The NewGrounds Annual Tournament of Animation of is an animation tournament that occurs during the summer of each year. The competition pits the top animators of the web against each other to find out who the true Champion of Animation is...
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Joined on 3/8/05
I thought it was such a shame about McBooga and JagonDudo being eliminated as they did such wonderful pieces. Coughing-dog also seemed like he might be the one to beat.
If Fungasm or Lazy Mode Comics really pull themselves together I think Dave Bruno might have a proper challenge on his hands.
Seeing Coughing-Dog and Jagon eliminated in the first round really irked me ... I've been a part of and ran a number of tournaments, and there are numerous ways of avoiding situations where you eliminate serious contenders in the first round.
Ranked brackets allow for every serious contenders to get a chance to at least eliminate weaker opponents. That doesn't always happen. There are always surprises (aka Fungasm) where a "higher ranked" competitor may not be able to fully execute their idea for any given reason.
But the matches between Bruno/Jagon and LazyMode/CoughingDog were 4 complete well-executed pieces. Their past works showed a history of quality. And yet, they were pitted against each other, rather than some of the "last second open rounders".
Ranked matches ensures that some lesser artist doesn't just drift through their bracket to get utterly stomped in the finals.
Sorry for rambling ... this is your event, not mine, but seeing the weak turnout upon the migration (and I sincerely hope it does stay here on NG... it takes time for a "new thing" to take root in a new community... even if it's been around a while) ... seeing the weak turnout, I figured any advice could increase the overall quality and competition could be helpful.
That said, congrats to the winners.
Again, apologies for rambling.
I agree with your conclusion here. I was trying out the idea of pitting similarly leveled people against each other in the first round so that each of them would have a challenge, but this leaves the problem of low versus high later in the tournament, like you said. I will modify the structure like that next year.
Even with the weaker turnout due to migration, the number of open round entrants this year was pretty average compared to year's past, so I'm excited to see what happens next year. We already have a LOT of ideas on how to make the contest better and more exciting next year.
Thanks for the feedback! The contest is continually growing and evolving to fit the community.
yeah seeing a couple of those lose in the first round was pretty sad. does that mean those artists are completely out or do they just lose a few overall tournament points for losing vs their competitor? i can understand that the 'best animator' will eventually win no matter who gets knocked out, but the fact that this stuff is so subjective makes it hard to believe you're not able to redeem yourself in the next round at all.
You're talkin' double-elimination ... where losers of the first round, then have a chance to battle each other to get back to the finals ... which is actually pretty cool to see.
Especially in a case like this ... where it's feasible that a first round loser could come back and win it.
But I don't believe that's the case.
Double Elimination is an interesting take, it will definately be considered next year.
TOFA is judged on all the spectrums of animation, not just 1. Not only that if you blame the results you're blaming various judges.
@Thundaboom ... I don't think folks are "blaming" the judges for who won their respective matches (as in, no one's complaining about the judging). People seem more bummed out that several decent contenders were knocked out in the first round. And I specifically, am bummed because it didn't have to be that way...
... I think the judges did a very fair job of judging.
The tournament also could of been done as "highest 8 scores moves on to the next round" so top 8 continue, then next round top 4 scores, and so on.
TheMAM
YAY! GO BRUNO!