"I Walk Alone" (Otakon 2005)

Post by **VegettoEX** » Mon Aug 22, 2005 9:25 pm

Allo!

Took a bit of time to get the monster encoded, but it's available! "I Walk Alone" was our ("our" being Meri and myself) entry for Otakon 2005's AMV contest. It played in the final contest as an entry in the "SERIOUS/DRAMATIC" category... which was easily the strongest group of dramatic videos I've ever seen in a single contest in my life. Holy. Crap. If you haven't already checked out "Nightmare" (the winner of the category), by all means, drop what you're doing and check it out (be sure to come back here, though ^^). Amazing.

Anyway, this is a video Meri and I made together. It's essentially a fangasm of some of our favorite characters of all-time in a giant, oozing pile of shounen angst (*insert emo cry here*). You can read a good bunch more about the video (concept stuff, editing stuff, etc.) over in the video description, if you're interested.

Many thanks to those who liked the video enough to give it 2nd-place in the category, especially with the likes of "ntyfive²" and "Caught in the Crossfire" in the category. We had a great time working on the video, and we're glad to share it with you!

TITLE: I Walk Alone
ARTIST: Green Day
SONG: "Boulevard of Broken Dreams"
FOOTAGE: Cowboy Bebop, Trigun, Rurouni Kenshin (OVA), Neon Genesis Evangelion, FLCL, DragonBall Z
FORMAT: XviD (DivX-5 compatible)
FILESIZE: 80 MB

I know it's a little big, but from what I understand, an XviD of this quality is actually *LESS* CPU-intensive than an MPEG-1 of the same type. Plus, there's some insane stuff to try and compress in the video (it was fun watching VirtualDubMod choke on the opening static) ^^;;.

http://www.animemusicvideos.org/members ... hp?v=85907

(Make sure you get all of the other drama videos in the contest -- Nightmare, ntyfive², Mamimi, Run, & Caught in the Crossfire)

Gamingdevil · Post by **Gamingdevil** » Tue Aug 23, 2005 8:58 am

Wow, both were very nice. How close was it between the two of them as I can imagine it was pretty close?

Meri · Post by **Meri** » Tue Aug 23, 2005 9:10 am

Gamingdevil wrote:Wow, both were very nice. How close was it between the two of them as I can imagine it was pretty close?

This year (I think) was the highest voter turnout, with maybe about 2000 votes or so (usually votes come anywhere between 300-800). As I understand it, it was a VERY close race between our video and the first place winner, "Nightmare". I think there may have been a difference of 100. I didn't get the exact numbers, but friends that did manage to see the final tally said it was tight.

GotenZ1 · Post by **GotenZ1** » Tue Aug 23, 2005 10:19 pm

These are both incredible videos. I put my hat off to you guys. Really good paralleling between the various series. I really like the ending montage (I sensed a little bit of looping on the music, and it worked very well). The whole video does a great job of giving us a beginning, middle, and an end to the struggles of each character...all condenced into a nice four and a half minutes. Keep up the good work!

Post by **VegettoEX** » Tue Aug 23, 2005 10:36 pm

GotenZ1 wrote:(I sensed a little bit of looping on the music, and it worked very well)

We didn't edit the song at all (other than fading in the beginning, since it comes in directly from "Holiday" on the album). That's my (and many others') one big complaint about the song... that particular instrumental piece near the end loops for about four measures too long. However, in this instance, it works because it gave us enough time to evenly showcase the characters ^^;;.

Glad you liked it! Thanks for checking it out.

askani son · Post by **askani son** » Wed Aug 24, 2005 5:29 am

Nice video guys! Great song too. It worked really well with the video.
I was wondering, what program do you use to make your AMV's? I have seen a few now where you make one video over lap the other in a smaller window, cool effect.

Meri · Post by **Meri** » Wed Aug 24, 2005 10:26 am

askani son wrote:Nice video guys! Great song too. It worked really well with the video.
I was wondering, what program do you use to make your AMV's? I have seen a few now where you make one video over lap the other in a smaller window, cool effect.

Our video's description on the .org lists what programs we used, but I'll mention them here, too. All of the video editing was done in Adobe Premiere, image editing/manipulation was done in Photoshop, and all video effects (split screen, ending montage) was done in Adobe After Effects.

My knowledge of After Effects at the moment is fairly basic. I can do masks, motion effects, blurs, color manipulation, and that's about it. However, that knowledge kinda goes a long way, as you can take that knowledge and mess with it any way you want. The 3D stuff and camera effects are pretty much beyond me right now.

Gamingdevil · Post by **Gamingdevil** » Wed Aug 24, 2005 7:26 pm

I just wanted to let you guys now you got me hooked on "Boulevard of Broken Dreams" I hope you're pleased with yourself

Zackarotto · Post by **Zackarotto** » Thu Aug 25, 2005 7:05 pm

Heh. Go get yourself hooked on the whole American Idiot album, like me.

I only checked out Nightmare and I Walk Alone so far (maybe I'll download the others later), but I think both were amazing. I can see why Nightmare was given the win, but I can understand why it was close. I thought I Walk Alone had more dramatic/emotional power, which is pretty important, considering the category.

I was surprised at how similar some of the scenes were in each anime, and it even made me want to watch Trigun again (well, it also gave me a refreshed appreciation for some of the other series, but it's been a lot longer since I watched Trigun). Keep em coming.

Sun_Wukong · Post by **Sun_Wukong** » Mon Aug 29, 2005 11:23 am

I didnt think Nightmare was that great. Sure it looks like the guy put a hellve a lot of time into making it, but I just didnt get anything out of it. Mabey because I havent seen NGE.

Kanzenshuu

"I Walk Alone" (Otakon 2005)

"I Walk Alone" (Otakon 2005)

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