Final SVE Voting

This morning from 9am to noon, I participated in the final selection voting for my peer group, Special Visual Effects. I jumped in the car and headed down to Dolby Laboratories in Burbank, a quick 20 minute drive through minimal traffic, at least at 8am in the morning! The swank Dolby Labs office was on the third floor, decorated in wonderful wood accents and textured seating. There were several Emmy Awards from the past years for Outstanding Sound, and some old sound equipment made when Dolby Labs was in its infancy. We were greeted with breakfast from 8am to 9am, and as I signed in I ran through the names of the people that might be showing up. Richard Edlund, whom I met last year at the Aero Theatre for the 2005 VES Festival, was listed but didn't show, as well as Jeffrey Okun. Mark Spatny was also listed, but I didn't run into him.

The entries, as you are aware, have already been publicized. Today was the day where the members of the ATAS SVE section would vote and rank the five nominees in each category. Approximately 20-30 people showed up, I would have hoped there would be more. After a quick breakfast, we were herded into the Dolby screening room, which is impressive in itself. Wonderful seats and of course, amazing sound. The sound presentation from the DVDs in the screening room was pretty amazing. The picture was from a DVD source, so while the picture was huge, the clarity was not. It's quite a shame because I know most of the shows that were nominated were shot and edited in HD or film. Maybe next year we'll actually get HD DVD or BluRay, so we can see all the detail. DVD just doesn't cut it, especially after staring at 2k plates for the past six months on Flags! I've been spoiled.

The entire voting process took about two and a half hours, and while there were nominees present for the voting, they could not vote for the category they were nominated for. We were given the same supplimental information like last time, and we actually watched the exact same nominee videos. However the second time around it was much easier to see what was outstanding in the remaining shows, and to rank them accordingly. Shows that I thought were amazing in the first round I only found adequate in the second.

Be sure to check in again next week, when the winners will announced! They will be held at the Shrine Auditorium in Los Angeles on August 19th. Good luck to all the nominees!