Global Shinkai Day 2009...

Posted February 28th, 2009 by Nick
in

...is coming to a close.

This had become a bigger event that I had even anticipated. I've been a member of the Cherry Blossoms Falling Makoto Shinkai fansite forums for the better part of a year now and I remember when Global Shinkai Day was just an idea put up to just get the forum members for a couple of fan sites together to simply watch Shinkai's movies together at the same time. I had the idea of setting up some kind of voice-chat collaboration so that we can talk and have conversations through the films, so I had setup a Ventrilo server1.

There weren't as many people with mics on as I wanted, but it seems that my ongoing commentary of the films (especially early on) became a bit of a hit anyways. I now have probably around 10 hours or more of audio to go through to pull out snippets of observations and information that we went through about the films. It would be pretty cool to put together commentary tracks for the films together. It would probably months of work to do, but I feel like I might be up to it. Still, much of it was me just blathering on about whatever came to mind at the time, even down to playing guitar at one point during the times between the films. Yes, you just might be able to hear me attempt to play "One More Time, One More Chance" on my Yamaha acoustic. If I dare. And the time I started imbibing myself on sake...

In any case, I really have to thank Laz from the Cherry Blossoms Falling forums for contacting the people at CoMix Wave and Crunchyroll to get all of this together. Here's a few statements from him to start and end the event that I recorded from the Ventrilo chat:

Introduction to Global Shinkai Day 2009 (MP3)

Closing Statements to Global Shinkai Day 2009 (MP3)

Again, a very big thank you Laz Long for getting this whole event rolling. Hopefully, we can make Global Shinkai Day 2010 an even bigger event.

  1. 1. Settled on, really, as I was looking at options like Skype, Teamspeak, and Dimdim, but in the end, Ventrilo was just the best option overall. Though I'm going to have a good look at Teamspeak 3 in the future if it gets released soon.

Re: Global Shinkai Day 2009...

On March 1st, 2009 BakaTanuki (not verified) says:

Shinkai Day was awesome. I've been a fan of 5cm Per Second since it was first released on DVD here. I'm glad I got a chance to see Voices of a Distant Star. I didn't have time to watch The Place Promised in Our Early Days like I wish I had. Still, I got to see something fantastic and I got a friend to watch 5cm and VoaDS.

Then when podcasting tonight, 4 of us were discussing those two films. I really love them both. I also switched my desktop wallpaper to something Shinkai related.

Re: Global Shinkai Day 2009...

On March 1st, 2009 Martin (not verified) says:

I had a lot of things to do yesterday but I found myself nursing a mild hangover with an hour or so to spare in the morning so ended up brewing an outsize pot of coffee and rewatching 5cm (HQ, subbed). The occasional lagging of the video was a mild annoyance, but TBH Crunchyroll did a great job of hosting the movies without visitor demand crashing their servers!

After a bit of deliberation I decided not to participate in the discussion stuff - I feel like I've said pretty much everything I'm able to put into words about it already. The relevance and poignancy never seems to lessen with time though, no matter how many times I've seen them.

If nothing else it's given his works exposure to more potential viewers, which I'm sure makes all the effort that's gone into the event worthwhile. How about a Satoshi Kon Day too later this year? Eye-wink

Re: Global Shinkai Day 2009...

On March 1st, 2009 Xcomp (not verified) says:

Was a fun day watching the movies with various people and it was great being able to watch the unreleased dub of 5cm too!

Excellent work with the unintentional "commentary track", Zitch (or should I call you Nick here?)! It probably would be a good idea to put a fan made commentary track... Then again, you could give people an excuse to join the voice chat next time Eye-wink

Re: Global Shinkai Day 2009...

On March 1st, 2009 EliteHunters says:

I have to admit that Global Skinkai Day was great. Logging on early Saturday morning on Ventrilo, waiting for all to just log in.....getting worked up just to troubleshoot the bloody configuration for the mic settings and just when you getting frustrated trying the solve it, you actually get it working and your throw completely into the mix.

There for almost and entire day, talk to those who are good enough just the hit back with good conversational material about the film, personal insights....all the substance that made it a day to remember when we sat down and watch films that rest deep within our minds.

In the end.....it was a great day.

God willing, lets be around for another one.