It amazing to me that you can take several dozen opinionated design experts from around the world, throw them in an airplane-hangar-sized space filled with design objects for two days, and get them to reach a consensus on which are the most awards-worthy. But that's exactly what happened a few weeks ago, when the iF International Forum Design convened 44 jurors to examine over 4,000 entries and select the winners of the 2012 iF Design Awards.

This year they actually shot the proceedings and posted them on YouTube to launch iF Close-up, the organization's new monthly video podcast. We don't get to see any jurors heatedly issuing broken-beer-bottle challenges or rolling around on the floor, but the five-minute video does give you an idea of what goes on at the proceedings. As Awards Chairman Professor Fritz Frenkler notes, one of the biggest challenges in wading through such an enormous selection is getting everyone to stay fresh, so that the objects perused in the evenings are getting the same fair shake as the ones viewed in the mornings.

Hit the jump for a complete list of people you see (and hear) in the video.Featuring statements of: Prof. Fritz Frenkler, Christoph Boninger, Ineke Hans, Jeroen van Erp, J'amie Cohen, Marta Dahlig, Carsten Gluth, Charles O. Job, Aart van Bezooyen, Kunpyo Lee, Barbera Keukens, Low Cheaw Hwei.

Also starring: Werner Aisslinger, Prof. Achim Heine, Jennifer Tsai, Fred Held, Hagen Fendler, Hiroaki Tanaka, James Irvine, Karoline von Hafen, Michael Lanz, Philippe Grohe, Prof. Martin Topel, Sam Hecht, Tadashi Koike, Thomas Hirt, Verena Kloos, Andy Payne, Christine Hesse, Prof. Jinhee Park, Markus Ludermann, Prof. Eku Wand, Rob Wagemans, Stefan Büscher, Susanne Schmidhuber, Sven Schnee, Vicky Tiegelkamp, George M. Beylerian, Stefanie Heyduck, Hans Brindfors.