2007 Fannish Year In Review!
Since I'll soon be offline for the rest of the year, I'll post this now. I did this last year and personally enjoyed it, which is why I'm doing it again this year. I have really mixed feelings about my fannish output this year.
The Vids
Insane January Vidding Project '07 (Multi) - This is the round-up post for IJVP07, and it captures my feelings pretty well. "B.O.B." is probably my overall favorite, but I really like certain things about each vidlet. There are things I really don't like about each of them, too, though. It was a good learning experience, and a harbinger of the year-to-come for me.
You Can Call Me (Due South) - My first vid of the new year was YCCM? Huh. What else can I say about this vid that I haven't already said at length? In re-reading my 2006 fannish review, I thought it was interesting to see that I felt I had learned to vid to my fannish emotions, given that then in 2007 I made "YCCM" and "That's All." I think YCCM especially is the culmination of that lesson from 2006, since I think "That's All" is leading me to something else. I am always and continually grateful for the response that vid got and still gets; occasionally I receive a comment so full of happiness that it makes me happier just reading it.
Hello, Tigh (BSG) - An April Fool's joke gone wrong, really. It shouldn't even really count as a vid, but this seemed to be a thing for me this year - brief comedy vids that aren't beta'd and are more ideas than anything.
That's All (Due South) - This is a a vid I talked a lot about while making it, which I don't usually do. I also played more with effects than I ever have before. I have to say that in retrospect I am less happy with it than I was when I first made it, though I still appreciate that it, I think, captures the essense of the fanon Ray/Ray fans have built up. But, yeah, watching it now I tend to focus a lot on the faults. What I find interesting is that the three vids I posted for VVC I all made before this vid, because ever since I made this vid, most of my serious vid ideas have some trick or tech requirement now that they haven't had before.
Weapon of Choice (Farscape) - I made this for Club Vivid this year. I'd been sitting on this idea for awhile (and almost made it the year before for CV) and when I got down to actually vidding it, it came out much differently than what I had in my head, and even now I have trouble realigning what's there with what I thought the idea was for so long. I think it's a good vid but it's just not what I expected. Heh.
The Loyal (Children of Men) - My VVC Premieres Show vid. I love this video. The idea grabbed me almost immediately because, for one of the first times ever, it sounded like the color of the movie to me - that gritty grey-blue and grey-yellow color. elynross really helped me make this vid even stronger. I have very fond feelings towards it (and her!) still.
Let's Go Crazy (BSG) - I made this with laurashapiro for Club Vivid. The co-vidding might actually still be my favorite thing about this vid. Hee. It was really fun to bounce ideas off of someone, to see her strikes of inspiration come to life and to share my own. It was a really great experience and a very fun vid and I'm glad I got a chance to do the instrumental parts because it was quite freeing. I'm grateful Laura asked me to help her with it. :) (And bonus kudos to her for doing all the hard exporting portion of it as well.) I think the vid is pretty funny, still, but then I find Gaius hilarious.
Summer Nights (Dante's Cove) - You guys. I don't even know. This is the year Dante's Cove ate my brain and I don't regret it for an instant. I think I may have first had this idea at VVC, even, but I can't recall anymore. It was really fun to make, if un-beta'd and probably not as funny to people who haven't watched the show with me specifically. Heh.
Mountanic and Mountalot (Due South) - These were made for ds_flashfiction's DS Match challenge and were light and frothy and fun to make and I still laugh every time it gets to Kate Winslet's voice saying "this is where we first met" and Vecchio grinning when he's introduced as Johnny Depp. I'm easy. *g*
Tape It (Twitch City) - I feel like I didn't really vid very widely, fandom-wise, this year, and I was kind of surprised when I was looking at my vids posted list and saw that I vidded in 6 different fandoms both last year and this year. This year felt very much more Due South-centric to me. Anyway, this was my first post-Vividcon vid and I'm still pretty happy with it. The credits came out how I wanted, which was a relief, though my original idea for the vid had been for sections to switch more like channels were being changed but then I couldn't figure out how to make it not be extremely distracting and also just how to make it work in the vid, so that got dropped in the planning stages. But I think even something like the credits wouldn't have happened without "That's All," and I keep trying to speed up my cutting time for fast songs like this, though I can still see an occasional place where it lags. But I think it paces pretty well for me, so I'm happy with that.
Pour Some Sugar On Me (Due South) - It feels appropriate to end this year with not only a crazy-ass comedy vid, but a Due South one. I just kind of stare at this list and think "Of course it had to end this way." For all my mock fussing about it, I'm really pleased with how this video came out.
Overall Thoughts - Um. Yay Due South? Heh. As I said at the start, I have very mixed feelings about this year in vids. I'm really really happy with some things and disappointed with other things and kind of in limbo about where I'm going to go next and what I'm going to do. I feel like I learned a lot as a vidder this year, especially via IJVP and "That's All," but that I'm still processing it and trying to figure out what to do with it. I'm excited about the See-Thru Vidding Project (spoiler for Farscape's The Peacekeeper Wars!) and some of the crazier vid ideas that I'm letting myself have, so if I can find the focus and the time next year, it might be a very strange and experimental vidding year for me. On the other hand, I also feel like I could keep making Due South vids the rest of my life and be entirely happy. This year feels like an in-between year for me, though that could honestly be fallout from the last few months I've had personally. I don't know. I look forward to 2008!
My favorite of my own vids this year:
It's got to be "You Can Call Me." It's everything I love about the show and the fandom, and my emotional ties to it make me kind of blind to any faults. :)
My best vid this year:
"The Loyal." YCCM got the most comments, but if I was going to show somebody a vid, I'd show them this one because part of YCCM's charm, IMO, is the connection to the show.
Vid of mine most underappreciated by the universe, in my opinion:
"The Loyal."
Most fun video:
Probably "Let's Go Crazy," which was fun to make and I think the final result is fun, too. PSSOM is pretty fun, too, though.
Video with single sexiest moment:
"That's All," when Kowalski leans in to kiss Vecchio and then you see the hand-clasping shot after.
Hardest video to make:
"That's All." By far. And if you saw my whining while making it, you know why. Heh.
Most unintentionally *telling* video:
Hm. Unintentionally, I'd probably say "Hello, Tigh," only because I didn't make it to profess my Tigh love, but that's what people seemed to take from it. Everything else, my intentions and what people got were pretty equal. Unless you want to start looking too deeply into "Pour Some Sugar On Me" and then who knows what you'll find.
The Fic
I'm not including memes where I wrote ficlets in comments, though there were a handful of those. This is the year I tested the waters in a new fandom and new pairings and found them warm and inviting.
What They Teach At The Academy These Days (Due South; Fraser/Vecchio; rated PG-13) - A little New Year's Eve story that I wrote during my family visit during last Christmas holiday. I had a really good time writing it and it still has one of my personal favorite of my own Vecchio lines: Ray’s mouth dropped open. The Mountie was seducing him again. It was scandalous.
A Just Reward (Due South; Fraser/Vecchio; rated NC-17) - "Vault" fic where they give each other blowjobs. There you go - now you've read it. *g* Written to satisfy my own shock that there is not way more Vault fic out there. I mean honestly.
Five Times That Fraser Made Ray Laugh (Due South; Vecchio/Fraser; rated PG) - Most notable to me in that it spurred brynnmck to write one of my all-time favorite F/V fics, Five Times That Ray Made Fraser Laugh. I don't actually enjoy re-reading my own story; there are a few things in it that always stick out to me and I'd change them if I was going back to re-write.
Feelings Are Boring, Kissing Is Awesome (Due South; Vecchio/Fraser/Anita Cortez; rated R) - I love Anita Cortez (as we'll see in a bit) and I just always wanted to read the three of them making out, so International Multifandom Making Out Day seemed like a good enough reason to write it. Heh. I apparently was way more about the shameless PWP this year!
All These Stupid Things (Due South; Vecchio/Kowalski; rated NC-17) - Once again, PWP. They're really hot! I love them! They do reckless, sexy things together!
DS Aprilfools stories (various fandoms/ratings) - This is a link to the eight fics I wrote for the ds_aprilfools challenge, which was really fun and I still have ideas for. My favorite of these is a tie between Winning the Race (Anita backstory fic that shows just how much I adore this character) and Love Song (Vecchio/Fraser, rated PG, a fairly brief fic that I'm extremely proud of both for structure and emotion).
Drive All Night (Due South; Vecchio/Fraser/Kowalski; rated PG-13) - Written for Brynn and unbeta'd but I still think the atmosphere of it worked pretty well, capturing that feeling of a long drive at night.
Windblown (Hard Core Logo; John; rated R) - My first fic written for the ds_shakespeare challenge. This fic came out as I'd imagined in my head, which is the best thing any creative endeavor can do. John is a hell of a character, the perfect character for fic writers as katallison pointed out, and I was glad to be able to write this.
Our Dancing Days (Due South; Vecchio/Fraser; rated PG-13) - My second ds_shakespeare fic. I was ok with this when I wrote it, and then shortly after that I hated it, and now I'm back to liking it. I can't really figure out what changed in my response to it, but I think it's not as bad as I thought it was.
Morning (Due South; Vecchio/Kowalski; rated hard R) - Just another captured-moment, sort-of PWP fic. I don't know, apparently I don't have as much to say about fic as I do about vids. I do like this one, though, and think it worked better than my first V/K fic.
All In (Due South; Vecchio; PG-13) - My final ds_shakespeare fic. I started this one back when I started "Our Dancing Days," but I let it lie for a long time, finally taking it out again and finishing it off at the end of November. The middle section was the part I hadn't written yet, though I knew what I wanted there, so I was happy when I finally broke through whatever was keeping me from writing it and got it down. The "Jack" section changed a couple of times before I settled on the post-JiB moment. I'm actually very happy with how each of the sections lead into each other, either by referring emotionally to the section before or by referring specifically to language (like the "it's my fault" / "it's not your fault" bit). I was also really happy with the responses to it, because people got what I was going for, and that's always a thrill.
Overall Thoughts - My writing really fell off after the first half of the year; I basically didn't write anything from June until December. I keep adding ideas to my growing "To Write" list, but I'm still having trouble settling down enough to write something. I also wrote a lot less this year, not necessarily in number of fics, but number of words. Though to be fair I also have my currently 12k word ds_harlequin story I've been working on, off and on, and I didn't count that in my word total though I probably should. Heh.
My favorite of my own stories this year:
I don't know. I am still in last-fic-posted love with "All In," but I also still really like "Windblown" and "Winning the Race." Interestingly, those are all (mostly) gen pieces.
My best story this year:
"Windblown."
Story of mine most underappreciated by the universe, in my opinion:
"What They Teach At The Academy These Days."
Most fun story:
"Feelings Are Boring, Kissing Is Awesome." The fact I used a Dinosaur Comics quote as the title for the fic probably makes it more fun for me. Hee.
Story with single sexiest moment:
I actually think the conversation in the hot car between Ray and Fraser in "5 Times..." is really hot. Though I'm also a fan of Ray giving Fraser a blowjob in "Just Rewards." Heh.
Hardest story to write:
Probably "All In," although really it's still this harlequin fic which I can't seem to get pinned down ATALL.
Most unintentionally *telling* story:
Huh. I...have no idea.
Total number of words written:
19,360.
If you have any specific questions about any of these vids or fic, feel free to ask! Many, many heartfelt thanks to every single person who commented on any of these. I vid and write the ideas that I have and want to see, but I post them because I like sharing them with people, and I am always grateful when someone takes the time to say they liked it. I wish I was better at that myself. For the people who say they "only" comment and don't produce much or anything - you all are doing a huge service for fandom. Thank you.
The Vids
Insane January Vidding Project '07 (Multi) - This is the round-up post for IJVP07, and it captures my feelings pretty well. "B.O.B." is probably my overall favorite, but I really like certain things about each vidlet. There are things I really don't like about each of them, too, though. It was a good learning experience, and a harbinger of the year-to-come for me.
You Can Call Me (Due South) - My first vid of the new year was YCCM? Huh. What else can I say about this vid that I haven't already said at length? In re-reading my 2006 fannish review, I thought it was interesting to see that I felt I had learned to vid to my fannish emotions, given that then in 2007 I made "YCCM" and "That's All." I think YCCM especially is the culmination of that lesson from 2006, since I think "That's All" is leading me to something else. I am always and continually grateful for the response that vid got and still gets; occasionally I receive a comment so full of happiness that it makes me happier just reading it.
Hello, Tigh (BSG) - An April Fool's joke gone wrong, really. It shouldn't even really count as a vid, but this seemed to be a thing for me this year - brief comedy vids that aren't beta'd and are more ideas than anything.
That's All (Due South) - This is a a vid I talked a lot about while making it, which I don't usually do. I also played more with effects than I ever have before. I have to say that in retrospect I am less happy with it than I was when I first made it, though I still appreciate that it, I think, captures the essense of the fanon Ray/Ray fans have built up. But, yeah, watching it now I tend to focus a lot on the faults. What I find interesting is that the three vids I posted for VVC I all made before this vid, because ever since I made this vid, most of my serious vid ideas have some trick or tech requirement now that they haven't had before.
Weapon of Choice (Farscape) - I made this for Club Vivid this year. I'd been sitting on this idea for awhile (and almost made it the year before for CV) and when I got down to actually vidding it, it came out much differently than what I had in my head, and even now I have trouble realigning what's there with what I thought the idea was for so long. I think it's a good vid but it's just not what I expected. Heh.
The Loyal (Children of Men) - My VVC Premieres Show vid. I love this video. The idea grabbed me almost immediately because, for one of the first times ever, it sounded like the color of the movie to me - that gritty grey-blue and grey-yellow color. elynross really helped me make this vid even stronger. I have very fond feelings towards it (and her!) still.
Let's Go Crazy (BSG) - I made this with laurashapiro for Club Vivid. The co-vidding might actually still be my favorite thing about this vid. Hee. It was really fun to bounce ideas off of someone, to see her strikes of inspiration come to life and to share my own. It was a really great experience and a very fun vid and I'm glad I got a chance to do the instrumental parts because it was quite freeing. I'm grateful Laura asked me to help her with it. :) (And bonus kudos to her for doing all the hard exporting portion of it as well.) I think the vid is pretty funny, still, but then I find Gaius hilarious.
Summer Nights (Dante's Cove) - You guys. I don't even know. This is the year Dante's Cove ate my brain and I don't regret it for an instant. I think I may have first had this idea at VVC, even, but I can't recall anymore. It was really fun to make, if un-beta'd and probably not as funny to people who haven't watched the show with me specifically. Heh.
Mountanic and Mountalot (Due South) - These were made for ds_flashfiction's DS Match challenge and were light and frothy and fun to make and I still laugh every time it gets to Kate Winslet's voice saying "this is where we first met" and Vecchio grinning when he's introduced as Johnny Depp. I'm easy. *g*
Tape It (Twitch City) - I feel like I didn't really vid very widely, fandom-wise, this year, and I was kind of surprised when I was looking at my vids posted list and saw that I vidded in 6 different fandoms both last year and this year. This year felt very much more Due South-centric to me. Anyway, this was my first post-Vividcon vid and I'm still pretty happy with it. The credits came out how I wanted, which was a relief, though my original idea for the vid had been for sections to switch more like channels were being changed but then I couldn't figure out how to make it not be extremely distracting and also just how to make it work in the vid, so that got dropped in the planning stages. But I think even something like the credits wouldn't have happened without "That's All," and I keep trying to speed up my cutting time for fast songs like this, though I can still see an occasional place where it lags. But I think it paces pretty well for me, so I'm happy with that.
Pour Some Sugar On Me (Due South) - It feels appropriate to end this year with not only a crazy-ass comedy vid, but a Due South one. I just kind of stare at this list and think "Of course it had to end this way." For all my mock fussing about it, I'm really pleased with how this video came out.
Overall Thoughts - Um. Yay Due South? Heh. As I said at the start, I have very mixed feelings about this year in vids. I'm really really happy with some things and disappointed with other things and kind of in limbo about where I'm going to go next and what I'm going to do. I feel like I learned a lot as a vidder this year, especially via IJVP and "That's All," but that I'm still processing it and trying to figure out what to do with it. I'm excited about the See-Thru Vidding Project (spoiler for Farscape's The Peacekeeper Wars!) and some of the crazier vid ideas that I'm letting myself have, so if I can find the focus and the time next year, it might be a very strange and experimental vidding year for me. On the other hand, I also feel like I could keep making Due South vids the rest of my life and be entirely happy. This year feels like an in-between year for me, though that could honestly be fallout from the last few months I've had personally. I don't know. I look forward to 2008!
My favorite of my own vids this year:
It's got to be "You Can Call Me." It's everything I love about the show and the fandom, and my emotional ties to it make me kind of blind to any faults. :)
My best vid this year:
"The Loyal." YCCM got the most comments, but if I was going to show somebody a vid, I'd show them this one because part of YCCM's charm, IMO, is the connection to the show.
Vid of mine most underappreciated by the universe, in my opinion:
"The Loyal."
Most fun video:
Probably "Let's Go Crazy," which was fun to make and I think the final result is fun, too. PSSOM is pretty fun, too, though.
Video with single sexiest moment:
"That's All," when Kowalski leans in to kiss Vecchio and then you see the hand-clasping shot after.
Hardest video to make:
"That's All." By far. And if you saw my whining while making it, you know why. Heh.
Most unintentionally *telling* video:
Hm. Unintentionally, I'd probably say "Hello, Tigh," only because I didn't make it to profess my Tigh love, but that's what people seemed to take from it. Everything else, my intentions and what people got were pretty equal. Unless you want to start looking too deeply into "Pour Some Sugar On Me" and then who knows what you'll find.
The Fic
I'm not including memes where I wrote ficlets in comments, though there were a handful of those. This is the year I tested the waters in a new fandom and new pairings and found them warm and inviting.
What They Teach At The Academy These Days (Due South; Fraser/Vecchio; rated PG-13) - A little New Year's Eve story that I wrote during my family visit during last Christmas holiday. I had a really good time writing it and it still has one of my personal favorite of my own Vecchio lines: Ray’s mouth dropped open. The Mountie was seducing him again. It was scandalous.
A Just Reward (Due South; Fraser/Vecchio; rated NC-17) - "Vault" fic where they give each other blowjobs. There you go - now you've read it. *g* Written to satisfy my own shock that there is not way more Vault fic out there. I mean honestly.
Five Times That Fraser Made Ray Laugh (Due South; Vecchio/Fraser; rated PG) - Most notable to me in that it spurred brynnmck to write one of my all-time favorite F/V fics, Five Times That Ray Made Fraser Laugh. I don't actually enjoy re-reading my own story; there are a few things in it that always stick out to me and I'd change them if I was going back to re-write.
Feelings Are Boring, Kissing Is Awesome (Due South; Vecchio/Fraser/Anita Cortez; rated R) - I love Anita Cortez (as we'll see in a bit) and I just always wanted to read the three of them making out, so International Multifandom Making Out Day seemed like a good enough reason to write it. Heh. I apparently was way more about the shameless PWP this year!
All These Stupid Things (Due South; Vecchio/Kowalski; rated NC-17) - Once again, PWP. They're really hot! I love them! They do reckless, sexy things together!
DS Aprilfools stories (various fandoms/ratings) - This is a link to the eight fics I wrote for the ds_aprilfools challenge, which was really fun and I still have ideas for. My favorite of these is a tie between Winning the Race (Anita backstory fic that shows just how much I adore this character) and Love Song (Vecchio/Fraser, rated PG, a fairly brief fic that I'm extremely proud of both for structure and emotion).
Drive All Night (Due South; Vecchio/Fraser/Kowalski; rated PG-13) - Written for Brynn and unbeta'd but I still think the atmosphere of it worked pretty well, capturing that feeling of a long drive at night.
Windblown (Hard Core Logo; John; rated R) - My first fic written for the ds_shakespeare challenge. This fic came out as I'd imagined in my head, which is the best thing any creative endeavor can do. John is a hell of a character, the perfect character for fic writers as katallison pointed out, and I was glad to be able to write this.
Our Dancing Days (Due South; Vecchio/Fraser; rated PG-13) - My second ds_shakespeare fic. I was ok with this when I wrote it, and then shortly after that I hated it, and now I'm back to liking it. I can't really figure out what changed in my response to it, but I think it's not as bad as I thought it was.
Morning (Due South; Vecchio/Kowalski; rated hard R) - Just another captured-moment, sort-of PWP fic. I don't know, apparently I don't have as much to say about fic as I do about vids. I do like this one, though, and think it worked better than my first V/K fic.
All In (Due South; Vecchio; PG-13) - My final ds_shakespeare fic. I started this one back when I started "Our Dancing Days," but I let it lie for a long time, finally taking it out again and finishing it off at the end of November. The middle section was the part I hadn't written yet, though I knew what I wanted there, so I was happy when I finally broke through whatever was keeping me from writing it and got it down. The "Jack" section changed a couple of times before I settled on the post-JiB moment. I'm actually very happy with how each of the sections lead into each other, either by referring emotionally to the section before or by referring specifically to language (like the "it's my fault" / "it's not your fault" bit). I was also really happy with the responses to it, because people got what I was going for, and that's always a thrill.
Overall Thoughts - My writing really fell off after the first half of the year; I basically didn't write anything from June until December. I keep adding ideas to my growing "To Write" list, but I'm still having trouble settling down enough to write something. I also wrote a lot less this year, not necessarily in number of fics, but number of words. Though to be fair I also have my currently 12k word ds_harlequin story I've been working on, off and on, and I didn't count that in my word total though I probably should. Heh.
My favorite of my own stories this year:
I don't know. I am still in last-fic-posted love with "All In," but I also still really like "Windblown" and "Winning the Race." Interestingly, those are all (mostly) gen pieces.
My best story this year:
"Windblown."
Story of mine most underappreciated by the universe, in my opinion:
"What They Teach At The Academy These Days."
Most fun story:
"Feelings Are Boring, Kissing Is Awesome." The fact I used a Dinosaur Comics quote as the title for the fic probably makes it more fun for me. Hee.
Story with single sexiest moment:
I actually think the conversation in the hot car between Ray and Fraser in "5 Times..." is really hot. Though I'm also a fan of Ray giving Fraser a blowjob in "Just Rewards." Heh.
Hardest story to write:
Probably "All In," although really it's still this harlequin fic which I can't seem to get pinned down ATALL.
Most unintentionally *telling* story:
Huh. I...have no idea.
Total number of words written:
19,360.
If you have any specific questions about any of these vids or fic, feel free to ask! Many, many heartfelt thanks to every single person who commented on any of these. I vid and write the ideas that I have and want to see, but I post them because I like sharing them with people, and I am always grateful when someone takes the time to say they liked it. I wish I was better at that myself. For the people who say they "only" comment and don't produce much or anything - you all are doing a huge service for fandom. Thank you.