More awards: SNPA says yes to two Birmingham News photos

A photographer at The Birmingham News in Alabama won two photography awards from the Southern Newspapers Publishers  Association. Click on the thumbnails and you'll see why.

Bernard Troncale, a staff photographer for the Birmingham News,which  is part of the Advance Publications group, won second place in sports and honorable mention in the spot news category.  The new web features on al.com make it easy to see many of Troncale's photos. He also has his own web site

Bernard Troncale's second-place photo shows Fred Funk reacting to a missed putt in the first round of the Regions Charity Classic in Birmingham. Judges said:

“The strong horizontal lines of the golfer’s unusual gesture lead the viewer’s eye through the composition of this image, while the hint of a grimacing expression adds an element of emotion. It¹s the golfer’s body language that makes this image rise above sometimes passive golf photos, while the photographer added a feeling of anticipation to the image by placing the teetering ball near the edge of the frame.   The clean background and horizontal crop of this photograph also helps in leading the eye to the golfer’s partially shadowed face.”

The spot news photo    is part of package on Slain soldier Army Spc. Charles D. Dusty Parrish coming home.

Judges said: “This image is both sad and endearing. The pain of the soldier’s death is obvious in the emotional gestures of the adults, but the young son’s attempting to be stoic while he salutes is perhaps more powerful. While the photographer was covering a scene that is somewhat commonplace in recent years, the emotional layers of this image tell not just of a soldier’s death, but also of the legacy left behind.

Mac Thrower, editorial writer with the Mobile Press-Register was awarded first prize for eidtorials on a grocery tax in SNPA's 2009 Carmage Walls Commentary Prize competition at the SNPA News Industry Summit in Naples, Fla.

Judges said:

"Thrower's analysis of the need for reform of Alabama's antiquated tax system was exhaustive and convincing.  His excellent writing made compelling a subject that in less skilled hands could have been dry and lifeless.  The Press-Register, through its editorial page, provided excellent leadership on an issue that is critical to all who live in Alabama."

Read the entry  to see why the series of editorials seeks reform. For instance:

Poor families in Alabama are a little better off than they were two years ago, when the Legislature and Gov. Bob Riley agreed on raising the income tax threshold for a family of four from an obscenely low $4,600 a year to the slightly less repugnant level of $12,600. But, according to a new study, Alabama still levies the nation's highest income taxes on poor families.

I like that the contest links to the originals and/or entries.

I wrote earlier about some printing awards for four newspapers in the private Advance Publications group. I've written about the Birminham News and the Press Register.