Judges' Comments

'Chiloe Stories' took first place in the unaffiliated Best Multimedia Package category for its ambitious and exhaustive look at this region in a compelling mix of audio, video and still imagery. Some judges felt there was a steep learning curve on the navigation, but the top nav was applauded for its originality, even if it wasn’t 100 percent successful. A site map of some sort would have been useful, or, short of that, allowing the story credits page to morph into a site overview by making each image link to its respective section. The stories were all interesting and illuminating, but could have benefited from editing and more attention to pacing. The audio was well done, but one judge would have liked to have heard the native language kept in the sound mix to remind the user that the voice they were hearing belonged to a translator. The biggest drawback to this site, however, was the extremely slow loading of the pages.

Second place went to 'Lebanon, Kentucky' by Mountain Workshops for its beautifully photo-friendly design and simple approach to storytelling. Judges enjoyed the images best and thought the stories were interesting but we ultimately were left wanting more.

The 'Saved from the Streets' movie by The Photography Channel took third place. While most judges took issue with the relentless image pans, we felt the strong photos, coupled with the additional audio interviews, produced an excellent multimedia story. Other pieces gained more points due to their original content. Although this piece originated as a Washington Post story, we felt the additional material made it a successful repackaging. Some more thought could have been given to page design and interactivity.

Maria