I honestly thought everyone's was great. Except mine...
Note: I didn't enter.

Congratulations everybody!

The only thing that stopped me from entering was that I had a bunch of projects I was working on (and still am). If I hadn't had those projects, I would have totally entered. I loved everything about the contest, I just couldn't find the time in between my projects to finish my entry. But that's just me.

Congrats to the winners!

First off, a belated congratulations to the winners. Good job to all of the entrants as well; just getting a film of this nature completed is a feat in and of itself.

That said, since Mr. Rundown has mentioned it, I think it would be remiss to not address the low turnout this year. Unless I remember incorrectly, Kitchen Sink was actually shorter than TOY by a month or so, and TOY was shorter than Avant-Garde by three months. It's also worth noting that the highest turnout for the three contests was for the longest running: Avant-Garde, with well over 30 entries. TOY had slightly less than 30. Both of these contests ended in the summer, when most of the site population is on holiday, which may have been a boon to entrants who waited until the last minute to make their films. Obviously, a high turnout says nothing of the quality of submissions- I'll leave that judgement up to you.

In theory... well, I can't say I like the idea of shorter contests, but I would probably support it. It's disheartening to think we might have to limit the aspirations of the motivated to garner more entries from those less driven, but it'll hardly be a contest if we keep hemorrhaging contestants at the current rate. Each year the people who produce large, ambitious films seem less inclined to wait for a contest to roll around anyway, so maybe it's a moot argument. I can't speak for Smeagol, but annual contests seem to be losing relevance as the site progresses, so maybe we should just start working toward more community lead seasonal competitions?

I am honored!!!! THANKS!!!!

I swear a lot more people were intending to enter, but dropped out. Also, the standard of the yearly BiM contest is quite high, so unless an entrant is either brave/good/both then people are likely to be intimidated. I actually made an entry for this contest, but released it early because I didn't think it was good enough (and I wanted to use copyrighted music/sounds, but I was prepared to work around it). Maybe next time I'll just stick my fingers in my ears and enter properly...

I suppose less is more, and it means those who did enter get a lot of attention no matter where they placed.

Wow! That is a really small amount of entries? Don't we usually get, like 50 for the annual contests?

Even so, congratulations to the winners! I knew that I would not enter this contest because I didn't like the theme and perhaps some people felt this was too specific (like meeee! not the people who have already posted here, because most of them seem like they like the theme but didn't have time.)

I think it's true that some people are intimidated by the official contests, at least a couple of years ago and earlier all of the top entries were by the brickfilmers who many consider the "greats", people like Nick Durron, Smeagol and FilmyGuy who have been around forever and have inspired a lot of people on this site. The result of this is a lot of people feel that theirs no point in entering when they'll just be overshadowed by the best out there. I think that this year specifically had a poor turnout because of the theme being so specific. The theme is usually based around a very broad idea, that can be interpreted in an infinite number of ways. This year the theme was a structure, not an idea; which I see as much more limiting. I also think that in reality not a lot of people are interested in making an interactive adventure. As soon as I saw the theme I immediately decided I wasn't interested, and I think a lot of people did the same. I'm almost positive there will be more entries next year should there be another official site contest.

Youtube Channel

It's still a while until summer gets here, Funmi. That's around the time when they do a new contest.