Place equal portions of music and video footage from various cons in a cocktail shaker. Add a couple jiggers of cool transitions and shake well. Serve in a Scarlet Rhapsody style glass and garnish with a sprig of supposed wit.

I've been filming conventions since 2003 and began making convention music videos a year later. Having a refreshing beverage is essential to my music video production. If it's a good video, I can say that I was refreshed and in good spirits when making it. If it's a bad video, I can say that I was drunk while making it.

The Fanime Con Video
Fanime 2005
WARNING: This video is nearly 9 minutes long and its file size reflects it.
This was my fifth Fanime and I wanted to give a nice tribute to the convention this year. Traveling Valentine received Press Passes to cover the convention and we had a ball doing so. This video tested my abilities and patience as it featured changes in tempo and mood. The movie editor program crashed frequently and had trouble saving all my hard work so I ended up cursing a lot before finding a solution. But I did get to make note of a few popular movies that I got to see before Fanime. I'd like to thank Victoria for buying the CD that contained the song used.

iPod iCam TV Advertisement
Footage Intended For Advertising Class
The final for my Spring 2005 class involved creating an advertising plan for a fictional product. We created the iPod iCam: an iPod that also works as a digital camera. The idea was to use Apple's current ad campaign with the dancers and unmask the silhouette with the iPod screen. My main part was making a rough draft of the TV commercial. Since I've never held an iPod before and the iPod iCam doesn't exist (yet), I made a prop iCam out of aPocky box. It turned out pretty well and the final was successful. Hats off to Jenny, Joy, Kaleigh, Sophorn, Raymond, Sam, Fumiyo, and Edgardo.

Iron Cosplay
Anime Overdose 2005 Iron Cosplay Summary
Luck In Spades hosted the Iron Cosplay event for AOD Sunday. It was a fun event that helped wind the convention down. Using scrap bits of materials, cardboard, and anything else that would be considered trash, two teams competed to make a pre-existing Samurai costume. Blank CD's were the theme ingredient. This video condenses the hour-long event into a few minutes. Which team reigns supreme?

And Now For Something Completely Different
Anime Overdose 2005 Psycho Le Cemu Fandom Tribute
This convention was pleased to announce the J-Rock band Psycho Le Cemu as its headlining act and guest of honor. Casual and devoted PLC fans flocked to AOD to see them and enjoy the convention hosting them. This video is a quick homage to all the Psycho Le Cemu fandom. I was unable to select a PLC song for the video so I chose something completely different.

Masquerade Royale
Anime Overdose 2005 Masquerade
An interesting experiment. I wanted to do a video highlighting the AOD masquerade, but I didn't know what song to use. I then discovered that my movie making software was able to automatically create movies based on what videos and music I would input. I fed it all the masquerade footage and a small list of songs I was thinking about. The program produced a video that was simply weird. But it did have some interesting segments that I liked and the selected music was catchy. So I went with those segments, that song, and fixed up the rest to my specifics.

SNL
Anime Overdose 2005 Saturday Night
During the Saturday night of Anime Overdose 2005, Victoria and I met a convention photographer who was dressed in different clothing. This quick video highlights our late night exploits while others were at the Psycho Le Cemu concert. This adventure marked a couple second times for me.

The Magical Box
Anime Overdose 2005 Warm Up Video B
My computers were acting buggy just as I was about to start on the AOD videos. I made this video to check if the audio would synch with the video correctly. If it performed to my satisfaction, I would proceed with the video production. If it didn't, I'd buy a new computer. The desktop computer performed well. The laptop didn't, but that's a different can of worms.

Death of Jack O'Neill
Anime Overdose 2005 Warm Up Video A
I filmed a lot of footage for Anime Overdose 2005. I decided to make a few videos to highlight the big events of the convention. But before I would make such efforts, I needed a couple warm up exercises. This warm up served to remove a Monty Python kick I was currently under. It's an obscure Monty Python track called "Scottish Farewell" from an album I do not recall. I liked it because it involved gunfire. And it was a coincidence that I was able to borrow a P-90 and the lender was willing to be shot with his own gun.

Hogwarts Hidden Photo Albums (Contains three different chapters)
Metreon Festival Of Animation 2004
Victoria (Ravenclaw) and I (Slytherin) debuted our "Harry Potter" uniforms for the Metreon Festival. So what if it wasn't anime cosplay? Cosplay is cosplay. Joined by Claudine (Slytherin), we filmed some Wizard Duels. I improvised a script for a short film after seeing the footage. In a nod towards the moving pictures described in the novels and seen in the movies, the films emulate an old silent movie with intentional bad editing and cheesy music.

Cheat Commandos
Archived Footage
I was bored and had 20 minutes to spare so I made this. I may make a new video if a full length version of the song becomes available.

The Bright Side Of AM
Ani-Magic 2004
Sometimes moving a new venue brings trouble with the transition. But no matter how things went for you at that con, always remember. Remember the fun times and the cool live programming. Remember the friends you meet for the first time and for the umpteenth time. Always remember the bright side of AM.

Oreo-Con 2004
Naruto madness at Ani-Magic
Sana-chan and her friends were decked out in "Naruto" cosplay for all of Ani-Magic 2004. For completing her Orochimaru (or as she called him, "Oreo-chan") costume, she founded Oreo-Con to debut it. It was hard to keep up with most of their antics. But what I did capture on film was some pretty funny and energetic stuff.

Dangeresque the 3rd: Still Not In 3-D
Japan Town Anime Faire 2 Music Video
To celebrate my tenth convention music video, I decided to go back to my roots of the first video that included Strong Bad music, Lupin the 3rd cosplay, a Windows Movie Maker program that refused to work, and lots of caffeine. This was the first music video where I actually planned every shot to use before the convention; a tradition I do not plan to keep. After completing my tenth video, I realized that this special tenth video was actually my ninth video. Oops.

August United
August 2004 Music Video
I was busy through most of August thanks to events like:

• Vacation in Texas
• O-chibi Con
• Recca-Con Ice Cream Social
• Helping Victoria move into SFSU
• Michi-Con
• Great America Trip
• MGL DDR Trip
• Tales Of Anime

Instead of making a video for each event, I decided to blend footage of most of the events together into one video to save time.

Cosplay Heroes
Anime Expo 2004 Con Music Video
It's a simple salute to the cosplayers who add color and personality to the convention. I had fun playing around with video effects. I did get to see "Spiderman II" before attending AX so I felt no guilt using footage from the trailer. The post AX Disneyland trip helped pad out the video.

Initial D Car Full of Pain
Trueno Display Music Video (Anime Expo 2004)
After taking a tour of the inside of the Initial D car at Anime Expo, I got to see that though the car looked good on the outside, the interior was devoid of basic luxuries like air conditioning and seats. I imagined that a car like that would be a pain to own with all its performance problems. And luckily, there happens to be a song about a lousy car full of pain sung by my favorite Canadian band: The Arrogant Worms. The video ends with footage of me riding the Disneyland Matterhorn ride. Much to my surprise, the cart died prematurely in the middle of the ride.

Warning: Contains a little bit of swearing and a little bit of Man-Faye.

Fanime Tonight
Fanime 2004 Con Music Video
There was quite a bit of drama to deal with before attending Fanime this year. I opted to simply avoid the drama and enjoy the con tonight and deal with the drama tomorrow.

Protect My Fanime
Fanime 2004 Con Warm Up Music Video
A "South Park" episode involving ninjas was popular when Fanime came around. I made a quick video using the Japanese song from that episode as a prelude to the final FANIME music video. After making this video I swore off making videos using music with lyrics that I do not understand.

The Cosplayers Go Forth
Cherry Blossom 2004 Music Video
This was the first time Traveling Valentine attended Cherry Blossom Festival in San Francisco. Most footage comes from the parade and the random incidents that took place while waiting for the costume contest to finish. The parade felt like a long march in the hot weather. The only marching music I had is the opening march from "The Blackadder Goes Fourth" so I used that in the video. If I were to do associations between cosplayers and the "Blackadder" cast:

• Captain Blackadder: Adam
• Lieutenant George: Nate
• Captain Darling: Victoria
• General Melchett: Tom
• Private Sodof Baldrick: EBK