After the competition, here's how the cover of Social Photography looks

In November last year we ran a competition, together with the Ilex Press, to find a photo to add to the front cover mosaic of my forthcoming book, Social Photography. So many fantastic entries were submitted to the pool that we found ourselves selecting two winners, who were announced in December. After a little rearrangement by Kate the Designer, there's now a gorgeous final version of the cover!

In case you're wondering, Elisa's photo is in the top left corner, the very first image on the cover; Ben's is the third image down in the fifth column across. It's definitely worth checking out their Flickr streams, too!

And the winner of the Social Photography cover competition is...

Actually, that should read 'And the winners are...' We received over 200 submissions to the competition to see one of your photos feature on the front cover of my next book published by the Ilex Press. There were landscapes, portraits, and macros, wildlife, architectural, and street photography shots. Some were in colour, some were in black and white; some people had chosen to apply filters, some hadn't. We were delighted by the number of entries and seriously impressed by their quality. Choosing one winner became such a difficult task that we decided that perhaps two would be a better option. It cut down on the nail-biting and shouty emails. I am very pleased and proud to announce, then, that the two images which will feature on the front cover of Social Photography will be:

by Ben Denison

and

by Elisa Alonso Aller

We chose Ben's photo for its instantly recognisable scene fused with gorgeous colours and great composition. We liked Elisa's for its bold colours and great story. Congratulations, both. We'll be in touch soon to organise the tiresome admin of licences and the rather more exciting receipt of prizes.

Everyone who entered made it a tough job to select a winner; thank you. It really wasn't an easy selection process: you gave us so much to consider. And now Designer Kate has to re-jig the cover design... again!

Team Photocritic, live and in conversation

On Wednesday 15 May at 16:00 BST, Team Photocritic (otherwise known as Haje and Daniela) will be coming to you live and direct across the Intergoogles from the HQ of the Ilex Press, which publishes some of our books. Video cameras, live transmission, and two excitable writer-photographers. What can possibly go wrong?

We're going to be in conversation, discussing our newest books and our current projects. If there's time and we don't get too carried away, we'll squeeze in a Q&A session. Do line up any questions that you might want to put to us.

Ilex is hosting the event on its Ilex Live site. Tune in for 16:00 if you're in the UK, and if you're not in the UK, here's a nifty timezone converter.

As an added bonus, Ilex will be offering a super-special discount on the e-versions of some of our books. If you head over to the webstore, you'll see what's on offer. The details covering how to claim your discount will be revealed during the broadcast!

See you tomorrow!