**The DIYStompboxes 10-Year Anniversary Contest Thread**

[midwayfair]

DIYSB Anniversary Contest

J-J-J-Judges: John Danna (jdansti), Jim Bennell (mustachio), and Jon Patton (midwayfair)

Please read all rules and other posts in this thread before requesting clarification.

0) CONTEST VOID WHERE PROHIBITED.

1) Entries may be posted from August 1, 2013 at 12:00am EDT until August 31, 2013 at 11:59pm. This competition is for new or unseen builds only. All submissions will be posted on this thread first. Do not post submissions on the Pictures thread or on another forum before posting them here. You may post pictures elsewhere after posting them on here if you like.

2) The entry Fee is $5/per pedal to be entered. A maximum of two pedals may be entered, but only one of those builds can win a prize. We need 12 entries to officially start the competition. The entry fee is due any time before your pedal is posted. The entry fee is a donation to the forum and is non-refundable.

Please click here to purchase your entry:
http://diystompboxes.com/zencart/index.php?main_page=product_info&cPath=6&products_id=94

3) Format for submissions.
Name of entrant:
Pedal name:
Tell us a bit about the pedal:
Pictures of the pedal (inside and out):
Audio/video:
Schematic, layout, etc.

4) There are no restrictions on the type of builds. For example, through-hole, SMD, analog, and digital are allowed. There is no theme for this contest.

5) Competition is open to all builders. No commercial or production builders. A person who occasionally sells a pedal to others is not a commercial or production builder. Commercial builders please observe the following restrictions to keep the contest in the spirit of DIY: (a) do not enter a pedal that is part of your commercial line; (b) if you are more than a one-man shop, it's expected that you will enter a pedal built solely by you; (c) consider omitting your branding as a signal that it is not a company build. Obviously some of this is on the honor system, but most of the commercial builders we expect to enter would never take advantage of the community.

6) Circuit layouts do not have to be your own. You may use layouts designed by someone else, but designing your own will garner you substantial bonus points (see "Scoring," below). Builders who use a pre-existing layout for their build must give credit to the original layout designer (if known). The schematic, layout, and/or code must be made public with the contest entry.

7) Entries must be completed, working builds. Pictures and gut shots are mandatory. Video and audio submissions must show first demonstrate a clean signal, followed by only the built pedal (with NO delay, reverb, etc.). You may then mix your pedal with other effects if you wish. Video should show the pedal settings or have narration to describe the settings. Audio clips should have narration to describe the pedal settings. The judges will be listening to the whether the effect does what it is intended to do and will not consider the artistic qualities of the demonstration or the demonstrator's skill with an instrument. A single chord or a few notes may demonstrate the circuit as well as a complicated piece. Note: Previous contests have required audio or video. We decided that this time a build would not be disqualified without provide audio/video evidence of a working pedal, and instead are imposing a scoring penalty for a lack thereof (see "Scoring," below).

8 ) Scoring.

• Aesthetics: This is the overall look of the enclosure, including the artwork, the knobs, the layout, etc. (1-10 points) There are no restrictions on the finish: enclosures can be etched, painted, laser engraved, decaled, etc. The medium is less important than the implementation; a good decal would score higher than a bad laser etch.


• Guts: This covers the wiring/soldering/dressing (1-5 points) and circuit complexity (1-5 points) (10 points total). An analog circuit will be scored on how complex of an analog circuit it is and a digital circuit would be judged on how complex of a digital circuit it is. A simple digital circuit may receive a lower score than a complex analog circuit.


• Sound: The pedal sounds good for its stated applications. (1-10 points). A penalty of –5 (that's negative 5 points) will be applied to any pedal submitted without audio or video.


• Je ne sais quoi: This covers things like "mojo" (rare components), practicality ("I could use this on my pedalboard" or "I would have no difficulty using it live"), and "originality" (there's nothing new under the sun, but then people keep creating new things). (1-10 points.)


• 5 bonus points for designing your own PCB, perfboard, or stripboard layout for the project and/or writing your own code for a digital effect. (If you write your own code and design a PCB, it's still 5 points.)

The judges' decisions are final.

9) Prizes. We would like to provide prizes for 33% of the entries. The number of winners will therefore increase with the number of entries. (12 entries = 4 winners; 15 = 5 winners ...).

Thanks as always to the generous support of the community and retailers for providing prizes.

So far we have:

Parts!

• $50 in store credit from Smallbear Electronics (www.smallbearelec.com)
• $25 in store credit from Pedal Parts Plus (www.pedalpartsplus.com)


PCBs:

• Various PCBs courtesy of the judges, including some original designs and rarities!
• 1776 Effects PCB prize pack
• More to come!


Completed effects and enclosures:

• A handpainted enclosure with custom art (courtesy of MidwayFair)
• HaveYouSeenHim has offered a JFET matcher as a prize (picture here: https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/u/9878279/JFET%20tester%20haveyouseenhim.jpeg).
• More to come!

Winners will choose their prizes from the prize pools, starting with first place. Winners in turn will have 24 hours to respond after notification.

The prize pool is still expanding and we are getting specifics from some of the donors. More prizes will be posted as they are confirmed.

10)

Disqualifications. A pedal submitted without photos, schematic, or layout will be disqualified. Pedals posted before August 1st or after August 31st will be disqualified; no exceptions to this timeline will be granted for any reason. Any entry posted without an entry fee is ineligible. Any submission that the judges deem inappropriate, including, but not limited to, content that is offensive, defamatory, indecent, disparaging, obscene, pornographic, abusive, harassing, or illegal, or which constitutes an unlawful invasion of privacy, or which in any manner violates these Rules, may be disqualified. Finally, any attempt to pass off what is substantially another person's work as one's own will be grounds for disqualification, as is any other fraud or attempt to deceive. (For instance, changing one part on an existing layout and claiming it as an original layout is wrong. Start from scratch.)

11) Shipping. Winners outside the country of the prize-giver will be responsible for shipping fees, taxes, or VATs that are above or beyond the in-country shipping rate, at the discretion of the prize-giver. A prize-giver living in the continental United States should expect to ship their prize free of cost to a CONUS winner, but is permitted to request that a winner in Europe cover a portion of shipping costs.

Winners agree to accept prizes "as-is." The prize donors, judges, and forum are not responsible for prizes lost or stolen in shipment to the winners.  If any prize is returned as undeliverable, an attempt will be made by the prize donor to resolve the shipping problem with the recipient. If the problem cannot be resolved within 30 days, the prize may be forfeited or an alternate winner may be selected at the discretion of the judges.

Prize donors have been requested to ship the prizes within a month if there's any prize that isn't complete at the time the winners are announced that requires more than a day or two to finish.

12) Questions. Any questions that are directly related to the competition, rules, prizes, etc. should be posted here for other forumites to benefit. PLEASE DO NOT SEND PMs FOR COMPETITION QUESTIONS TO ANY OF THE JUDGES! Post them here and one of the judges will answer as soon as possible.

GOOD LUCK TO ALL WHO ENTER![/list][/list][/list]

[Govmnt_Lacky]

SOOOOOOO glad to see this happening. Great work by Jon, John, and Jim!!!     

Now.... Bring on the endless questions 

[midwayfair]

Currently discussing a change to Rule 5.

[jkokura]

Currently discussing a change to Rule 5.

Thank you Jon.

Jacob

[pakrat]

Thank you guys!!! I have no idea what to build, but I'm in! 

[midwayfair]

After some discussion, rule 5 has been changed to allow commercial builders, with a couple restrictions to ensure what is entered is in the spirit of DIY. We made this decision after some discussion and the observation that some of the most spectacular builds we see are by non-commercial builders. We absolutely do not see an undue advantage. We know some people may disagree in principal, but past contests (including Madbean's recent ones) back up this decision.

Also, just to clarify: is someone donates a prize, of course they can still enter the contest.

[Jdansti]

I'm looking forward to a great contest!!!  I've written some lyrics in honor of this momentous occasion.  Sorry no recording (it's more humane that way ). This is to the tune of "Pigs on the Wing, Pt 1" (or 2), so everybody pick up your acoustic guitars and sing along:

You know that it's time for the Anniversary Contest
And we know that you'll enter and do your best
So go to your shop and build a stompbox
We have faith that you won't flop
And any fool knows what it takes to rock
A stompbox for the Anniversary Contest

BTW, I'm available if you need me to write some equally awesome lyrics for your own tunes. 

(We need a sarcasm emoticon). 

[Vallhagen]

Very cool. I have an idea about what to build, and i just again found some inspiration to create stuff, so... I'm in!

Cheers
Bengt

[Jdansti]

^ Cool!!!

[FUZZZZzzzz]

August... that gives me just enough time to learn how to knit a sweater for my pedal video... I'm going to join this one.. hopefully

[Jdansti]

^ Great!  We're about 1/3 the way to a contest if the 4 who've shown interest sign up!  And this is just the first day!  Keep 'me coming!

[Ben N]

Keep 'me coming!

That's what she said.

[Perrow]

I'll enter, I love competitions.

I'll even donate a prize,  just let me get home and see what I can find

[GGBB]

Yay!  I'm in.

[GGBB]

And I have a question (sorry!  ).

What about multi-circuit pedals?  Allowed?  Not allowed?  Restrictions?  I am thinking about something with two circuits on one board, separately switchable etc. - much like two pedals in one box, but in this case the two pedals are a natural pair and have a thematic thing going on.

[midwayfair]

And I have a question (sorry!  ).

What about multi-circuit pedals?  Allowed?  Not allowed?  Restrictions?  I am thinking about something with two circuits on one board, separately switchable etc. - much like two pedals in one box, but in this case the two pedals are a natural pair and have a thematic thing going on.

Entry cost is per pedal. A pedal is a discrete device in an enclosure. Whether you decide to stick one, two, three, or five circuitboards in there, add footswitches, and extra attendant wiring is your decision. The point system was designed to account for the inevitable multipedals: e.g. just putting two circuitboards in a box doesn't automatically make a pedal more complex and may in fact lose points if it makes the guts less tidy. There may be other considerations.

For reference, or just for some empirical evidence for anyone thinking of entering a multi or worried about others doing so: a multipedal hasn't won one of the four Madbean contests despite several entries by popular builds, and the only things with two footswitches that have even placed were Super Duper 2-in-1 (dual SHO) with a spectacular enclosure and a digital programmable pedal controller (which I'm not sure even counts as a multipedal).

[Jdansti]

+1 What he said.

Also as a reminder, only one prize per winner. A multiFX pedal is only eligible for one prize, same as single FX pedals.  And as stated in the rules, if you enter two pedals and they both score high, you only receive one prize.

I'm going to confer with J & J regarding how to handle ranking a winner who has two pedals that place. For example, does the higher score of the two pedals determine rank?  I'm sure I know the answer, but I need to run it past the other judges.

[Paul Marossy]

Uh... actually the DIYstompboxes forum has been around longer than ten years. I've been a member since Aron left the Ampage forum and started his own started his own forum. That was like 2001-2002? I remember at least one forum move somewhere around 2003 where I had to "start over", which I guess would be the 10th anniversary of this particular forum.

OK, done splitting hairs now.   

[midwayfair]

Uh... actually the DIYstompboxes forum has been around longer than ten years. I've been a member since Aron left the Ampage forum and started his own started his own forum. That was like 2001-2002? I remember at least one forum move somewhere around 2003 where I had to "start over", which I guess would be the 10th anniversary of this particular forum.

OK, done splitting hairs now.   

Yeah, but "The 10th Anniversary of This Particular Incarnation of Aron's Stompbox Forum Contest Thread" was over the character limit for thread titles!

[Paul Marossy]

Uh... actually the DIYstompboxes forum has been around longer than ten years. I've been a member since Aron left the Ampage forum and started his own started his own forum. That was like 2001-2002? I remember at least one forum move somewhere around 2003 where I had to "start over", which I guess would be the 10th anniversary of this particular forum.

OK, done splitting hairs now.   

Yeah, but "The 10th Anniversary of This Particular Incarnation of Aron's Stompbox Forum Contest Thread" was over the character limit for thread titles!