The judging, conducted on Monday, March 26, at IPMA headquarters in Kearney, MO, lasted over nine hours. The panel of five judges included IPMA Awards Chairperson Chris Anderson, Deseret Mutual Benefit Administrators in Salt Lake City; Larry Clements, Redlands Community College in El Reno, Oklahoma; Matt Doughty, the University of Kansas Medical Center in Kansas City; Lori Fuller, the University of Nebraska Medical Center in Omaha; and Mark McCarty, Missouri State University in Springfield. IPMA Administrator Carma Goin and In-Plant Graphics Editor Bob Neubauer helped to oversee the event.
Chris Anderson, who has served as a judge for the past five years, was particularly impressed by this year's entries. "Every year the competition gets tighter especially in the digital category. So many of the entries were certainly deserving of recognition and could all have been award winners. The quality of equipment is making judging far more difficult. In the past we could pretty easily identify the equipment by simply looking at the piece, but this year we frequently needed to refer back to the entry forms to clarify the machines used."
He offers this advice to future entrants. "I can't emphasize enough the important role that bindery and folding can play in determining a winning piece. Be sure to double check those areas before submitting your entries." He also emphasizes, "Work closely with your designers. Poor quality or low resolution photos can also end up being the deciding factor. Although it's not really a printing issue, when the quality of several pieces is equally good, photo quality can make the final difference."
Lori Fuller, who served as a judge this year for the first time, gained several valuable insights from the process. "Among the five of us, we really looked at the overall piece and whether or not it retained its excellence throughout. Some of the key items that I noticed were: ink coverage and how well the registration remained along with color densities and consistencies; how well the bindery completed the piece; folds, scores, trims and binding processes. We would see breath-taking pieces where everything was perfect except for the bindery and it would be knocked out of the competition."
Lori goes on to say, "Even though design was not being judged, it does play a part. Good design is more than how the copy looks on paper. A good designer will take the whole piece into consideration, particularly when critical folding or trimming is involved. Being creative when using special processes can make or break a piece.
We would see vibrant pieces that flowed well, but there would be a low-res photo or graphic and it would distract from the whole piece.
Hickeys, blemishes, visible registration marks instantly disqualified many entries."
"If I were to give a tip to future entrants, I would say, look at all 5 of your copies before you send them AND have several others look too! There were several times that we saw a flaw in a piece and rather than toss it out on first look, we would pull all 4 pieces and compare them before we would make the decision. So it pays to submit only your very best." She adds, "My overall experience was amazing! I loved seeing what other in-plants are doing, what type of trends are emerging and the wonderful quality that was demonstrated."
Chris summarizes, "Win or lose -- all of the entrants should be very proud of the work they produced this year. This was definitely the most difficult year for judging because of the large volume of high-caliber entries."
