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Award Categories and Rules
Welcome to The Garden Media Guild Awards.
Now in their 17th year, the Awards celebrate the very best of horticultural communications in diverse media. You will find here all the information you need in order to submit one or more pieces of work for consideration by the judging panels.
The closing date for receipt of entries is September 5, 2008 and the winners and shortlisted entries will be announced at the Guild's Awards Lunch at the Royal Lancaster Hotel, London on November 20, 2008, details of which can be found here.
Please be sure to read both the Category Rules and the General Rules below and note that there are new Awards this year for the best news story, local radio broadcast and young gardener intiative of the year.
Entry Forms are available for download (right). These new-style Entry Forms are interactive PDF documents which can be filled out on-screen. To open them, you will need the free Adobe Reader software which, if not already installed, can be downloaded here. Please note that printed entry forms are no longer available.
If you need further information, please contact the Awards coordinator, Valerie McBride-Munro on 020 8892 9243 or 07887 716777 or by e-mail.
Entries for the 2008 Awards are invited in these categories:
BOOKS
For new hardback or paperback books. See the Rules.
A Practical Book of the Year
B Reference Book of the Year
C Inspirational Book of the Year
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PRESS
For the newspaper (D) and magazine (F) with the best gardening content; for the best News Story (E) published in a magazine or newspaper; for the best three articles (G); or selected column, single article or article from a feature or series (H) published in a magazine or newspaper; and for a selected column or article from a feature or series published in a professional horticulture or trade journal (I). See the Rules.
D Newspaper of the Year
E News Story of the Year (New Award)
F Magazine of the Year
G Journalist of the Year
H Practical Journalist of the Year
I Trade Journalist of the Year
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PHOTOGRAPHY
For a portfolio of garden and/or plant photographs published in diverse media (J); for a themed assignment illustrating a book, feature, series or website (K); and for a single photographic print of any gardening subject (L). See the Rules.
J Photographer of the Year
K Features Photographer of the Year
L Single Image of the Year
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BROADCASTS
For national or regional TV and radio gardening broadcasts, whether single programmes or selected programmes from a series or strand. See the Rules.
M Television Broadcast of the Year
N Radio Broadcasts of the Year (New Award)
(a) National Radio
(b) Local Radio
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MULTIMEDIA
For an article or broadcast on an environmental or ‘green’ topic (P); for the best article in any medium by a new writer or journalist in their first year (R); for complete websites, blogs, podcasts, interactive TV programmes, CDs or DVDs (S). See the Rules.
P Environmental Award
R New Writer Award
S Digital Media Award
T Young Gardener Initiative (New Award)
The Young Gardener Initiative Award is to encourage the media to seek out and promote the best sustainable community or education project that develops and nurtures horticultural talent, nationally or locally.
The first part of the Award will go to any person working in the UK media who has identified and promoted the entry. The second part of the Award will go to the individual project nominated.
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LIFETIME ACHIEVEMENT AWARD
This special award is decided by a poll of Guild members. (An online voting form will be posted here shortly.)
General Rules
All submissions except for categoriest L and T must have been first published or broadcast between September 8, 2007 and September 3, 2008 and must be received by September 5, 2008. Late entries cannot be considered and proof of posting will not be accepted as proof of delivery.
All entries must be made using the official Entry Forms (available here) or copies of it; and each nomination must be accompanied by an entry fee (£44 for books, £12 for other categories) to cover administrative costs.
Payment may now be made by credit/debit card (see Entry Forms) or via online banking. If paying by cheque, please make it payable to ‘The Garden Media Guild’. Clearance of your cheque is acknowledgement of receipt. Failure to include an entry fee will invalidate the entry; and if the entry criteria are not met, no refunds will be made.
It is not necessary to be a member of The Garden Media Guild in order to enter or to nominate work for an Award. However, non-member entrants must be UK-based and their entries must be from UK media.
You may nominate your own work or that of someone else. You may make any number of different entries as long as each is accompanied by its own Entry Form and the appropriate entry fee. However, no piece of work may be entered in more than one category, albeit the judges reserve the right to move an entry into a different category if they deem it to be more appropriate. Please liaise with colleagues and associates to avoid duplication of entries. Multiple nominations will not be a factor in the judging.
All nominations will be treated in strict confidence.
Entries will be considered by a panel of Guild members and invited specialists in each category. If a judge has made a contribution to an entry, an alternative judge will be seconded to the panel.
The judges’ and the Guild Committee’s decisions are final and no correspondence will be entered into. There will be one winner in each category unless the judges exercise their right not to make an Award in a category.
Winners will receive a £250 prize cheque from the Guild together with a personalised framed Award certificate and the right to use and display the Guild’s Award seal for a year.
By entering, you grant the Guild the right to display your work, duly credited, at the Awards Lunch and elsewhere.
Entries will not be returned unless specifically requested. To request return of an entry, fill in the Return Postage checkbox on the Entry Form and include a self-addressed label or packet, together with sufficient postage stamps for the return delivery. Please note that entries which are not accompanied by return postage will be disposed of by the Guild.
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Category Rules
BOOK AWARDS
For new hardback or paperback books published during the qualifying period singly or within a series. Revised, updated or republished books are not eligible. Please send three copies of each nominated title, accompanied by an entry fee of £44 per title. Specify category A, B or C – whichever you think is most appropriate – in the box on the Entry Form.
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PRESS AWARDS
Category D is open to any national, regional, local or specialist newsprint newspaper.
Category E is open to any national, regional, local or specialist newsprint newspaper, consumer or trade magazine.
Category F is open to any national, regional, local or specialist magazine.
If entering category D or F, please send three copies of each of three consecutive issues (magazines) or gardening sections (newspapers) with cover dates between October 2007 and September 2008.
If entering category G, please send three copies of each of three different articles not necessarily from the same magazine or newspaper, publishedduring the qualifying period.
For other Press Award categories please send three copies of the published article.
All Press Award category entries should include at least one original version of each magazine, newspaper or tear sheet submitted. If the name of the host media and the publication date are not self-evident, please clearly write this information on the reverse of each copy. Authors’ manuscripts should not be sent.
Specify category D, E, F, G, H or I in the box on the Entry Form. A fee of £12 must accompany each entry.
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PHOTOGRAPHY AWARDS
Entries for categories J and K should be unmounted first generation tear sheets or complete publications. Mark each tear sheet clearly on the reverse with an identity tag in the form J2/18JohnSmith/RoseNews210408 where the first character (Award category) is followed by the image number and the total number of submitted images (image 2 of 18), the photographer’s name, the title of the host publication and the publication date.
If books are submitted, the identity tag should be written on the inside back cover where the relevant page numbers should also be listed.
Category J requires a submission by the photographer of a portfolio of at least 15 and up to 20 garden and/or plant images that demonstrate diverse skills in a variety of media.
Category K requires a submission of at least five images from an assignment that accounts for at least 80% of all the photographic illustrations published in the context.
A fee of £12 must accompany each entry and if entering both categories, two different sets of photographs, with no duplication, must be submitted, together with two £12 entry fees.
Web images may be submitted if they are viewable in context, clearly credited and first published during the qualifying period. Provide their Web address (URL) on the Entry Form.
Category L entries must be photographic prints of at least 10 x 8in and no bigger than 12 x 16in. Photographs must have been taken during the qualifying period and you must include the creation date on your Entry Form. Unpublished work is also eligible to win this category. Photographers may enter up to six images in this category as long as each image is accompanied by a separate Entry Form and £12 entry fee.
Entries in category L must not be duplicates of images entered in any other category.
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BROADCAST AWARDS
These Awards are open to the makers of national or regional television or radio gardening programmes or magazine strands, including features, documentaries, interviews and phone-ins.
The Awards will be made to the programme as an entity and presented to the individual producer, director or presenter whose name appears on the Entry Form.
Please send three non-returnable DVDs (television) or three CDs (radio)containing an entire programme and mark on the case or sleeve the timecode of a continuous sequence of up to 10 minutes' duration which should be required viewing/listening for the judges*. Please ensure that titles and credits, as broadcast, are also included.
Label each disc with the programme/item name, the production company (if relevant), the host TV/radio station, the broadcast date and a contact name and telephone number.
Specify category M, N(a) or N(b) in the box on the Entry Form. A fee of £12 must accompany each entry.
*Brief extracts of the shortlisted entries will be played at the Awards Lunch. Entrants should therefore include their own Apple QuickTime-compatible highlights sequence which must be no longer than two minutes (TV) or 45secs (radio). Digitised video should be 640 pixels wide and H264/MPEG4/AVC-encoded. Radio sequences should be in .WAV or .AIF (or .AIFF) format.
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MULTIMEDIA AWARDS
Entries are invited from journalists, authors or broadcasters on the topic of environmental or ‘green’ issues (category P), and for the best article in any medium by a new writer or journalist in their first year (R).
Category R entries must be the work of someone who had never been published or broadcast prior to September 7, 2007.
Please send three copies (including at least one original) of a printed work or one CD or DVD of a broadcast. For articles published online, please provide the website address (URL) on the Entry Form.
If the name of the host media and the publication date are not self-evident, please supply this information. Authors’ manuscripts should not be sent.
Entries for category S can be complete websites, blogs, podcasts, interactive TV programmes, CDs or DVDs.
Entries for category T should be submitted by the project’s reporting journalist, with three copies of each of the articles written, including at least one original version of each magazine, newspaper or tear sheet submitted, and/or one CD or DVD of a broadcast.
Unlike the majority of categories where the qualifying year runs from September 8, 2007, this special Award will be open to any project started, developed or completed in the period September 2006 to August 2008.
For websites, please supply the web address (URL) or send one copy of the CD or DVD. For interactive TV programmes provision must be made for the judges to view entries impartially.
Specify category P, R, S or T in the box on the Entry Form. A fee of £12 must accompany each entry.
Please note that entry fee cheques should not include other payments, eg for Awards Lunch ticket purchases or return postage. The latter must be sent with your entry as stamps attached to an appropriately self-addressed label or packet.
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