Whew, that's finally over with.

by blazehedgehog

So Gametrailers is having a video contest. Or, should I say, was having a video contest, because the deadline for entries is in about three hours. The contest itself was to make a scary, game-related halloween video. A few years back, I won $1000 (in Gamestop gift cards) for a video I did, and loving Halloween, I decided I'd give it a shot again. The prize this time is $500 on Amazon, which obv...

So Gametrailers is having a video contest. Or, should I say, was having a video contest, because the deadline for entries is in about three hours. The contest itself was to make a scary, game-related halloween video. A few years back, I won $1000 (in Gamestop gift cards) for a video I did, and loving Halloween, I decided I'd give it a shot again. The prize this time is $500 on Amazon, which obviously has a lot more than just videogames on it.

I decided on a "Motion Comic", done entirely in pencil, because that seemed like the sort of thing I could get done quickly and easily. By the time I finished my Luigi game, I had barely a week left to make my entry. Finding motivation was tough - after winning the $1000 on Gametrailers back in 2006, I began entering a slew of other contests over the span of a couple years - and 99% of them resulted in nothing more than wounded pride (some of them actually ended wounding more than that - let's just say "super terrific carpal tunnel syndrome" and leave it at that).

Gametrailers basically said that "anything goes" with regards to content, as long as it stuck to the theme. To quote:

"It doesn’t matter if the form is machinima, live-action, clay-mation or pencil drawings, as long as it is fits the theme."

Story Board Below that, they listed a few "inspirational" videos - mainly things like scary gameplay montages and the like. As I browsed the few entries I could find, I discovered that most of them stuck closely to the "inspirational" videos Gametrailers had pointed out. I needed to set myself apart from the pack. I chose an original "animation", drawn entirely in pencil (since that would be the easiest to do within the time alotted). I drew up some storyboards and slowly, I got the ball rolling. What this basically meant is that I had to go in to "crunch-time mode" - no recreational activity (no videogames, no TV, etc.), and especially no internet. In the past, when I'd have to resort to these sorts of measures, it would only last for a single day. This time, I would spend the majority of the week locked up with no internet access, drawing like a bandit. At the peak of productivity, I counted drawing over 20 images in a single day - all told, it was probably more than I've drawn in the last three years combined. Believe me, my arm was ready to fall off, I had drawn so much.

After days of drawing and hours of editing video, I finally uploaded the finished product to Gametrailers barely even an hour ago. Only now is it beginning to sink in that I may have spent all that time and all that effort and I still might only get a runner-up prize (500 GTP for use in Gametrailers' stupid "Auction House". 500 GTP is barely even half the cost of what most items end up "selling" for). I'm not 100% satisfied with the final product, but I honestly did not have any time to do anything more than what I managed to finish.

If you want to give the video a look, be my guest. If you need me, I'll be over here, flipping out with stress.