A couple more to delete there btw....
I think it's best to try to stay close to the "official way", for a few reasons. One, a set format of sorts makes it easier for everyone to read your list. You're not in this alone remember, the whole point of the lists is that you are sharing with the rest of us. Two, with prizes involved and numbering goals, it's best to make things easy on the person doing all the counting/verifying. Three and four, I had them in my mind by Godzilla distracted me.

Besides, it doesn't sound like doing it the way you planned would save that much time. Once you get used to maintaining your list post, it will go smoothly no matter how "complicated" it seems at first.

There is lots of room for individuality in your list by the way, you don't have to stick to the guidelines or to anyone else's format. Get creative!
I'm the same way. I'm all about nostalgia, and probably a quarter of my collection is stuff I loved as a kid, that I have to be in the right mood for to watch.

Too funny, I didn't even remember Danger Mouse until you mentioned it and I wiki'd it. I was not a big fan either, I was just like you, when it was on I knew Bananaman was on after that, so I would endure it.

Nickelodeon was on pretty much 24-7 for me in the mid 80's. Another show I would love to own is "Today's Special." I used to really enjoy that show. I would like to see some of the uncut original Canadian broadcasts, but from what I've read, there doesn't seem to be enough interest in them (or they don't exist anymore?) I haven't done any research into it for a few years, it may be time to see if anything's surfaced. I'm skeptical, though, that it would really be as great as I remembered.

The only thing I've ever run across on Today's Special has just been youtube clips

I was going through my unwatched pile today to get a list together and was also shocked by the amount of animation I own. My tentative goal is still to get through the Daria set and the Pixar/Disney blu's, but I definitely have a lot of stuff to choose from.

Another question:

I intend watch some anime OAV's (Original Animation Video). These present particular challenges for counting. Some of these are series that can last 10-12 eps., some are one-shots, and some are two-parters. An individual OAV volume can last 30 min., 45 min., or 1 hour. How do we count these?

For instance, I plan to watch TOKYO REVELATION, a standalone OAV, which is about an hour. Does that count as one item on the list?

Other examples:
GENESIS SURVIVER GAIARTH - one tape has all three eps. of the series on it. Each ep. is about 45-50 min. Total of the tape = 142 min. One item? Or one-and-a-half?

URUSEI YATSURA - I have several OAV tapes of these. Two eps. per tape, each about a half-hour. I would count these like they're a TV series, with each tape counting as half an entry. Is that correct?

LEGEND OF THE SOHRYUDEN KINGS - multi-part OAV series. Each tape has two eps. of about 48 min. each on it. Total of each tape=97 min. Each tape counts as one item, right?

Sorry to be a stickler about this, but I need to be precise about the rules before I start something and I believe that the way anime has traditionally been presented and packaged is a little different from the norm and requires that I ask more questions before the process starts. And this is my first time doing one of these challenges.

Thanks.

Ash,

You're thinking too hard. The counting is pretty simple.

30 minute show (with commercials, so ~22 minutes without) = 1/4 entry
60 minute show (with commercials, so ~44 minutes without) = 1/2 entry
120 minute show (with commercials, so ~88 minutes without) = 1 entry

All kinds of animation, not just anime, has random times that don't neatly fit this. Just do the math and group things to make an entry. You don't have to put everything down in the order you watched it necessarily, just keep partial entries in a queue until you get enough to add up right.

No one is going to nitpick over a few minutes here and there. For example, say a certain series could possibly count as 2 or 2.25 entries depending on how complicated you want to make it. If you log it as 1, or 2, or 2.25; no one is going to care. Just personalize your format the way you want, and don't worry about the numbers.

Relax.

also
Thunderbirds - the Bill Paxton movie

question would movies like
Cat's and Dogs, G-Force count?

I know that's sci-fi, but is it "space"? I never saw it (the movie or the series) and won't for the challenge, but am curious about the answer.

nice

All right, I appreciate your patience, but one more question:

According to the stated rules, a movie counts as one entry.
Anime movies released to theaters are often 50 min. to an hour in length, e.g. the Saint Seiya movies and the two Silent Mobius movies. They're short but they're still movies released to theaters, so I'm going to count them as one entry each. Tell me that's okay and I'll leave you alone till I start watching.

Thanks.

^ personally yes a movie like Silent Mobius that 50 minutes in length count - I go with the notion that AAMPAS counts a feature length film as being more than 41 minutes in length.

Thoughts about Tron?

I need to watch that again to gear up for the new one in December and it just happens to be on my DVR from HDNet Movies.

yes I'd count it, a majority of it was computer imagery. Annoyed that RCN here in DC dropped HDNet/HDnet Movies from it's channel lineup - would love to see Tron in Hidef.

No, ask as many questions as you want! That's what we're here for.

Yes, I'd say any theatrical released item of more than 45 minutes is fine to count as one. Even short direct-to-video "features" are okay in my opinion. It is sort of argued from time to time in the various Challenge threads; but technically, a 41+ minute feature is defined as a film by most aspects of the film industry, eligible for Oscars and what-not; so they've always been allowed. I'm sure if one was to go out of the way to watch every possible "short" film in the categories they might get second glances or some people getting "frustrated". But I wouldn't mind if someone watched 300 short films and "beat" someone who watched 100 long films that totaled more time. The numbers are the least important thing of Challenges. It's all about sharing the experience and building community. Someone's 20 three hour epic films are equal to another's 20 45 minute films.

It's not a contest, it's a challenge.

Yes.

Quickest way to determine it is to ask yourself, what would happen if all the animation from a film/show/whatever, were removed and I watched it? Would it pretty much destroy the movie or would it still function?

From what I've thought about it, the range for this challenge would be a cartoon on one end, where if you removed the animation, you'd be watching a blank screen.

At the other end, you have some horror movie with some monster that's, in reality, a puppet. Remove the puppetry from it and every scene has a puppet sitting there not doing anything.

On a similar note, a movie about wizards where the only special effects, or animation, comes from the spells shooting from their hands. Take that away and you have a dude yelling lightning bolt over and over without the benefit of even having nerf darts to throw. That too, ruins the movie and therefore would count for this challenge.

Because of that, this challenge can be very broad if one wants it to be or they can just strictly do cartoons for a month.

I think you got me on that. That would also mean WestWorld wouldn't count either, I'm pretty sure. Next year I'll make it much more generalized but probably longer and spend a little more time on actors and actresses.

I have zero problem with short films. I own a bunch and bring them out on that one challenge (horror), where numbers seem to count and I need a last minute boost to 100.

The only thing to remember is that film != show, so while a feature film and a show may both be 45 minutes long, only the feature film counts as one entry. The show requires more shows to get it up to the 90 minute mark for that one entry.

While I agree with most of what you said, I don't really agree with the last paragaph, necessarily. Almost every movie in the past 40 years has at least one scene were a hand-drawn animation of (a lightnight bolt for example) or a CGI effect was added. If you removed that animation, yes, that scene (which could be the major scene in the movie) is pretty much ruined. However, I wouldn't say that that would be applicable for this challenge.

This also brings up a whole can of worms regarding CGI. Just to name 3 movies off the top of my head: 300, Lord of the Rings, and Spider-Man 3. These movies would be nothing without CGI, which is a form of animation, but I would not count those for this challenge.

That kind of goes against my previous question about Tron. I guess the difference in that is that Tron seemed to overtly focus on the animation, though, where as the three movies I mentioned were meant to be photo-real.

And in those cases you're correct since they don't ruin the movie. Another example, which I think I listed in the rules and description thread is The Others. There's tons of cgi animation of countryside during the car drive in the opening credits but that alone doesn't make it eligible for the challenge. Haven't seen the rest, so I can't comment on the rest of the movie.

Does that clear it up more?

Tron counts since it would be an entirely different movie without the animation. G-Force wouldn't have the animals at all, which are the main stars. I think Cats and Dogs is the same.

I'm planning to watch two different versions of the same movie and planning to count them as two separate movies. One of these is ALAKAZAM THE GREAT (1961), an English-dubbed version of the longer, Japanese-language film, SAIYUKI (1960). The two versions are different enough that I believe I'm justified in counting each as a separate entry. And this is the same with two other Japanese animated movies that were dubbed and reedited in the U.S. In each case, the Japanese versions are significantly longer. They also have different titles. Acceptable?

^ Perfectly.

So an all-anime month? I'd be done on the 2nd if I did that. I think I really like Japanese animation, at least the few things I've tried, but just can't afford to find out for sure.

Also Cutie Honey, based on the anime series New Cutey Honey.

I wasn't planning on doing this challenge, but it will give me a chance to get to some of my unwatched DVDs of this type, and I can continue to focus on Sci-Fi and Fantasy titles that I was considering watching this month, but haven't watched yet.

I'm not going to worry about devoting the entire month to animation, I will just watch whatever I feel like watching.

The biggest challenge will probably be figuring out which anime titles will be suitable to watch with my kids.

Feel free to ask here. I've had a lot of experience sharing anime with my daughter, nieces, nephews, and their friends.

No-brainer that "Ash Ketchum" should be an authority

I'm in, this is one I actually have the library and interest for.

Not sure I understand the wild cards - does that mean I just get three free checks on the checklist? Or is that to "push" a watched title into a category it doesn't strictly fit?

Ororama, how old are your kids? There's lots of anime that is suitable for all ages of kids, and still great for the adults as well. But we've been stuck on the last two episodes of Sugar a Snow Fairy for like a month. Gantz, that's also a good one. KIDDING.

yes, but you could literally include anything that you feel is 'animated' - example: 'Child's Play' heck, you could even read a manga that was made into an anime series and include that as a wild card, or a short story. I'm thinking of transferring my animated shorts I made at RISD and include that as a wild card.

I guess I wasn't too clear in my previous post. I was just questioning your example. There are so many movies out now that if you took out all the CGI, the movie would be nothing, but I don't necessarily think they should count. 300 was filmed all in front of green screen with a very minimal amount of set pieces. The movie would be just actors in front of a green screen if you took out the CGI (that is one of the special features on the DVD! ) Does that mean 300 should count in an animation challenge? I would say not.

I would say that a live action movie about wizards would not count regardless of how many animated/CGI elements were present. I think the delineation would be whether the animation elements (CGI or not) were meant to be realistic and whether the makers of the movie intended those elements to be noticed or not. For most movies, if the effects take you out of the movie and you conciously think about that animation/CGI, then the filmmaker's have not set out what they intended to do.

For other movies, like Tron, where the animation was meant to be a part of the experience and people are supposed to take that in as part of the movie, then I would say those types of movies would count.