Competitions Can Be Career Makers
For writers, photographers, and filmmakers there is no end to the choice of competitions and festivals to submit your work. Some are monthly, some are annual, some have exhibitions attached, some have prize money.
But recognition from the right competition can be a rocket ship for your career. It’s not about prize money, a free camera, or the competition win itself, but about the fact that your project now has a stamp of approval from a professional body. Someone in the industry has said “yup, this is good.”
For personal self-esteem this is massive, it’ll offer a boost in motivation, the energy needed to push on with a project, and most importantly it means that you have news to send to your email list of editors and producers - “my work was recognized in this competition. Are you ready to publish it now?”
The barriers to entry for competitions are a little lower than pitching full projects to outlets too. Pitching for publication with outlets means you need 20 images, a five minute film, or a 2,000 word article, minimum. For competitions and festivals you need just a selection of the final piece.
Competitions offer a way to test work before you begin hard pitching, a way to check whether you have enough material or need to keep working, and a way to check your own gut reaction to your material - is it good enough? A you comfortable with the message? Are you proud of it? If it’s sub par, you’re not wasting valuable outlet contacts on work that, deep down you know isn’t good enough. It’s also a way to get eyes on your work without waiting for the perfectly edited, painstakingly produced, final piece.
When I began making documentary pieces, I spent a long time with a civilian militia in Dallas. I’d show up on the weekend to photograph their lifestyle - the weapons training, the ammo stockpiling, but also the sensitivities in their inter-group relationships. I was a student at the time, working towards a masters degree in journalism, and threw my images into the College Photographer of the Year competition.
It didn’t win outright, but managed first place in the “international story” category. Later The New Yorker covered the competition and published some of the winning images, including mine. It was fortuitous, and more than anything give me a taste of possibility. It was the validation that I needed to push onwards with my career, and a flag to other outlets that labeled my work as “quality.”
Use the same metrics for choosing competitions and film festivals as you would choosing editors and producers to pitch to - relevance to your work, and competitiveness (the likelihood your work will be seen). Take time to research the notoriety of your chosen competition or festival within the industry. Is it known? Is it well respected? Is it connected to an outlet? Check also previous winners. Where is there work now? Are they publishing in the types of places you aspire to be?
Some competitions will require a small entrance fee, whether they do or not isn’t a measure of legitimacy, but do pay attention to what the competition offers as “prizes.” If it sounds too good to be true, it probably is.
Lastly, up your chances of success by finding as many competitions or film festivals as possible. Again, the same as pitching to editors or producers, the more you reach out to, the greater the chances of a result!