davlin (31st Jul 2009 14:50)

Beautiful job,story ,acting , cinematography and production values all first class could'nt fault it. Well done Ben &Co Dave www.davlin-studio.co.uk

Atom (29th Jul 2009 17:59)

I guess it just comes down to, as prideful as it sounds, having a similar to Oscar situation of being 'robbed'- in that we were really given every indication we were going to win. We got the Audience Award at the screening, the audience gave us a noticeably better and overwhelmingly positive reaction compared to the overall winner (who played right after us at the initial screening), the producer of the event lauded our movie as if it had won, we got emailed questions about it and how we put it together from 48 hour people and fellow contestants, and were finally part of the top ten. All this, perhaps in our own cocky overexpectation, made it hard not to think we had won. People had said so, the producer thought so, and really so did we. The fact that the winner, in multiple categories, was a movie I didn't even bat an eyelash at as competition- well, it both makes me feel negatively cocky/shitty for discounting that movie (after all, even though the movie clearly didn't follow any of the rules and I didn't care for it doesn't mean I have any right to get angry at them for winning. It was the judges, not the winners who poorly chose.) and yearning for some validation for the movies that didn't win. I won Dallas, yeah, that's cool. And I get to go to Vegas for it, yeah. But it's no fun when you can't do it with the people you work with, with your brother, and your friends. It just won't be the same. And while I love Greg and John and A Love Not Standing, there's just something not fully satisfying in the win. Because most importantly, it won't have been Atomic. And worst of all, the winning film has np chance against nationals, which is a shame. These judges need p start looking at a larger scope- just like Dallas the previous two years, when you pick a weak entry as a winner you shouldn't be 'OMG!' surprised when they can't compete in the post-season national competitions; in turnaling the whole city look bad.

spydurhank (29th Jul 2009 10:17)

Wow dude... that really blows and I know how that feels. I think you shouldn't feel to bad though because if you lose to someone that didn't really follow the criteria of the rules of the contest... What does that tell you about the judges and the way the contest itself is being run? Here's an example. I've entered 5 art contests in the past 3 or 4 months. They all called for renders of 5 super hero kids with ages ranging from 11 to 14. My first four renders, I went out of my way to make sure that they all looked like little kids, body type, face, that kind of thing. Most of the other artists made their renders look like adults which was clearly visible since they gave the female characters big boobs and high heels among other things. I think that 1 or 2 of the artists that actually drew kids might have won but I don't remember, the other winners were the ones that drew adults. They as well won by a landslide. I realized later that the guy who posted the contest wasn't a judge, he put out a call for any viewer of the art to cast a vote for their favorite. After a little research I found out that the guys that were winning were just having all of their friends vote for them. I had a few votes for my work from folks that actually honestly liked it but I asked my friends that knew about the contest, not to vote for me because I figured that it'd be unfair and almost like cheating since your friends are gonna vote for you just because well... because their your friends. So in the end it turns out that it wasn't an art contest after all. It was a popularity contest and whomever had the most friends was going to win wether they followed the rules or not. It's not exactly the same as what happened to you guys but the similarity in the unfair department of the voting kinda sticks out. But I take it with a grain of salt and keep entering art contests because their might be at least one person out there that likes my work and could possibly hire me. You never know dude. The same goes for you guys man. Keep doing what you're doing guys because you're really good at it. I feel bad for everyone that worked on your project because everyone did and amazing job. I might go as far as telling your guys that work with you in your future projects... don't expect to win because the judging panel is a little sketchy but we're still gonna do the best job that we can. Vulcan judges suck sometimes dude so don't let them get you guys down. Frank.