2013 | Video Contest News - Featuring News about Video Contests!

Apartments.com’s 2013 “Roommate of the Year”

Posted by Dan L. on December 13th, 2013

It’s December which means it’s time for me to post the winner of Apartments.com’s 5th annual “Roommate of the Year” competition. “Roommate of the Year” is a really strange video contest because the deadline is in May but the rules say that the winner can be announced any time after July 7th. Sometimes the sponsor will announce the winner in the summer but last year they announced the winner a few days before New Year’s Eve. So if you make the finals you basically have no idea when a winner will be selected. It looks like this year they posted the results in late October. Here’s the 2013 winner. As always, the grand prize is $10,000 in cash and $10,000 to cover the winner’s rent for a year. I can’t embed this video so click on the image to watch it.

This year’s winner isn’t fancy but it was certainly amusing. It even featured a super tiny baby goat. You can’t go wrong with baby goats, my friend. Baby goats are video contest gold.

-

Doritos announces 24 (surprisingly offensive) Crash the Super Bowl semi-finalists

Posted by Dan L. on December 5th, 2013

A typical Doritos fan

I had really high hopes for this year’s Crash the Super Bowl contest. FritoLay had made a lot of nice changes to the competition and for the first time ever, filmmakers from outside of the US were allowed to submit entries. I thought all that new talent would yield a fresh and fun slate of winners. But this afternoon Doritos unveiled a set of 24 Semi-Finalists and most of the ads they picked are pretty terrible. A lot of them lack punchlines or decent stories and many are just or . I can look past ads that are simply lame or unoriginal but some of the winners are downright, straight-up offensive. A few of them are so inappropriate that they could never in a million years air during the new, family-friendly Super Bowl. But what’s really shocking is just how misogynistic many of these ads are. As you watch these videos, keep in mind that views and votes had zero impact on which entries made the Top 24. A panel of judges from FrioLay and the ad agency Goodby, Silverstein & Partners, picked all of these commercials by themselves. Let’s start with a semi-finalist from Israel that would never, ever get approved by American censors:
.

.
Ha Ha. That guy’s girlfriend is a slut! His best friend is also a bastard but the best friend gets forgiven because hey, (imaginary) boys will be boys. I wonder if that guy is going forgive his girlfriend too? Eh…doesn’t matter. That girl was nothing but a prop for the men to fight over. She hold less value than a $2.50 bag of chips.

But the sexist subtext isn’t even the worst thing about this video. The whole point of the Crash the Super Bowl contest is to find commercials that could air during the SUPER BOWL. There’s absolutely zero chance that CBS would ever broadcast a commercial that included the word “bastard,” a post-make-out zipper sound effect or a totally unnecessary up-skirt panty shot of a floating girl. FritoLay received more than 4,000 Crash the Super Bowl entries this year. Couldn’t they find 24 ads that could make it past the censors?

Now if you thought that was too hot for TV, check out this semi-finalist from Australia:
.

.
Personally I like this one. It’s freaky but it’s freaky in a good way. It looked professional, it was clever, it was unique and it had a big, insane punchline. This video is so crazy that it actually went viral BEFORE it even made the top 24. A few days ago it got posted on a ton of popular sites and now it has more than a million views.

But let’s be serious here. That commercial was about a glory hole for fingers! Can you imagine what would happen if millions of Americans saw that during the Super Bowl? If Janet Jackson’s nipple could cause people to freak out, a fat dude sucking a phallic finger through a hole in the wall might break the 7th seal and usher in the beginning of the end times.

But like I said, at least that one is funny. This Canadian semi-finalist features a punchline that only a serial killer could love:
.

.
I’m not going to mince words. That’s some fucked up shit right there. I like dark humor and if this idea had been executed a little differently it could have been a great submission. It’s an extremely well made video and the editing is perfect. But there are a few little elements that just make my skin crawl. The actress was amazing and her eyes were filled with so much love and sweetness. And then he main character murders her. But here’s the worst thing about this entry; why is the dead mermaid so sexy!? Was the under-boob and cheesecake pose really necessary?? I know that she’s a mermaid and not a human and I know it’s just a wacky commercial but for christssakes….a guy killed a beautiful woman and hung her half naked body on the wall. She is literally his “trophy.” This one will never air on TV but if it did, I think women across the country would (rightfully) raise hell over that “joke.”

Here’s another semi-finalist that’s weirdly misogynistic. This one’s also from Canada:
.

.
I guess that did kind of feel like a Super Bowl commercial….from 1985. I enjoy seeing sexy ladies in super tiny bikinis as much as the next guy but sexist commercials like this one have been out of style for at least 20 years. Like I keep saying, I know these are just goofy contest entries but it’s just not cool to show a man pushing over a scantily clad woman so he can steal her Doritos. Violence against women, even cartoony violence, doesn’t belong in a chip commercial. Yes the Kate Upton look-a-like gets her revenge in the end but that doesn’t make this concept ok. It’s not funny, it’s not original and it’s not appropriate.

I don’t know if Doritos had a few, undercover women-haters on their judging panel this year or what but here’s another semi-finalist that’s based on the idea that men love Doritos more than pretty ladies. This entry comes from Hong Kong.
.

.
That video might seem harmless but go back and watch the beginning again. WHAT THE HELL WAS ABOUT TO HAPPEN TO THAT POOR GIRL!? She was on the ground screaming in a dark ally while three giant thugs were surrounding her. She looked terrified. Either those guys were going to steal her bag of Doritos or they were about to freaking gang-rape that girl. Look at their eyes. They didn’t look like they were after her chips.

Believe it or not, I’ve got one more semi-finalist that portrays women as worthless and disposable. But this one’s a two-fer because it also manages to mock an entire religion:
.

.
I hate to use the same joke twice in one article but seriously, this feels like a Super Bowl commercial from 1985. The “hot girl” character looked like she was supposed to be a prostitute. Who goes to the mall wearing a tiny, skin tight, hot pink dress, 6 inch heels and a ton of make up? And it always kind of bugs me when writers make jokes about the Amish. Whenever a filmmaker needs a character that doesn’t understand something that’s common in the modern world, you can just make that character Amish! It’s just lazy writing. But this particular ad takes things a step further. These Amish aren’t just clueless rubes. The dad is a dirty old man who lusts after a hot young woman that’s wearing an incomprehensibly sexy dress. That just feels wrong, doesn’t it? Do you think the judges at FritoLay would have picked this ad if it featured a strict Muslim family that had never been to a mall before? Why are the Amish the only religious group that it’s ok to make fun of? (Is it because everyone knows they’ll never see the jokes on TV or online??)

Or consider this; would the judges have picked this ad if the gender roles were reversed? What if a hunky dude got off the elevator and “Ma” pushed Pa in there?

I know that it probably seems like I’m over-analyzing these ads but keep this in mind; 2 of these 24 semi-finalists are going to air during the Super Bowl in February and they’ll be seen by 110 million Americans. So the messages and subtext of these commercials are important. Most of the advertising world got the message a long time ago that goofy sexism is still sexism and that it’s not ok. I can’t really blame the “average joes” who made these ads but I can blame FritoLay for picking some of these commercials. The Crash the Super Bowl contest is being run by some of the smartest and most successful marketing gurus in the world. They should have known that dead mermaid tits don’t belong on TV.

If you’d like to see the rest of Doritos’ semi-finalists, head here:

-

Will press coverage help your chances in the Crash the Super Bowl contest?

Posted by Dan L. on November 30th, 2013

.

I have a Google News alert set for the phase “Crash the Super Bowl” and those alerts have been blowing up my inbox all month. A few news sites covered FritoLay’s final call for entries but most of the stories I’ve seen came from local news outlets and were about people who entered the contest. And if you read these articles or watch these segments, it’s pretty obvious that the featured actors or filmmakers are the ones who contacted the media and pitched their story. Here are a few samples of what I’m talking about:

Hanford Sentinel: Local filmmaker competing in commercial contest for Doritos

Salt Lake City Tribune: Utah commercial shows what really goes on during sexy time

The Sheboygan Press: North High student is All In on commercial

Vicksburg Exponent Telegram: Bridgeport native submitting video for Doritos contest

FOX-Kansas City: Area filmmaker attempts to have his commercial air during super bowl

NBC-Lexington KY: Doritos smoothie could put grad student in National Spotlight

NBC-Atlanta: Doritos ad with Atlanta ties among most viewed in Super Bowl contest

Those stories are just the tip of the iceberg. Every year I see a few articles about local Crash the Super Bowl contestants but I’ve never seen 3 or 4 articles a day before. These stories are weirdly fascinating because most of the featured filmmakers clearly have no idea how the Crash the Super Bowl contest actually works. Most of them are trying to get some press coverage because they think that extra views and votes will help them make the finals. (Just for the record: Views and votes have ZERO impact in the first stage of the Crash the Super Bowl contest) Here’s are a few paragraphs from the Hanford Sentinel story. I’ll highlight important passages in orange.

HANFORD — A local filmmaker is competing for a chance to have his video be the next Doritos spot that will air live during the most watched sporting event in the United States.

Joshua C——-, owner and founder of R——–, a local film production company, has submitted his 30-second video “Bad Dog” in the annual Doritos “Crash The Super Bowl” commercial contest.

For the competition, contestants submit short video spots, judges select semi-finalists and then the world is allowed to vote for their favorite from the pool of finalists. The winner gets to have his video air live during the football game, wins $1 million cash, a trip to watch the Super Bowl and a trip to New York for a behind-the-scenes tour of the next “Avengers” movie, “Age of Ultron.”

But, for now, Cordero has to make it through the first phase of the contest.

“I’m still waiting to hear if I’m even a semi-finalist,” he said. “They will let me know on Dec. 11.”

He said that in order to move on, the judges will pick the semi-finalists based on certain criteria. One of those criteria is video views and ratings.

“I need my supporters to go to Doritos.com, watch and rate the video,” he said. “The more views and ratings it gets the more likely I might become a semi-finalist.”

Cordero then explained that on Jan. 4, voting will open to the public and his fans can vote for his video once every day until the contest ends, and if his video gets the most votes, he will win.

It’s clear this filmmaker never bothered to look at the official rules. It’s also clear that this guy thinks he’s a lock for the Top 5. He’s already planing his strategy for when he makes the finals! I could be a dick and post his entry but I won’t. His video did make me chuckle but as you can probably guess, there’s pretty much zero chance the judges will pick his entry.

As I said, most of the stories that wind up in my in-box are pretty similar to that article. The featured director asks people to help him win by watching his (not very good) commercial and rating it five-stars. In many cases, the filmmakers have high hopes and are confident that they’re going to make the finals because their ad is already one of the Top-Rated or Most-Viewed submissions.

This type of self-promotion might sound harmless but these articles could actually lead to some unforeseen, negative consequences. For one thing, some a-hole blogger could post a link to your story and say snarky things about it. But worse than that, press coverage might cause your cast and crew and family and friends to really get their hopes up. Your teammates may think “Hey, if NBC Atlanta bothered to send a TV crew to cover our efforts, we must really have a shot at winning!“ But NBC Atlanta (and really any news outlet in the world) is always on the look out for fun, easy stories. So the TV crew isn’t showing up because your entry is amazing; the TV crew shows up because you’re a local and your story comes with some amusing, pre-shot visuals.

So if you keep telling people that views and votes will help you win, and if your local paper backs up that idea (few reporters are going to bother checking the rules to see if you know what you’re talking about) then your friends are going to be in for a huge let down. After everyone finds out that your incredibly “popular” entry didn’t even make the semi-finals, you’re going to be receiving a lot of messages from people asking the same thing: “Dude, what happened? We were on TV! We were the #2 most viewed entry out of like 5,000 videos! How could we not win!??!”

Now having said all that, as long as you have your facts straight, a story in the Salt Lake City Tribune or the Vicksburg Telegram won’t really have any impact on your chances of making the finals. A story won’t help, but it also won’t hurt. So if you want to use the Crash the Super Bowl contest as an excuse to bulk up your production company’s press packet, I say go ahead and contact a local reporter.

-

PEEP THIS: Zenni Optical launches gigantic commercial contest

Posted by Dan L. on November 20th, 2013

By now, most of you guys are probably putting the finishing touches on your Crash the Super Bowl entries. But it’s never too early to start planning your next contest entry! So you might want to check out Zenni.com’s humongous new video contest before your creative juices dry up. The company is paying out $45,000 in prizes and if they really, really like your video, it might just wind up on TV. The rules say that videos must be exactly 28 seconds long but I talked to a rep from Zenni and longer videos are ok. In fact, they are also looking for viral-style videos that they can use online. But still, shorter is apparently better in this contest.

Here’s a quick synopsis from the contest page:

Twenty grand. When’s the last time you saw THAT much money? Yeah, a long time. Probably like never.

But if you wear Zenni glasses you might.

We need your brain, at least the creative part. And in return you may just win $20,000.

It’s easy. Smack us with a video, any length (but you score points if it’s short), that says something outrageous about you and your Zenni glasses.

Let your inner Fellini run wild. Surprise us with a zany Zenni story. Or create something touching, you know, with little kids or puppies (please, no cat videos). We’re looking for videos so good they might even go viral (saving us big bucks on an ad campaign).

This is a truly insane chance to make some serious scratch. We know, because our boss said “you guys in marketing are insane if you think I’ll do this.” But, after a couple of drinks…

Like I said, there’s some big money at stake here. The grand prize is $20,000 and first place is $10,000. Two second place winners will get $5,000 each and finally five third place winners will each receive $1,000. And here’s the best news of all: THERE’S NO VOTING IN THIS CONTEST! That’s right, none of the prize money will go to vote swappers or cheaters or Internet celebrities. If you wanna win some of Zenni’s cash all you gotta do is make a kick-ass video. The deadline for entries is December 22nd. So I suggest you go shoot a submission once Thanksgiving is over and out of the way. It will give you something to do while you’re waiting to hear if you made the Crash the Super Bowl finals! For more details, head here:

-

The 2014 Crash the Super Bowl contest is now accepting entries!

Posted by Dan L. on October 11th, 2013

On Tuesday afternoon, the 2013-2014 installment of the Crash the Super Bowl contest officially started accepting entries. As of right now you have 44 days to shoot and submit your Doritos commercials. It looks like some filmmakers actually shot their entries before the contest even began because there are already 30 ads in the video gallery. And speaking of the video gallery, Doritos has remodeled and resurrected the classic, scroll-able, video wall. Last year it was a real hassle to watch multiple CTSB entries because the videos were all hosted on a sluggish facebook page. But the new gallery is slick, fancy and fun.

Click to check out the gallery

This year Doritos made another change to the contest; ALL SUBMISSIONS ARE BEING UPLOADED TO YOUTUBE! If you’ve ever tried to upload a CTSB entry at the last minute, you’ll understand why this is a big deal. You can even submit videos that are hosted on your own youtube channel! The old CTSB servers would sometimes have problems in the final hours of the contest because hundreds of people were trying to upload videos at the same time. But now if you enter 20 minutes before the deadline you don’t have to worry that the uploader might crash on you.

Crashthesuperbowl.com is gone so if you want to read the official rules and the contest FAQs, you’l have to head to https://www.doritos.com. If you do decide to enter the Crash this year, be sure to tweet me a link to your entry () and I promise I’ll reply with a 140 character review!

-

$19,000 is up for grabs in Womadz’ new Liberty Tax Service video contest

Posted by Dan L. on October 8th, 2013

Lady Liberty likes to watch you do your taxes

Last week the new video contest website Womadz.com launched their first official commercial contest. It’s sponsored by Liberty Tax Service and there are some very nice prizes at stake. The video that gets the most votes will win $10,000 and the video that gets the 2nd most votes will receive $2,000. Then a panel of judges will select 3 winners and each of those videos will earn $2,000. I suspect that some VCN readers may be hesitant to enter this one because some contests that involve online voting can get pretty ugly. But the Womadz system has an interesting safeguard that should discourage people from cheating. Womadz is going to select 20 voters at random and award them $50 each. So if someone votes for themselves 1,000 times, some of their fake votes are probably going to win prizes. And if a bunch of “people” don’t respond to respond to e-mails informing them that they just won 50 bucks (of if the e-mail addresses turn out to be fake) then the Womadz team is going to realize something fishy is going on.

So cheating probably won’t pay off in this contest. I think whoever wins the grand prize is going to have to get it the old fashioned way….by begging for votes on facebook. But the $50 voter prizes will probably make the begging process a whole lot easier.

To enter this contest, filmmakers need to create videos that are aimed at people who are thinking about buying a Liberty Tax franchise. The sponsor has come up with two basic ideas and contestants need to incorporate one of those ideas into their entry. If you want to read the full contest brief, head here: http://www.womadz.com/liberty-tax—45-days-to-ceo

The deadline for entries is November 5th so you’ve still got a few weeks to come up with an entry. If you submit a video and need help getting votes, let me know (via ) and maybe I’ll give you a little plug on twitter or even here on the blog.

-

B&H’s “That’s Not What it’s Meant for” winners

Posted by Dan L. on September 26th, 2013

-

I like B&H. I’ve sent them a lot of money over the years and they always sell good gear at fair prices. I also think it’s kind of cute that their website is down half the time in observance of Jewish holidays. And I’m not being sarcastic. It always bothers me when religious folks try and come up with elaborate schemes to get around the rules of their own religion. For example, did you know that Amish workmen can use power tools? It’s only a sin if they actually buy the power tools and own them. The same thing goes for cars and cell phones etc. I myself was raised Catholic and let me tell you, the only thing Catholics love more than making up rules is figuring out ways to get around those rules. Recently a Catholic friend of mine said that some day she wants to have a spring wedding a few weeks before Easter. Technically it will be Lent then but for the right price you can hire a Catholic priest to show up and give everyone a one-night “dispensation” so that they can eat meat at the reception.

So anyway, if you’re going to be religious, you should go big or go home. If you think that God doesn’t want you to work on the Sabbath then you shouldn’t hire people to work on the Sabbath for you. Whoever is running B&H photography takes that kind of stuff seriously. Their website shuts down every Friday and right now they’re not taking any orders for the next 50 hours because they’re observing a Jewish holiday known as Succos. That might not be the greatest business move but I can respect B&H is doing. They’re like the Walter Sobchack of the electronics world. Walter doesn’t roll on Shabbos and B&H won’t sell you a lens during Succos.

So as a tip of my secular hat to B&H I thought I’d share the winners of their “That’s Not What it’s Meant for!” video contest. This was actually one of the most clever contest ideas of 2013. Filmmakers were asked to submit videos of photo and video gear being used in idiotic ways. I watched a lot of the entries and some people really came up with some ridiculous/dangerous stuff. My personal favorite was the guy who used his boom pole and wind muff to dust the top of his shelves.

B&H selected a set of 10 finalists and then let the public pick the winners. Here are the top 3 videos, in order. First prize was a Canon 6D or a Nikon D600, second prize was a Canon Rebel SL1 or a Sony Alpha Nex 5R and third prize was a Canon Powershot or a Nikon Coolpix.

-

The Crash the Super Bowl contest is back and this year it’s going global!

Posted by Dan L. on September 12th, 2013

crashthesuperbowl2014

Later this afternoon, Frito-Lay will officially announce the return of the Crash the Super Bowl contest! This morning’s edition of the USA Today teased some of the details but a few other news outlets got lazy and just straight-up posted Frito-Lay’s full press release early. It sounds like the people in charge of this contest actually listened to their fans (and maybe this blog) because they’ve made some phenomenal changes this year. You can read the official press release here but I’ll list the most important details:

The contest will begin accepting fan-made Doritos commercials on October 8th, 2013. The deadline for submissions is November 24th, 2013.

FACEBOOK IS NOT A PART OF THE CONTEST THIS YEAR: Last year Frito-Lay ran the entire Crash the Super Bowl contest through an annoying and poorly-designed Facebook app. This year the Crash is back where it belongs on it’s own, dedicated website.

A panel of judges that includes “executives from the Doritos brand, advertising professionals and the legendary Stan Lee of Pow! Entertainment” will select a slate of 5 finalists.

Two of these finalists will air during the Super Bowl XLVIII. One will be selected by a panel of judges from Doritos and the other will be chosen through an online, public vote.

THE AD METER CONTEST HAS BEEN RETIRED: For the first time ever, the winner of the Crash the Super Bowl contest is guaranteed to win a cash prize of One Million Dollars! If you win the online vote, you “win” the Crash the Super Bowl contest and you get the million bucks. There will be no bonuses for scoring well on the USA Today Ad Meter. Also for the first time ever, the second place winner is guaranteed a prize of $50,000.

The two filmmakers that win 1st and 2nd place will also get the chance to “become part of the Marvel family” and work on the set of Marvel’s Avengers: Age of Ultron.

All five finalists will win a trip to fabulous Rutherford, New Jersey in February so they can watch the Super Bowl from Doritos’ private skybox. The three finalists who do not win one of the big prizes will receive $25,000 just for making the top 5.

THE CRASH ISN’T JUST FOR AMERICANS ANYMORE: This might be the biggest change of all. For the first time in the history of the Crash the Super Bowl contest, Doritos will be accepting entries from filmmakers outside of the United States. If you live in one of the 46 countries around the world where Doritos are sold, you are eligible to enter the 2013-2014 installment of the Crash the Super Bowl contest.

Some fans are probably going to be annoyed by the “global” angle of this year’s contest simply because it means there will be more competition. But the Crash was getting stale and I think an international infusion of styles and talent is just want this competition needs right now. It will be sort of cool to see what kind of ads people in Romania and Peru and South Africa create. No word yet on whether or not submissions will need to be in English.

All in all, I think this is going to maybe be the best Crash Super Bowl contest ever. Last year’s installment was sort of a disaster for two big reasons; #1: The CTSB Facebook app was an ugly, spammy, hassle. #2: The winners of the contest got robbed because of changes USA Today made to their ad meter. You can read about these problems in detail in these two VCN articles; Did a poorly-designed facebook app almost ruin this year’s crash the super bowl contest? and Why didn’t Doritos’ Crash the Super Bowl ads do better on this year’s USA Today Ad meter? But basically, the facebook app tracked user’s data and clogged their friend’s feeds with updates every time they voted for an entry. And USA Today turned their highly-respected, long running Ad Meter poll into a bogus, online-only poll that anyone could access. One of the 2013 CTSB winners, Goat 4 Sale actually won 1st place on Nielson’s ad meter but the commercial didn’t crack USA Today’s top five. The ads that did score high on the USA Today poll mostly sucked and it seemed like maybe certain companies took some steps (cheated) to make sure their commercials would do well in the poll. If the USA Today ad meter had been run the way it had been run for decades, the director of Goat 4 Sale probably would have won one of Frito-Lay’s big bonus prizes.

But apparently those problems are in the past. I’m genuinely impressed that the folks in charge of this contest recognized that certain aspects were unfair to contestants and then to action to fix those issues. Doritos got a massive amount of free, social media exposure when they ran the contest on facebook last year. So it must have been tough for them to move the contest back to a dedicated website. I also think it was a stroke of genius to involve Stan Lee in this year’s Crash. Last year’s celebrity judge was Michael Bay. Let’s be honest, Michael Bay f*cking sucks. Nobody likes Michael Bay and his movies are total garbage. One of the 2013 winners actually won a job working on the set of Transformers 4. It was a great opportunity but I sort of feel sorry for that guy because he’s probably spent the last 5 months sucking up to Michael Bay and pretending like he’s proud to bring another Transformers movie into the world. But Stan Lee is different. Stan Lee is an icon. People freaking love Stan Lee and the Marvel movies have all been pretty great. So a chance to “join the Marvel family” is a seriously awesome prize.

Frito-Lay’s official announcement will probably happen around noon EST today. I’ll update this post with a link to coverage of the announcement when it’s available. In the mean time, here’s a link to the new Crash the Super Bowl website: The rules aren’t live yet but a teaser video is already up:

-