I saw a lifehacker post about NaNoWriMo, which is National Novel Writing Month, which is this month (November). Then my girlfriend told me about NaSoAlMo, which is National Solo Album Month. Write and record an original solo album (of about 30 minutes) in the month of November. So I started looking around for other timed art events and found that this seems to be a “thing” people do.
Most of these have a specific start and end time while a few can occur on your own schedule as long as you adhere to the time limit. Also most of them have no judging – it’s just a matter of finishing.
Here’s a few that I found:
Song Fight
New week a new fight. They post a title, you email them a 128kbs MP3 song and the internet votes.
Album a Day
Write and Record 20 minutes, or 30 songs in a 24 hour period. This one does not have a common time period.
the 3-Day Novel Contest
A more ambitious challenge. Write a novel in 3 days over labor day weekend. It’s actually a Canadian based contest but the world is invited. The winner gets published.
Script Frenzy
Write a 20,000 word script running about 120 minutes over the month of June.
24 hour comics
If you like pictures with your stories, here you can attempt a 24 page comic book in 24 hours. Any 24 hours will do.
48 Hour Film Project
This is a bigger deal. Sponsored by Visa and it tours from town to town. You have 48 to produce a short film of 4-7 minutes. You’re given a genre, a character, a line of dialog and a prop to help ensure the creation occurs in the alloted time. The 48 hours must encompass screen writing, rehearsal, all filming and editing and delivery to the judges.
The National Film Challenge
Is basically the same thing but, doesn’t travel from city to city. It happens worldwide in October. Also it doesn’t seem to have a big sponsor.