It’s an understatement to say that 2020 has been a challenging year for the world. We’ve experienced tense social dynamics and pivotal events that many of us couldn’t have imagined – much less attempted to cover. But true to the human experience, we all found a way to prevail under a semblance of new normalcy. Our industry was no exception to the downsides of these life-changing occurrences.
But like the millions of others affected, photographers, videographers and visual editors found a way to make it work. You did what you do. You made impactful pictures, powerful videos, and told poignant stories across the board. As work became nearly nonexistent for some of our colleagues and the assignment loads became feather-light for others, you responsibly masked up, hit the streets and made images that brilliantly defined this difficult period in time. To your credit, many of these chronicles were self-generated.
For our 2021 Best of Photojournalism contest, we want to enhance NPPA’s tradition of celebrating the results of your labor, vision and tenacity by recognizing the absolute best of the best. I’m especially honored to be the new chairman for this year’s competition and our division chairpersons are just as committed as I am to help this competitive experience be a fruitful one for you.
We have some returning members to BOP’s executive team, buoyed by two new ones. All of them have a broad range of experience in visual communications across multiple platforms, and their skills and qualifications will be a paramount element to what we want to accomplish this round. We added new categories to our existing lineup and repurposed others that speak specifically to the social issues raised during recent months.
We’re also revising our contest’s online experience to help you navigate our website with greater ease with a new site design and development by Seth Gitner with new logo design by Michael Johnson.
We all want BOP to continue its growth and relevance within the photo community and to be a place where great work shines. As always, your valued participation is key to making that happen.
We enthusiastically look forward to the work that you’ll submit. We’re sure it will be amazing.
Dudley M. Brooks
BOP Contest Chairman