This is difficult, how do you guys go about making the actual list?
I'm probably going to win for the most convoluted and roundabout way of doing things, but the results I have are pretty close to my "gut" feelings and are definitely the most quantifiable. First, I started with the parameter that I had to have seen five films from each director (yes, this immediately disqualifies Terrence Malick and the like, but none of them were close anyway). Second, I rated all of their films that I had seen 1 - 5 stars including half star increments. Third, I ranked them using this fancy formula (no, I'm not a math person):
2*x + y/2
where x is the average of their five best films and y is the average of all subsequent films. If I had only seen five films then y is the average of films four and five. The highest possible score is 12.5. Currently my number one director has a score of 11.43 and my number fifty director has a score of 8.45, though three new directors will probably make their ways on before the deadline. If two or more directors had the same score, I compared their best films.