New Rules for the 2006 AVA

[Kevin Thorp]

Have you all seen the rules? Your team contact should have received an email from FIRST.

Notable changes this year:

• New deadline: Paperwork by Feb. 6, animation and storyboard by Feb. 13
• Must be in QuickTime format. No DiVX, Cinepak or any other codecs.
• You have 2 chances of going to final judging: winning a regional AVA or being selected by the Autodesk judges
• 3 National Awards: Championship, Honorable Mention (new) and Rising Star (Rookie)
• New theme: "Ideas Realized – the process of visualizing what you want to achieve from being part of FIRST."

[Pat Fairbank]

Originally Posted by Kevin342

Have you all seen the rules? Your team contact should have received an email from FIRST.

Notable changes this year:

• New deadline: Paperwork by Feb. 6, animation and storyboard by Feb. 13
• Must be in QuickTime format. No DV, DiVX, Cinepak or any other codecs.
• You have 2 chances of going to final judging: winning a regional AVA or being selected by the Autodesk judges
• 3 National Awards: Championship, Honorable Mention (new) and Rising Star (Rookie)
• New theme: "Ideas Realized – the process of visualizing what you want to achieve from being part of FIRST."

Just a clarification on the video compression: the file format must be QuickTime (.mov), and the codec used must be DV-NTSC.

There is also a plethora of strict new regulations about frame rate, resolution, placement of text, audio levels, etc. so make sure you read the rules posted on Streamline before you start animating.

[mehul]

"the codec used must be DV-NTSC"

so i guess this would mean there is no size limit on the animation unlike last year where it was set to about under 300mbs if i remember correctly. If we use that compression i think it would give out a larger size than other compressions like divx or the cinepac mention before. I havent read all the rules yet it would be nice if someone posts it here

[Kevin Thorp]

Size limit is 250 Mb.

I'd post the rules but they include login information to Autodesk's Streamline site, and I dont know if they want that in a public forum.

[Ian Curtis]

I <3 the animation guys who changed what animators must animate. Now the only problem is tracking them down and awarding them with a cookie as I promised earlier in another thread, which I can't seem to find. Ah well, now we need to complete the animation this year.

That deadline really scares me.

[mehul]

hmm i read the file and as i though before there is no size limit to next years competition unless first posts it la8er. The codec we are used last year allowed us to compress our animation from about 1 gig to about 150 mbs -cinepac so dv would be larger file . anyway thanks for the info

-team1635 animator

[mehul]

Originally Posted by Kevin342

Size limit is 250 Mb.

I'd post the rules but they include login information to Autodesk's Streamline site, and I dont know if they want that in a public forum.

well that info is already in the usfirst website so its already public.

[Nuttyman54]

Originally Posted by mehul

well that info is already in the usfirst website so its already public.

not exactly...only those who have streamline can access it.

[Capt.ArD]

Whew, for a minute i thought they changed the content requirements. Theme changed, but that's easy to work with. This is my first year leading the animation team, so none of the format changes affect me. Before this my superiors did all that.

BTW, since windows movie maker doesn't support quicktime i don't think, is there a free video program so i can add the slate and black parts, as well as the voiceover?

[Nuttyman54]

Originally Posted by Capt.ArD

BTW, since windows movie maker doesn't support quicktime i don't think, is there a free video program so i can add the slate and black parts, as well as the voiceover?

AVID Free DV should be able to do that

[Kevin Thorp]

Our video editing software doesn't do Quicktime either. I started a new thread about video editing:

http://www.chiefdelphi.com/forums/sh...613#post426613

[BruceJ]

Just a quick tip for those who haven't used "safe frames" before.

In 3ds max, the settings you use in the Render Scene dialog will determine the aspect ratio of the frame when it is rendered.
The viewport can show this as a box known as the "live area" by right clicking on the viewport name and selecting "show safe frame".

By default, the live area is the largest box, then action safe frame/box at 10%, then the smallest is title safe at 20% from the edge of the live area.

This year's award guidelines say everything should be within a 15% boundary from the edge of the live area (which you should set to NTSC DV or 720x480 in the Render Scene dialog).
So you could go to the Customize menu, Viewport configuration, and select only Title Safe for example and set it to be 15.

If so, then in your viewport you will see the live area and another box inside of it at 15% from the edge.

-Bruce
Animation mentor, team 111

[Pat Fairbank]

The rules can be found in the attached doc.

[yixak]

[quote=Pat Fairbank]Just a clarification on the video compression: the file format must be QuickTime (.mov), and the codec used must be DV-NTSC.

That's not the way I read it. While I don't know Pat's qualifications (so he might just have the power to say, "Sorry, I don't think so"), I thought the DV-NTSC refered to the "Pixel-Aspect Ratio." Seeing it this way means that the next two lines of the codec regulations are not merely redundant, but simply narrow the field of codecs allowed while allowing each team to compress as they see fits their animation best. Seeing as there are other regulations that are independent of the codec (frame size, frame rate) I figured this wasn't a bad assumption, especially when exporting with the DV-NTSC format resulted (even after 6 hours of tweaking) in a file the five times larger than when using the H.264 codec with much, much worse image quality. Will this still get disqualified? (H.264 is neither cinepak nor a non-standard codec and we set pixel-aspect ratio to DV-NTSC with fps at 29.97 and frame size a 720x480).

[abroerman]

exporting with the DV-NTSC format resulted (even after 6 hours of tweaking) in a file the five times larger than when using the H.264 codec with much, much worse image quality. Will this still get disqualified?

I'll quote a post DLavery made not long ago:

Your animation will NOT be judged if you didn't read the rules and submit it in an acceptable format.

I have been perusing several of the animations that have already been sent to Streamline. Of the 51 animations I looked through, 24 of them - practically half of the entries - use illegal codecs, have improper image size, exceed the file size, or exceed the time limitations. Half of the entries are not in compliance with the submission requirements and are probably going to be disqualified by Autodesk. Based on past practice and what we have heard from Autodesk, they will be absolutely ruthless this year in ensuring compliance with the submission rules.
...
Some otherwise fine animations are going to be completely ignored because someone on the team made a stupid little mistake like using a MPEG-4, animation, Sorensen 3, or H.264 codec instead of the required DV-NTSC codec.