This year's winner in the freelance/ agency category is Tomas van Houtryve of Panos Pictures. His selection of 54 photos can be seen on the POYi website here. They include images from China, Moldova and Cuba, as well as an interesting take on Obama's inauguration seen from the point of view of expats and French supporters at Paris' town hall.

Van Houtryve surpasses, in his category, Paula Bronstein of Getty Images and Marcus Bleasdale of VII Photo, respectively second and third.

In the Photographer of the Year Newspaper category, the winners are Paul Hansen of the Dagens Nyheter, Mads Nissen of Berlingske, and the Denver Post's Craig F. Walker.

However, three particular awards have caught my attention. The first one is the Documentary Project of the Year, which went to Reuters' Times of Crisis, which chronicles the consequences, over one year, of the worldwide economic crisis. The essay, developed in association with MediaStorm, is the second high-profile multimedia creation from Reuters to win major awards. In 2008, it presented Bearing Witness - a look at five years of the Iraq War. It went on to win the inaugural New York Photo Festival awards.

The second is the Judges' Special Recognition in the One Week's Work category, which went to Finbarr O'Reilly. It's not the first time this Reuters photographer caught my attention - I remember the haunting image of a lone US soldier walking through the fog in Afghanistan. This time, O'Reilly is commended for his work in Congo.

A gold miner inspects a rock while digging a pit at the Chudja mine in the Kilomoto concession near the village of Kobu, Congo. 23 February 2009 © Finbarr O’Reilly / Reuters.

Finally, I was pleasantly surprised to see Ed Ou receive the Judges' Special Recognition in the Global VIsion category for his work at Getty Images Under a Nuclear Cloud. A year ago, Ou was barely known to anyone, but ever since winning a student grant of $5000 from Getty Images' Grants for Editorial, he's been a rising star. No doubt, we will see more of him in the next couple of years. Under a Nuuclear Cloud relates the lives of people living in Semey, Kazakhstan, where the former Soviet Union detonated more than 400 nuclear weapons.

For more on the POYi awards, check the official website at www.poyi.org.

VII Photo member Ron Haviv was in Haiti less than 24 hours after the earthquake devastated Port au Prince. His work is now part of an exhibition held at VII Dumbo, the Brooklyn-based VII gallery in New York. BJP talks to the photographer about his work.

BJP: How did you get to Haiti? Were you on assignment or did you choose to go yourself?
Ron Haviv: I flew on the first morning flight to Santo Domingo. On the flight I met up with several other photographers and we chartered a flight to Port Au Prince.
The night of the earthquake I as well as VII contacted numerous editors but no one was interested in sending me at the time.

BJP: What did you see when you got there? What was the extend of the devastation?
Ron Haviv: Upon arrival at the airport there was some damage and once outside the terminal I encountered a normal Haitian experience of people with cars waiting for passengers. As we drove towards the city we started to see destruction and bodies on the streets.

BJP: How did you go about reporting from Haiti? What were your resources? What were your editorial choices?
Ron Haviv: I, as normal, worked with another photographer, hired a driver and eventually an interpreter. We stayed at a hotel that had some damage but had periodic power and even wifi in the first week. Water was the only difficulty but we were able to take water from the pool for basic showers etc. The story was pretty obvious and it was all around us. The impact on the people was found in multiple ways. I spent time going from medical facilities, makeshift morgues, people living on the streets to looting and rescues.

BJP: Were you able to help?
Ron Haviv: On several occasions my colleagues and I were made aware of people that were trapped. At the collapsed MSF hospital they were having trouble finding a rescue team. With an MSF staffer we were able to convince a multinational rescue team to come and extract a man that had been trapped for four days. At another location a frantic mother flagged us down and we found a rescue team from New York who came and searched the home unfortunately to no avail.

BJP: Your work is now part of the Haiti: 12 January exhibition. What is the thinking behind this show and its fundraiser?
Ron Haviv: In conjunction with the worldwide effort to keep Haiti alive in the thoughts of the world and to raise funds, people from Tufts University near Boston decided to fund a book with all proceeds going to Partners in Health. The exhibit is an expanded version of the book and is accompanied by a multi-media production that was produced by telegraph21.com.

BJP: There is also an unusual book produced for the exhibition. What can we find in there?
Ron Haviv: The idea is that this book can be used by schools and others who want to have their own exhibitions to raise funds for Haiti. The book is 16 20x30 inch posters with images from myself and words from Simon Winchester.

BJP: You seem to be working across different media more often these days, developing one idea or one subject across print, event, video, etc. Do you see it as a requirement in today’s world to make a larger impact or to get the story out to as many people as possible?
Ron Haviv: In today's world of fragmented media it is imperative that we as photographers multi-platform our projects in order to reach as many people as possible. It simply is not enough for our work to appear in just a magazine, a book or a website alone. Each way of communicating can reach a different audience. This enables the photographer to get the message across in many ways.

Haiti: January 12 runs until 26 March at VII Dumbo, 28 Jay Street, Brooklyn NY 11201, USA. For more information, visit viiphoto.com.

Homage from Edmond Terakopian on Vimeo.

BJP: Why choose the Olympus E-P2 camera?
Terakopian: When I initially tested the E-P1 for BJP, I shot a few very quick test video clips and was impressed by the quality of the visuals. However without a microphone input, I didn't give it much attention. During my test of the E-P2 for the magazine, I was delighted to find an optional accessory (Olympus SEMA-1), which allows a microphone to be attached to the E-P2. This definitely had me interested in wanting to experiment shooting a film with it.

BJP: What were your first impressions of the camera in terms of its video capabilities?
Terakopian: The video is absolutely brilliant. Whilst it's not a Canon 5D Mark II or 1D Mark IV, it really is amazingly good. Although sound is automatic, you have full manual exposure control over the visuals. For my short film Homage, I shot mostly at above ISO1000 and the quality is rather good at 720p HD. Noise and colour were extremely well handled. What is a massive boost for this camera is the ability to be able to add various lenses to it. Although I shot the entire film using the Olympus 14-42mm kit lens and OM 50mm f1.4 and OM 85mm f2 lenses using an adapter, it opens up the possibility of using Leica M lenses and a whole assortment of weird and wonderful C-Mount lenses (with rather severe circular vignetting!).

BJP: How do you go about making such a film?
Terakopian: It's very important to have an idea and then a fuller script when making a project. My initial idea was relatively close to the finished product. The scripting aspect tightened things up. It's also good to have a script as the talent can get a copy ahead of time to get accustomed to what the idea is. Lastly, I'll say that it's also important to be free thinking and take things in from the location, talent and assistants. For example as it was snowing heavily on the day of the shoot, my whole opening sequence had to be scrapped. My assistant Antje came up with a great opening scene idea, which I ended up incorporating.

BJP: What accessories did you use?
Terakopian: One of the good things about the E-P2 is its size. As it's small and lightweight, photographic tripods work well in keeping things steady (as long as one doesn't need to pan). I used two Manfrotto carbon fibre tripods to keep the two E-P2s steady. I also used a Hoodman focusing loupe designed for DSLRs to aid with manual focusing. Lastly, audio was taken care of using the excellent Rode VideoMic, which I mounted on a side flash bracket.

For editing, I imported all the video files into Aperture 3. This allowed me to flick through all the clips and make my initial edit. I then made notes of good scenes within each clip, which I wrote in their respective metadata fields. After I had my rough cut done in my head, all the files were exported into a folder. These were then converted to Apple ProRes 422 using Compressor (to aid editing without having to constantly render). The film was then edited in Final Cut Pro and some of the sound was edited in Soundtrack Pro. However my initial plan to edit over two days expanded into almost five as there was a very complex multicam scene, which is extremely important to the story. Although I had to filter all the audio (very simple five minute job) to get rid of the subtle auto gain hiss, I was pleased that the auto gain isn't as aggressive as other systems I've tried.

BJP: What is your opinion of the E-P2 capabilities, especially in light of the other DSLRs you've used to shoot films?
Terakopian: As I mentioned, I wouldn't rate it as highly as my Canon 5D Mark II. However, it's much smaller, lighter and cheaper as is now part of my working kit. Up to ISO1600 and as long as I don't need 1080p HD, I'm more than happy using the E-P2 for 720p HD. Whilst I have my favourite Canon lenses (35mm f1.4L and the 85mm f1.2L II) the ability to be able to use my Leica optics on the E-P2 is a very attractive option. There is a new American company that is about to release a 50mm f0.95mm lens for the Micro 4/3 mount which also adds to the excitement of this system.

BJP: What’s next for you?
Terakopian: I have a script idea for my next film. But, I'm not telling, so watch this space.

Homage premiered on 03 March at the Brick House in London during Olympus' Pen event.

Image © Edmond Terakopian.

Question One: How Do I get an Agent?
Getting an agent is a bit like getting a boyfriend or a girlfriend - obviously without the snogging! You need to put yourself out there and attract a compatible match.

Lisa Pritchard © Laura Pannack, winner of World Press Photo 2009 Portraits Singles.

The question you should really be asking yourself is ‘How do I get an agent that’s right for me?’ Don’t just sign up with any agent that will have you and do ask yourself, ‘Am I ready for an agent’ and even ‘Do I actually need an agent?’.

If you’re happy dealing with your own promotion and shoot logistics, comfortable negotiating fees and client contracts, perhaps you don’t need an agent. If, as well as being a talented photographer, you’re a prolific networker and an organised multitasker then you might consider going it alone. You could just hire a producer, get yourself a personal assistant or set up an agent yourself.

Maybe you’re not ready for an agent and need to build on your portfolio and get a few commissions under your belt. However, if you’re still convinced an agent is for you, then here’s my advice.

Firstly, do your research and draw up a shortlist of appropriate agents. It’s amazing what a bit of googling will throw up. You can tell a lot about an agent from their website. Look for signs that you’ll fit in.

You need to complement their existing roster but be different enough, you need to be relevant to their client base. There’s little point in contacting a fashion agent if you only shoot cars, or an agent with a still lifer who specialises in abstracts of liquids if you specialise in - you’ve guessed it - abstracts of liquids!

Look for an agent at a similar stage in their career. Just starting out? Try and find an agent who’s recently set up. Beginning to get a name for yourself? One of the more established agents with a solid reputation could be the way to go. Are you, in fact, the most famous and busy advertising photographer on the planet and your agent has decided to retire (my number’s on the website!)? You’ll need someone with kudos in equal measures.

Secondly, and before making contact, make sure you’re looking good. I’m not talking going to the gym or buying new clothes (although I guess every little helps!?) but your professional image, your brand. The first thing they’ll check out is your website and it needs to scream ‘snap me up before someone else does!’ If you do manage to set up a meeting, you’ll need to take your portfolio, make sure this doesn’t turn out to be the deal breaker.

Thirdly, make your move, get yourself that date. Email, phone, snail mail (or a combination) are all fine. Be persistent yet polite, charming yet professional. Make them feel special, the only agent you’d ever be interested in. But don’t ever be creepy and stalky! I have one photographer who emails me about once a month and it’s beginning to freak me out- I wouldn’t mind but he’s rubbish!

If you’re doing a round robin, for goodness sake change the name each time, sending me a ‘Dear Carolyn’ email will not have me rushing for the phone.

Highlight why you’re a ‘good catch’ and why you’d be good for them, everyone will be considering what’s in it for them. Shout about your successes but don’t come across as an arrogant egomaniac.

Don’t take it personally and don’t send an angry email if you don’t get a response. Agents are very busy and generally won’t get back to you unless they’re interested. Keep trying if you really think its right.

An alternative method of getting yourself a date … for a face to face meeting… is simply getting yourself on the ‘Agent Radar’ and they might be the one making the move. I’ve taken several photographers on because they just proved too hard to ignore. Picking up a job that one of your chosen agent’s photographers was up for can be a good fast track (if you can’t beat ‘em join ‘em) as is getting press and winning awards. Win a gold at the AOP and watch those agents form not such an orderly queue!

Networking and being introduced at a private view is also a good way to get on the radar, as is a recommendation. Show your book to some advertising and design agencies and get them to suggest some agents. Then you can say ‘Ms Art Buyer’ highly recommended you as one of the best agents in town.’ Flattery will get you everywhere.

And fourthly, when at long last you get to have that ‘chat’, make sure you do some final compatibility checks. Keep a level head and a mental checklist of what you’re looking for. Most crucially, do you like them? Does it feel right? Do they seem to like you and are they interested in your work? If you don’t quite gel when you meet them, chances are it’s not going to happen.

Ask questions about anything that’s important to you. Don’t forget this is like going into business with someone. Who takes the portfolios out? What other promotion do they do? What do they expect from you? Do they do production? Who are their clients? Do they have a contract? Discuss all the expectations from both sides.

Well, I hope this helps, but before I go, a word of caution… a wrong decision could flaw your career. I have heard clients say they might want to use a certain photographer but can’t bear to deal with the agent so they look elsewhere. I’ve also had clients say that they go to their favourite agents by default for a job that perhaps several photographers can do.

Get it wrong and it could end up a short lived, empty affair or worse, you’ll end up wasting your days, muddling along in a dead end, destructive relationship. Get it right and it might be the long term, rewarding partnership you’ve always dreamed of, someone to share the ups and downs with and a place to belong. Good luck in finding your ideal partner!

Tune in on Thursday 11 March for Lisa's second column. In the meantime, send your questions at bjp.news@bjphoto.co.uk. Visit lisapritchard.com.

Send names to diane.smyth@incisivemedia.com

Image © Julian Lass

British Journal of Photography's editor Simon Bainbridge explains the changes:

From next week you will see a big change to BJP. We have completely redesigned the magazine and printed it on premium quality paper, delivering
improved photographic repro and giving more space to images and longer articles.
The biggest difference you’ll see, however, is that we are moving to a new monthly format.

The magazine has gone through many changes since it became a weekly in 1864 (having started out as a monthly in 1854, then going fortnightly), but this is likely the biggest you’ve seen since you’ve been reading us. And while it’s a decision that we didn’t take lightly, we believe it’s for the better.

These days more than 100,000 visitors come to our website (www.bjp-online.com) to find the latest breaking news stories. And given that the web delivers real-time coverage of world events, the imperative for print magazines has shifted.

You will be aware that photography is not the only industry going through major changes at the moment. For newspapers and magazines, the
calamity of the worst recession in 80 years amounts to the perfect storm, arriving on top of doubts about their very survival as their readers turn to free content online.

How to respond? Some are burying their heads, while others are cutting costs, moving to cheaper paper and serving up increasingly smaller chunks of content to readers that supposedly have less and less attention span. That’s a mistake, in my opinion. Why do something in print that you can do equally well online?

The most forward-thinking publishers are using the new environment to implement some long overdue adjustments to how they align their web and printed editions and play to their respective strengths. Simply put, the magazines that don’t adapt, or don’t get it right, will fail.

While we weren’t faced with any immediate crisis of our own, when we looked ahead to the future we felt the weekly format would one day become unsustainable. And once we recognised that possibility and opened ourselves up to change, we began to get excited about what we could deliver if we had a complete rethink.

One thing would remain the same – we will continue to serve professional photographers. But we also recognise that professional photography has undergone massive change, and now more than ever, the creative impetus is key. Whether you are visualising someone else’s brief, shooting a personal assignment for your portfolio, or competing against dozens of other local photographers in the same field, you need to create signature images.

With that in mind, we been thinking about why all the photography magazines on the newsstand seem to look the same. Where was the magazine that reflected the vital part photography plays within the creative economy? Where was the photographic equivalent of Blueprint, Grafik or Creative Review? So what we’ve come up with aspires to similar standards and ambitions, playing to the strengths print and the experience of holding a beautiful magazine in your hands.

While we will continue to report on the business of photography, it’s a creative business, and our new format is designed to reflect that and better satisfy our highly visually literate readership. We’ve invested in high quality paper and repro so we can showcase the best our industry has to offer. And we want readers. As in people who like to read, giving you more breadth of content, and more in-depth interviews, reviews and analysis. All this works better in printed magazines than on the web, and we believe we’ve created a new blueprint for what a magazine for professional photographers should be.

To complement the magazine, we are now working on redesigning our website, making it easier to navigate and adding new features. Unlike our direct competitors, we have a dedicated team of editors, who work solely on BJP. And that means that our website and blog (www.1854.eu) are constantly updated with timely, relevant content, so you will still be able to get the most up-to-date authoritative news and opinion as a daily fix.

According to Brown, the sculptors claim that while they did use the image as inspiration, they were unable to find, online, the original copyright owner. However, Brown says that his image has been widely distributed online, each time with clear copyright information.

BJP contacted the sculptors, and after a couple of back-and-forth, they have agreed to talk. Here is what they had to say:

We believe it is important to understand Spam in regards to the context of the exhibition it was part of. All the work in the exhibition looked at very unprecious, irreverent forms of artistic production. e.g. we deep fat fried and battered a 200 year old bible; we defaced photographs of award winners from a retail magazine and blew them up to life-size corporate portraits; we posted an obituary in a national paper for the death of a cartoon character.

For Spam we wanted to use a ubiquitous web image as our starting point and turn it into an artwork. "Vader kid" is on many blogs and is used by some as myspace profile photos. Contrary to what Alex Brown has said, many of blogs the photograph appears on does not credit him with the photograph (some of the websites have even put their own watermark on the image). We didn't know the photograph had been taken by a professional. But for us the photograph was only the starting point for our work. We were never interested in finding out who had taken the original, that was irrelevant to the working process. The fact the image already had such a large web presence is what made the image important to us. As pointed out by many posts on the blogs, our composition is very different from his. The whole feel of the work is also very different. We believe the problem has occurred because most people are viewing Spam as a photograph (particularly the photograph taken at a similar angle to that of Alex Brown's) and not in its entirety as a sculptural installation.

We contacted Alex immediately after hearing of his concerns and asked if there was anyway we could deal with the situation amicably. We assured him it was never our intention to upset him, nor was it merely to copy what he had already done. However, instead of replying to us, he has selected certain parts of this email and posted blogs slandering us plagiarists. He has also contacted galleries we've worked with also slandering us plagiarists. We do not really believe this is an appropriate first step towards dealing with the situation amicably.

The Environment Agency's biggest mistake, despite the fact it announced its plans on Twitter, was how it managed the issue. Within minutes of BJP publishing its report on the Agency's actions, photographers flooded the Agency with emails, tweets and Facebook messages decrying the move. How did the Agency react? It started deleting Facebook messages and blocked access to the page. Within 24 hours, it was issuing a statement (both to the media and on Twitter) apologising for its overzealous use of the "delete" button on Facebook. Eventually, the Environment Agency scraped the plans for a database.

Now, it's time for the Labour party to learn it the hard way. As first revealed by the Photographer Not a Terrorist campaign, and as Kate Day at The Daily Telegraph writes, the party that has been in power since 1997 has launched a social media experiment using Flickr. 'Change we can see' asks for UK residents to send pictures of places that have changed over the past 13 years. Of course, and in this case this is a side point, the photographers would give an unrestricted license to Labour for use in its campaign.

The point here was that photographers seized on the occasion to pass a message to labour about the main 'change they can see': the rise of stops and searches under Section 44 of the Terrorism Act 2000, which was enacted by this Labour government. "So instead of adding pretty pictures of their local hospital to the Flickr group," writes Day at the Daily Telegraph, "they have uploaded copies of the stop and search forms they were given while trying to take photos in public places."

And of course, Labour has done the one thing you shouldn't be doing in a socially connected media world: it tried to ignore the issue and started deleting images and comments it didn't agree with. The result is simple: a story that could have been dealt swiftly with is now getting a lot more press than expected (the Facebook group for "Change We Can See" is still open for comments, if you feel like having fun).

2009 has seen social media becoming one of the most important online tools for the dissemination of news and comments (whether true or false, positive or negative). 2010 should confirm this trend, and impose social networking websites as people's first source of news through, as Maria Popova puts it, curated serendipity. Isn't about time that politicians, institutions, commercial entities and government agencies learn how to use these sites?

The event was extensively covered by the media. The Guardian wrote that 'Trafalgar Square in central London was lit up by flash bulbs,' while the BBC reminded readers that the powers granted by Section 44 were found to be illegal by the European Court of Human Rights.

Even Agence France Presse dispatched a team to cover the event. It interviewed amateur photographer Lucy Hogan, from Bath, who said: "The support has been incredible. There are so many here today, even photographers from Italy.

Amateur Photographer's news editor Chris Cheesman was also present. He reports that the event was marked by only one incident when 'an officer was seen pursuing the woman as she walked away from the crowd.' Read his report here.

Listen to photojournalist Marc Vallée's reaction to today's huge turnout:

Listen to protesters screaming for their rights:

More photos of the event:

First up was the Squares Management team at the Greater London Authority. It manages both Trafalgar Square and also Parliament Square. After being put on hold, a member of the team told BJP that Greater London Authority was unaware of the 'gathering' as it as 'not an authorised event.'

The Metropolitan Police, on the other hand, while declining to officially comment, did say that it was aware of the event.

Now, some have expressed doubts over the effectiveness of the event, and the fact that it could be counter-productive. Simon Pollock, a music photographer, wrote this morning that he would not be attending the event. "I can’t help thinking that if we were a bit more polite and less stand-offish to start with, that the conversation would last about a minute and then both parties would be on their sweet way," said Pollock.

I understand his point. The last time a high-profile photographer was stopped, in this case Grant Smith, who is co-organising tomorrow's event, commenters on our Facebook page accused the photographer of antagonizing the police. The whole situation, a reader wrote, was "not handled well by ANYONE involved in this sorry tale."

Some photography magazines, such as ePHOTOzine, have argued that fact. In a 07 December 2009 post, ePHOTOzine's editor, Peter Bargh wrote: "I believe we should be free to take pictures in public access places, but I also realise that we have to be very careful regarding terrorism. I don't really have any issues about being stopped and my motives questioned, as long as I'm then allowed to continue once it's clear that I have no hidden agenda."

He added: "We all happily accept the occasional questioning at airport checkouts and I don't see a great deal of difference when photographing potential terrorist targets."

One could say that Bargh has a point. Except that the European Court of Human Rights has found, earlier this month, that the way these stop-and-searches are conducted is illegal, humiliating and embarrassing. In fact, the court went out of its way to say that these stops could not be linked to airport checks: "An air traveller may be seen as consenting to such a search by choosing to travel," the Court said. "He knows that he and his bags are liable to be searched before boarding the aeroplane and has a freedom of choice, since he can leave personal items behind and walk away without being subjected to a search. The search powers under section 44 are qualitatively different. The individual can be stopped anywhere and at any time, without notice and without any choice as to whether or not to submit to a search."

The European Court added that the powers lacked proper safeguards and could easily be abused by police officers. As our reporting, and that of Amateur Photographer - the only other magazine, it seems at times, to deal with this issue - has shown, these powers HAVE been abused in several high-profile cases. And that fact needs to be highlighted!

That's why the British Journal of Photography is supporting tomorrow's 'gathering' of photographers. In the next few weeks, the Home Office will be submitting its appeal to the Grand Chamber of the Court of Human Rights. If that court finds in favour of the Home Office, these "illegal" powers will continue to be used and abused, with some police officers comforted in their belief that the act of taking a photo in a public place is suspicious.

We need to prevent this from happening, and, at the moment, the best course of action is to show that we, photographers, stand united in defending our rights.

The photo event takes place at noon tomorrow, Saturday 23 January. For more information, visit photographernotaterrorist.org.

Only 11 other positions are considered worse than being a photojournalist. They are: Butcher, Mail Carrier, Meter Reader, Construction Worker, Taxi Driver, Garbage Collector, Welder, Dairy Farmer, Ironworker, Lumberjack and Roustabout...