Rant Rant Rant...
Be constructive people... Stuff like "it rocks!/it sucks!" will not be posted. General ranting is accepted at the AX Karaoke Group or the AX Message Board. This is meant as a forum/archive for comments and criticisms which could make AX Karaoke better for years to come. Let the rant begin :b
First a "Thank You" from the Admiral himself, Hank
It's taken me a little longer than expected to recover from this year's AX, but I wanted to just give my belated thanks to all who contributed to this year's AX Karaoke.
First and formost, to my staff: Luke, Rob, Steph, Rin, Dom, Tanzy, Jenny, Tommy, and Evelyn- none of this would have been possible without you guys. Not only did you guys do an amazing job, but more importantly, you all kept things loose and fun, which in the end is what it's all about =)
Hong, for getting us the big room for the contest finals and all those really cool prizes
James Dodd and the Anime Expo VTech department, for providing the karaoke audio equipment and for the extra tech help during the contest.
Mandy Lee, Van Nguyen, Jon Shin, and our special Industry judges for graciously volunteering their time as contest judges.
Many other people whom, although they weren't officially on Karaoke staff, helped out in one way or another: Angie, Eileen, Jason, Jane, Tetsu, Mike, Mikey, Scott, Melissa, Chris (aka the X-Japan guy), Bernard (aka Duo-Kun), Jaimy (aka Doraemon), and probably a couple of more names whom I can't remember right now. You all made a difference!
Lena, for her brilliant work with the Golden Microphone Trophies.
Kirstin, for her beautiful angelic artwork on the Karaoke Contest Button.
And last, but definitely not least, to the girl in costume whose name I never got at the contest, but whom recognized me at the LoGH panel and gave me her extra raffle ticket, thank you! *holds up the Reinhard cel phone strap he won*
- Hank
Anime Expo Karaoke Coordinator
And here it again, the rant on... "NO-SHOWS"
Nothing to say except the staff did an exceptional job in keeping the contest running smoothly this year. There was a lot less "dead time", which means I didn't have to keep switching my camcorder on and off ^_^ Bravo and all that to the new registration format, the fairly organized "list" and of course the two MC's who handled the occasional lulls with flair and humor.
But this is a "rant" so... TWENTY-SEVEN (27) no-shows out of a list of sixty-nine (69)??!!?!??!! What's up with that...
Duo
... is all ranted-out on this no-show bit
Anyone else wanna add more to it for this year?
Lights... Stage... and Sound!
Lights! Or lack thereof? The staging area this year was barely decently lit... it wasn't until started watching my recording that I realized how bad lighting for the contest was. Both rooms that were used had very strong spotlighting ceiling lamps which alternately gave too much or too little lighting and cast way too much shadow.
Stage... um... bouncy wouncy collapsable stages that are way too shallow. 'Nuff said
Prelims sound was pretty good considering the cramp space. There were occasional feedback problems but overall "good". Sound at semis/finals were horrendous! Perhaps it was just because of the speaker set up, but it was hard to hear from the stage, the sound for the audience actually "rippled" because the speaker output weren't in sync, the mic volumes kept fluctuating to componsate for the singer and the singer kept componsating for the mic volume componsation 6_9"
Vocal DEADENING just plain DOES NOT WORK for some songs. It ***KILLS*** the treble which leaves some songs with just a drum beat and nothing else. They should've put a warning label on it for the contestants that read "use at your own risk".
Point of this rant? (none) I think that when planning a space for this event in the future, AX needs to understand that the light/stage/sound considerations are vastly different than your regular panels. I have no special suggestions on how to improve upon this deficiency so I'll shut up now ^__^
Duo
Special message for those who went to the AMV Contest on Friday night
HA!! HA... HA...! HA, HA, HA!!! Hahahahahahaaa....
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If you have any comments, please mail me at: duo_kun_2000@yahoo.com |