In a world where a picture worth more than moment, Photography awards serves a great deal out of it. These awards boosts morale as well as broaden the exposure of photographers.
Awards are like a perfect reward to the hard work. It boosts the morale as well as it validates your creativity and dedication. Now world is very fond of social media and pictures. Any announcement or news depends on the power of good picture or post. Photojournalism surpasses contemporary journalism long time ago. To celebrate this, world offers few prestigious photography awards to the best photographer. Amazing contests held each year. Professional, semi professional, even amateurs photographers from allover the world participates in them. Without any biasness and favoritism, winner’s selected. Jury believes in the quote of Libba Bra strongly. “Reminds us that greatness lies even in the smallest of moments. In the humblest of hearts, and we shall, each of us, called to greatness. Whether we shall rise to meet it or let it slip away the challenge put before us all.” ― Libba Bra
To honor photographers, world celebrate World’s Photographer Day on August 10. Hundreds of awards given in this regard. Few are for portraits, few are women awards, etc. Moreover there are 4 prominent photography awards. Awards listed and discussed below.
The IPA
International Photography Awards (IPA) the top tiered award for photographers. It held in June every year. May 31st is the deadline of the contest. Winner gets the cash prize of whopping $33,000. Professional as well as beginners can participate in it. There are various categories where one can take part in. For example people, nature, advertising, special, sports etc. Photographers can take part in more than one category, but they have to pay separately for each one.
Aside from the big awards, IPA also gave out titles like
- Fine Art Photographer of the Year,
- Advertising Photographer of the Year,
- People Photographer of the Year,
- Editorial Photographer of the Year,
- Architectural Photographer of the Year,
- and Photography Book of the Year, among others.
Sony World Photography Awards
Another big awards is Sony world award. Its contest held from June to January. Professional, semi professional and students can take part in this contest. It also has many categories like travel, landscape, sports, culture, documentary, etc. It has skill level competition where one can judge his creative level and take part in. Each skill set has 10 categories. One has to pay for each category he is taking part in. Entry fee is 10 dollars per category. It also has a Youth category where kids from age 12 to 19 take part in and gets acknowledgement.
Renown people in the industry judges the entries. After the contest, best one gets proper exposure and exhibition in the photography world.
Monovisions Photography Awards
Furthermore another one of the biggest award is Monovision award. This contest held in August to November. This is unique because the only condition is picture should be black and white. Undertones like sepia, gold or selenium are also acceptable. Any photographer from the world can take part in this contest. 12 Categories are People, Landscapes, Abstract, Photojournalism, People, Fine Art, Architecture, Conceptual, Travel, Nature & Wildlife, Street Photography, Portrait, and Nude.
There are two categories in this contest, best photo and best photo series. Cash prize is $5000. Best photo gets $2000 while best photo series get the prize of $3000.
The National Geographic Photo Contest
Last but not the least is National Geographic photo Contest. This competition held from September to October. There is no entry fee in this contest. Any professional or non professional photographer can take part in. Basic categories are people, nature and culture, whereas other categories are also welcome here. This is one of the popular award among photographers. Winners specially featured on their official Instagram account and annual magazines.
While there are other awards category, kind, gender etc wise. But discussed above are the most famous and reckoned awards in the world. if you wants to try your luck in any of these, just follow the procedure and you never know, maybe world is kind on you.