce a finished animated film. Ideally, a large
portion of your animation will use computer-generated scenes,
effects, and characters to tell your chosen story.
There is
no required software or hardware for this category. Individuals may
use professional 3D modeling software or consumer level 3D software.
General
Rules for Both Divisions
All entries
must be postmarked no later than January 31, 2002. A package with a
February 1, 2002 postmark will be returned to the sender unopened.
Use the appropriate mail delivery choice in order for all entries to
be received prior to February 12, 2002. Any package received after
this date will not be able to entered into the
competition.
You may submit more than one entry in a Division
and you may submit entries in both Divisions.
A separate and
completed entry form must accompany each entry. No exceptions! If
you submit 4 animations for competition you must include 4 entry
forms with every required field completed.
All animations
submitted for competition must be at least 10 seconds long and no
longer than 300 seconds long (5 minutes).
All entries must
be submitted in one of the following ways:
Tape (NTSC
Only):
VHS
SVHS
Mini-DV
DV-Cam
CD-Rom (optical
disc):
MPEG formatted file
Quicktime (MOV) formatted
file
AVI formatted file
Contact the Animation Chair for other
options (see contact info)
All entries must be labeled in the
following manner:
Name or Names of animators
Title of
Animation
Format
Division
Your presence is not
required at the BricksWest Animation Festival in order to compete or
win an award for your entry. If you are not present your award will
be sent to you in the mail.
All animations submitted for
judging must be appropriate for general audiences, persons of all
ages, and should not contain explicit violence, explicit sexual
content, or explicit language inappropriate for children.
All entries submitted must not have won awards from other
animation festivals or competitions. Any entries submitted to other
animation festivals and competitions that have not won awards are
eligible for entry into the BricksWest Animation Festival and
Competition.
Entries need not be original creations for the
BricksWest Animation Festival and Competition. Any animation placed
on a web site prior to January 31, 2002 or created and released in
any means for public viewing is acceptable for entry into the
competition. The only caveat to this is any animation that has won
an award under the conditions stipulated in Rule #9 is not eligible
for consideration of an award at the BricksWest Animation Festival
and Competition.
All entries must be an "original" cinematic
production according to the terms spelled out in the section
"Originality" below. Any entry that clearly violates these terms
will not be considered for the competition. It is important to
respect the rights of the author or owner of an original work and it
is assumed by this committee that you, as an animator, would like
your work protected under these same rights.
Awards
There will
be two awards given in each category. The first award is the
Conference Attendee Choice Awards, abbreviated ChaCha Award, and
will be determined by those in attendance at the BricksWest
Conference. There will be a station or multiple stations set up
around the conference where conference attendees will view the
animations. They will vote for their favorite in each division on an
award form and submit it to the Animation Festival Committee. The
votes will be tabulated and the entry receiving the most votes in
each division will win an award.
The second category for the
awards is the Conference Organizers Award, abbreviated Cho Award,
and this winner in each division will be decided among the
conference organizers. In this case a majority vote will be all that
is needed to determine the best animation in each category.
In this the first year of the BricksWest Animation Festival
and Competition it might be possible to win both awards in a
division. This practice and other rules will be discussed among the
BricksWest Conference Organizers and the Animation Festival
Committee following the completion of the competition. Future
animation festivals might follow a different practice from this
policy.
Originality
The
term "original" cinematic production has been applied to both
divisions of the competition and requires defining with regards to
this BricksWest Animation Festival and the competition aspects of
the festival. Original can be defined as new or fresh ideas or
products that are the source from which others copy or reproduce. It
is the opinion of the BricksWest Animation Festival Committee that a
scene from a film or television program done with LEGO mini-figs in
a LEGO set constitutes a level of originality. Others, however, may
tend to disagree with the BricksWest Animation Festival Committee
from a strict and limited legal interpretation of the law. Since the
BricksWest Animation Festival organizers are accepting no financial
reimbursement for their participation, there is no entrance fee for
the BricksWest Animation Festival submissions, and there is no
financial reward associated with winning the competition, the
organizers feel confident that there is little to no reason that the
holders of the copyright for those original works of cinematic art
would be interested in this animation festival or the animators
themselves for violating their rights. We, the organizers feel that
works which in part borrow from the original work of cinematic art
would constitute a work under the law as a parody if in fact the
work parodies the original cinematic art.
An exact or entire
reproduction of a film or television program using audio and visuals
taken from the original motion picture or television program and
using LEGO System elements and pieces would, however, constitute an
infringement upon the copyright holder of the original work of
cinematic art, and it will not be allowed to participate in this
competition. While this leaves a lot of wiggle room and is up to the
interpretation of the BricksWest Animation Festival Committee and
the BricksWest Conferece Organizers, we feel confident that it will
be clear to us when an animation crosses the boundary and begins to
infringe upon the rights of the original work of art. If you wish to
parody an original cinematic production, be clear about it in your
treatment and development of your animation. Please DO NOT leave it
to others to decide whether it does or does not parody the original
work.
Returnable Entries?
Normally
animation festivals do not return your entry to you in the mail. The
BricksWest Animation Festival provides a service for returning your
entry in the mail provided that you do three things. First you must
submit an entry to the Animation Festival Committee. We are sorry to
say that we will not be able to return an entry to you that you
never submitted to us in the first place.
Second, you must
include a self-addressed return label that can be affixed to the
original packaging that your entry was sent in. The Animation
Festival Committeeís plan is to place your entry back in the
original packaging, re-seal the package, affix your return label,
and send the whole thing back to you. If you use a mailer, a soft
envelope style package from a shipping/delivery company that
requires its destruction upon opening, then you must send a mailer
in the original package. Ideally you will have the return address
already filled in and complete.
The third step you must take
is to pay the return postage. You can pre-pay the postage for the
return envelope and insert that with your entry into the original
package. For those with boxes, you might have to purchase stamps for
the return postage or get creative and place brown paper over the
return address and postage and place the send to information and
postage on top of the brown paper cover. Either way if you do not
include the cost of getting your entry back to you, you will never
see it again. Sorry, but the Animation Festival Committee has no
means of paying for your entry to be returned to
you.
Disclaimer
LEGO is
a trademark of the LEGO Group of companies that does not sponsor,
authorize or endorse the BricksWest Animation Festival. The LEGO
Group of companies is not responsible for judging or rewarding any
of the animations submitted to this festival. The BricksWest
Animation Festival organizers and the BricksWest organizers will be
soliciting, handling, judging, and managing the competition known as
the BricksWest Animation Festival and are solely responsible for its
outcome.
The BricksWest Animation Festival Committee assumes
no ownership or distribution rights over any entry submitted to the
competition, without written distribution agreements being made with
each individual filmmaker. All entries not returned under the
conditions described in the "Returnable Entries?" Section will be
destroyed no later than one year after receipt of the entries. The
BricksWest Animation Festival Committee and BricksWest Organizers
will make no attempt to distribute the entries without the expressed
written consent of the copyright owners.
The Bad
Things
There are
many bad things that could happen to you in your efforts to submit
an entry. First, the BricksWest Animation Festival cannot be
responsible for the postal service's failure in handling and
delivering your entry or entries. If we do not receive your entry or
the entry arrives late, then your entry will not be considered for
the competition. If your entry is received late, we will return the
package to you immediately by using the postal serviceís provision
of ìreturn-to-senderî any package that is unsolicited. We will
consider any package received after the postmark deadline of January
31, 2002 as unsolicited.
Submitting an entry in the wrong
video or television standard, for example PAL or SECAM instead of
the required NTSC, will result in the Animation Festival Committeeís
inability to view your entry and therefore an inability to judge it
for competition. Sorry, but the committee does not have access to
equipment using the European or Australian standards.
Leaving your entry medium unlabeled will result in the
committee's inability to discern what entry belongs with what entry
form. This breakdown could lead us to judge an animation to which we
do not know to whom it belongs. To prevent this situation we will
simply not judge any entry that is not labeled. The entry must be
labeled on the medium that it is being submitted on. For example, if
your submitting a VHS tape, NTSC formatted, simply stick a label on
the outside with the information outlined in the rules. The same can
be done for optical discs, but be certain to label the opposite side
from where the digital information has been encoded.
Finally, since these videos will be seen by persons of all
ages, the content must be appropriate. Any explicit violence or
explicit sexual content or explicit verbal language will not be
displayed at the public viewing opportunities and the awards
presentation. Any entry deemed inappropriate for a general audience
comprised of persons of all ages, will not be available for the
Audience Award.
Contact
Information
You may
contact the Animation Festival Committee by any of the means listed
below. However, each entry must be mailed to the address below.
Email submissions of animation entries cannot be
accepted.
Email: thumat@gactr.uga.edu
Phone: 706-202-9226
Address: 100-3 Viking Court,
Athens, GA 30605
|
