Georgia Press Association Monthly Clip Contest

ELIGIBILITY
This monthly contest is open to all members of the Georgia Press Association, including GPA interns and Georgia College Press Association members.

CATEGORIES
The six categories of competition include:

01 Spot News – A single photo of an event for which no advanced planning was possible.
Examples include, but are not limited to, accidents, fires and natural disasters.

02 General News - A single photo of an event for which advanced planning was possible.
Examples include, but are not limited to: courtroom events, funerals, news conferences, mock exercises and campaigns. Unplanned events that develop during the course of planned events should be entered in Spot News.

03 Sports - A single sports action or sports feature photo. Examples include peak action or sports related events outside the field of play.

04 Feature - Events and subjects other than Spot News, General News, Sports or Illustration depicted in one photo.

05 Multiple Photo - Events or subjects depicted in more than one photo. (Photo stories, photo essays, sequences or a series of photos)

06 Illustration - Preconceived concepts in one image. Food and fashion should also grace this category. Conceptual illustrations are defined as images either and/or manipulated by computer, illustrated with lighting in studio or on location, double exposures, added boarders, or multiple photos presented in one frame (i.e. collage).  Illustration entries are submitted on a monthly basis but are judged quarterly.

The Photo Clip Chair can move an entry to its appropriate category if necessary. They also can disqualify an image that they feel is manipulated heavily, breaks the spirit of competition, or is unethical in any manner. The photographer’s name in a caption  field or metadata is grounds for automatic disqualification due to influence on a judges decision.

DEADLINE
All entries must be uploaded to the Georgia Press Association Clip Contest FTP site by midnight the seventh day of the month following the month of publication.  Illustrations entries will be judged on a quarterly basis but should be entered the month following publication.

ENTRIES
Photos published in a GPA member product are eligible. Publication is defined as hard copy printed or electronically reproduced in your GPA member product. 

ENTRY LIMITATIONS
A maximum of nine (9) entries in any combination of the six categories may be made each month. The Clip Chair may disqualify any or all of the contestant’s entries for the month if the limit is exceeded. A series of related photos published in more than one month should be entered in the month concluding the series. Any entry with more than one photo must be entered in category 05 Multiple Photo.  A photo may be entered as often as it is published unless it has previously won in the contest.  However, a photo cannot be entered in more than one contest category for the same month.  To clarify, a photo entered in category 05 Multiple Photo cannot be entered in any other category the same month. If the same photo appears in more than one category for the month, the Clip Chair may disqualify one or both entries. Each entry must be the work of an individual photographer.

POINT SYSTEM
Each photographer entering the contest receives two points per month entered.  First place receives 50 points, second place receives 40 points and third place receives 30 points. No ties or honorable mentions will be awarded. These points are not associated with the annual Better Newspaper Contest.

PHOTOGRAPHER OF THE YEAR
The photographer who accumulates the most points during the contest year will be named Photographer of the Year, provided that the photographer has shown versatility by winning in at least three (3) of the contest categories during the contest year. The Photographer of the Year award will be announced and presented at the annual GPA convention. There can be no tie for Photographer of the Year. The winner will be determined by a tiebreaker.

Tiebreaker rules. Of the tied photographers, the photographer awarded the most first place wins during the contest year will be named Photographer of the Year. If there is a tie in the number of first places during the contest year then the photographers tied for most first place wins go to a second tiebreaker. The winner of the second tiebreaker is the photographer awarded the most second place wins during the contest year. If there is a tie in number of second place wins in the contest year then the photographer with the most points in January of the contest year is the winner. If there is a tie in points for January of the contest year the photographer with the most points in February is the winner.  If there is a tie in points for February of the contest year the photographer with the most points in March is the winner and so on until a winner is determined.

CONTEST AGREEMENTS
It is understood that any copyright of any entry remains the property of the photographer or employer of the photographer.  However, all participants agree that by entering the contest, they give permission to the GPA to reproduce winning entries, either through hard copy or electronically. All available precautions will be taken to ensure the security of the electronic reproduction.


CONTEST ENTRY INSTRUCTIONS

CHOOSE A CODE
Choose your unique photographer's code. This important code will be a part in naming all your files and will serve as a way to distinguish your entries from the entries of others.  Use a lower case FIVE-letter sequence (example: aeiou). Every photographer must have a unique code.  Do not spell words or names. If you spell a word or name or you choose a code that is being used by another photographer you will be contacted by the GPA Clip Contest Chairman and assigned another code to use. The code you choose or are assigned will be the code that you use every time you enter the GPA monthly clip contest. Do not use aeiou, it is an example.

PREPARE YOUR ENTRIES
Please use Adobe Photoshop 7.0 or later or PhotoMechanic to prepare your images. The image orientation must read in normal viewing position, with top of the image standing upright. Images will not be rotated. It is the entrant's responsibility to ensure proper viewing orientation.

CAPTION YOUR PHOTOS
se Photoshop's "File Info" option (under the File menu) or PhotoMechanic’s IPTC Info to caption the photo using a concise caption. At the end of the caption the caption, add your photographer's code and the date the photo was published. Remove your name any other information in the File Info fields. Failure to do so is grounds for automatic disqualification from the clip chair. Your unique code will be used to identify your work.

For example: Larry Hackney shouts at Bibb County Commissioners during a special called meeting to discuss tax increases for the county. aeiou Date of Publication 01-15-11

Use Photoshop’s File Info option or PhotoMechanic’s IPTC Info to complete your captions. If your photos are already captioned using a captioning plug-in, re-enter the information using one of the two programs listed.

For photo stories, you may include a short story summary as well as a caption in the lead image of the story. You may include a concise caption in each of the other story images, if you choose. Captions for each image in stories are not required.

NAMING YOUR FILES
Name your picture files beginning with the two-digit category number followed by your unique photographer's code, followed by sequential two-digit numbers corresponding to the number of photos you are entering in that category. Add sequential letters to the string for each photo in a picture story entry. End it all with .jpg

SINGLE PICTURE ENTRIES
A single photo entry might have a file name like this: 04aeiou01.jpg (04 is the category number, aeiou is the photographer's code, 01 is your first entry within this category, and .jpg is the mandatory suffix). Other entries within the same category would be 04aeiou02.jpg and 04aeiou03.jpg.  Do not use aeiou, it is an example.

PICTURE STORY ENTRIES
Photos in a picture story entry might look like this: 05aeiou01A.jpg, 05aeiou01B.jpg, 05aeiou01C.jpg (05 is the category number; aeiou is the photographer's code; 01 is your first entry in the category; A, B and C indicate the first three photos in a picture story, and .jpg is the suffix). Picture stories may contain a maximum of 12 images in each story. Entries with more than 12 images can be disqualified by the clip chair. Do not use aeiou, it is an example.

Place the files comprising a single picture story together in a folder. Title the folder with the category file name of the photos it contains. For instance, the images of a multiple photo entry have the file names: 12aeiou01A.jpg, 12aeiou01B.jpg, 12aeiou01C.jpg. The folder they are placed in would be titled 12aeiou01. Again, picture stories may contain a maximum of 12 photographs each.

ORGANIZE YOUR ENTRY
Make an entry folder named the two-digit month and your photographer’s code.

Your entry folder entry might have a name like this: 08aeiou (08 is the two-digit month August, aeiou is the photographer's code). Do not use aeiou, it is an example.

Put all your entries for the month in that folder. This is the folder you will move to the FTP site.

SUBMITING YOUR ENTRY

Upload your entry folder to the FTP site. Please contact Woody Marshall for log-in info.

IMPORTANT
If this is the first time you have entered the GPA Contest electronically please include a text or word document that includes the following information in the entry folder.
Name
Code
Newspaper
Email
Phone

Software notes