Cameraphone Photographer of the Year

The cameraphone has transformed photography and photojournalism. Now The Times is looking for the David Baileys and Henri Cartier-Bressons of the digital age with its Cameraphone Photographer of the Year award.

The winner’s picture will be displayed in The Times and a leading London gallery, where it will appear along with those of the other finalists. The best snapper will also go on an all-expenses-paid trip to capture their own news shots, and will advance to represent Britain in Sony Ericsson’s international Cameraphone Photographer of the Year.

Last year Lena Lachmann-Morck took the honours with a news picture of a fire engulfing the Royal Academy – only the second picture she had taken with her phone. Watching the scene unfold from her office across the road from the scene, she captured fire-fighters tackling the blaze so that she could text a colleague in Edinburgh.

Ms Lachmann-Morck’s picture, taken with her “old Nokia”, appeared in The Times the next day. The Times actively encourages readers to submit cameraphone photographs.

Paul Sanders, the picture editor of The Timesand a member of the competition’s judging panel, said that the cameraphone came into its own with breaking news.

“Last year, the winning image had real drama – it is the content and not the quality that makes mobile phone images from major events such a valuable resource for modern news gathering. The eyewitness perspective delivered in a single image – often shaky or out of focus – captures the essence of the moment for news coverage.”

Analysts predict that, by 2010, 77 per cent of mobile phones will come with a built-in camera.

The cameraphone as a news recording device came to the fore with the London Tube bombings in July 2005 and the grainy images that people took of fellow passengers making their way through darkened tunnels.

The Times received about 150 pictures captured with mobile phones when the Buncefield oil depot exploded in 2005 and newspapers recently paid in the region of £2,000 to run images taken by a 17-year-old of the failed car bomb attack in London’s Haymarket in June.

Cameraphone competition

The Times has teamed up with Sony Ericsson for The Search, a competition to find the world’s best pictures taken on a mobile phone. Photos in the category of News and Sport will be accepted this week.

For full competition details, and information on prizes and how to submit your entries, see www.sonyericsson.com/thesearch

Send entries by MMS to 07834 885 058, with your name, age and a daytime telephone number. Please include the word "TIMESSEARCH1” at the beginning of the caption, and a brief description of your shot. Entries must be received by midnight on 24th Sept 2007.)

Cameraphone Photographer of the Year

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