Longhand Awards announces third edition

This year the show has roped in clients including National Geographic, Concern India and Zee Media.

Toppling the notion 'Brevity is the soul of wit' and reviving the dying art of long-yet-involving copy writing, Longhand has launched its third edition. The award show recognises, promotes and awards the best in the art. Started in 2012 by Grey's creative director Bodhisatwa Dasgupta, the award this year has gone a step ahead and roped in clients who will actually use the winning copies.

The entrants will have to write according to a real brief. The winning ads on each brief (gold and silver) will be published by the client in a leading daily. The clients this year include National Geographic - Facebook Page, Concern India - Elderly Care and Zee Media - Everyday Heroes.

Speaking on his experience so far, Dasgupta says, "In the first edition we received 500 odd entries. The following year it dropped to 430 but the quality improved substantially. The participants had a better understanding of the awards. I would like to dub Longhand 3.0 as the best year so far as we managed to get three clients this year. This addition will propagate Longhand and also what long copy can do for the brands."

The competition will go on till May 31. Participants can submit their entries on http://Longhandawards.com/. The entries have to adhere to very specific briefs, details of which are available on the website. There's no regulation that requires the work entered to be unpublished. After the competition, all entries will be uploaded on the site.

Dasgupta informs that in the last two editions, Longhand witnessed an extremely interesting mix of entries dominated by 'Young Blood'. "The entries cut across students, freelancers and junior copy writers at the agencies," he says, adding that some of them were quite outstanding.

"Usually at the agencies there is hierarchy when entries are chosen for awards and for young copy writers or freelancers it is difficult to pay exorbitant amount of entry fee to showcase their work at popular awards. Longhand is a platform for such talent," he reasons.

The award has also received entries from writers in their 40s and 50s, making the participants' list an interesting mix. The winning entries will be paid by the clients and as mentioned their work will be published in a leading daily.

This year's eight-member jury includes heavyweights from both national and international advertising circuits, including Mohammed Khan (jury president), Chris dRozario (jury president), Rory Sutherland (of Ogilvy UK), Prathap Suthan (of Bang in the Middle), Alok Nanda (of Alok Nanda & Company), Deepak Joshi (of The Thinking Machine), Josy Paul (of BBDO) and Neil French.