GTC Awards - 2023

The GTC Dick Hibberd Award (formerly the TiCA) is awarded to an individual who, in the opinion of the Council, has furthered the cause of the GTC by fostering and improving the art and craft of television camera professionals over many years. Each nominator must explain in writing the reason for their nomination.

The Innovation Award is awarded to a piece of equipment that has made an outstanding contribution to the art and craft of the television camera professionals. It should have been in use for a minimum period of one year before the date of the nomination.

Fellowship of the GTC, which includes free lifetime membership of the GTC, is granted to a GTC member who, in the opinion of the majority of the GTC Council, has 'served the GTC in an exceptional and exemplary manner'.

Honorary membership of the GTC, which includes free lifetime membership of the GTC, is granted to a non-member who, in the opinion of the majority of the GTC Council, has made a 'significant contribution to television camerawork or assisted the GTC to function'.

Council has made the decision to pause the GTC Awards for Excellence, and as a result, we are not asking for nominations for 2023.

The awards have been running for many years, so Council members believe that they need to explain the reason for this decision.

Organising the awards is a major operation. It includes: calling for nominations, contacting and informing nominees, requesting programme clips from production companies, editing clips for judging, appointing judges, running judging and collecting results. When judging is finished nominees are informed of the results, the trophies are commissioned and purchased, the clips re- edited for the awards ceremony and the logistics of organising nominees to attend or to receive their award before the event for acceptance videos. These tasks are spread over the year, but are all done by just a few council volunteers.

However, this would all be worthwhile and would be seen as a great success if we could see large engagement from our membership, but sadly this has not been the case over the last few years.

Despite canvassing for nominations through all our channels, very few are received, and this years nominations were mostly from Council members. During Covid the 2 awards ceremonies were on- line and despite the effort in producing them, streaming them “live” and being available after the event, the number of views was incredibly disappointing for all those involved - last year less than 3% of the membership.

It’s difficult to find any one reason why there is this lack of enthusiasm for the GTC Awards, perhaps over the years since their inception the plethora of other awards have made ours more difficult to stand out. In the past, if a non member has won an award, they are given one years free membership - few renew and carry on as members.

After long discussions, these are some of the reasons we have decided not to have the awards for 2023 The decision can always be revoked, if there is enthusiasm from the membership for them to carry on in the future.

Your comments would be welcome: awards@gtc.tv

Peter Rance

2022 Awards Organiser