Preview of MMD Cup 3 Finals Preview

One of the neat things the Vocaloid community does is the semi-annual MikuMikuDance Cup.  For those who don’t know, it’s an Iron Chef-style MMD video contest with the winners determined by the fan community on Nico Nico Douga.  The qualifying round for the 3rd meet is now in the books, and with 86 videos in three different categories, it could get tedious trying to find the cream of the crop, but never fear.  Over the next week or so, I’ll be profiling some of the top qualifiers in each category and tell you whether their hot or not.  This will lead up to the big final round starting August 14.  A brief breakdown as to how this will all work is after the break.

During the next three installments, I’ll be looking over the Top 5 clips from one of the three theme choices.  Since the My List rankings are the key metric for the MMDCup, I’ll be using that to determine the Top 5.  As for my rating system, it’s going to be a little different than what you’re probably used to.  Since these videos are under a half-minute, it’ll be impossible to give a traditional X out of Y score, so instead I’ll rate them based on what the finished product *could* be based on the preview.

To further explain, I’ve enlisted Ms. Hatsune’s help.  She was gracious enough to provide this for me.

That’s pretty decent handwriting for a Japanese person.

Anyway, each video’s score will be measured in leeks from zero to two.  There will not be fractions because I think fractions diminish the purpose and effectiveness of the point scale.  One final warning: this will inevitably be a subjective process in some respect, so mileage will vary, even among the V-ism staff.  The only way we’ll know who’s right, though, is when the winners are announced on August 24th.

Our coverage starts tomorrow with Theme #1.