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2017 will be the third year The Micropalaeontological Society runs their Microfossil Image Competition. The outstanding success of the last two years is reflected by the creation of our 2015, 2016 and 2017 Micropalaeontology Calendars. Each year, the calendars have required two print runs and have sold out! A summary of the winning images can be found here (2014, 2015 2016), whilst a Flickr archive of all submitted images can be found here. Read more

View all image entries in our Flickr album.

The Micropalaeontological Society is delighted to announce the winner of this year’s Micropalaeontology Image Competition!

Maxence Delaine, Lille 1 University, France won the competition with this beautiful image of two testate amoebae:  Difflugia pyriformis (L), Difflugia viscidula (R). These testate amoebae on display typically have a length of between 150-300 µm and are built by the organism using recycled mineral grains. The specimens were sampled in a small river of Brittany (Rau de l’étang du Loc’h, Peumerit-Quintin, France). The winning image is a composition of 2 pictures obtained with the SEM of the Laboratoire d’Océanologie et de Géosciences (UMR 8187) at Lille 1 University. The 2 pictures were subsequently combined into a single one, which was then processed in order to obtain this final colour enhanced SEM picture. Read more

All of the fantastic entries into the Microfossil Image Competition & Calendar 2016 can be viewed here, and are also available on Flickr.

Read more

View all image entries in our Flickr album.

This is the second year the TMSoc has run our micropalaeontology image competition and once again we received an excellent set of entries. Thank you everyone who took part! After much deliberation, we are delighted to announce that the overall winner is Claudio Stalder of the University of Fribourg, Switzerland, who submitted this amazing SEM image of Thyrsocyrtis sp., an Eocene radiolaria from the Equatorial Atlantic Ocean (Barbados). The radiolaria is approximately 0.07mm in diameter. We would like to congratulate Claudio on capturing such a beautiful image and sharing it with us. Claudio will receive the TMSoc Image Competition prize of $200 in recognition of his success.

As well as Claudio’s winning microfossil image, an additional 11 images have been chosen by the competition committee, each of which was deemed an excellent image and worthy of commendation. This therefore provides us with the 12 images required for the 2016 calendar! Like last year, the calendar has been produced in spiral-bound A4 format with one page per month.

A full list of the winners can be found below:

· Stefano Barone, Italy

· Cintia Yamashita, Oceanographic Institute, University of São Paulo, Brazil

· Luka Šupraha, Department of earth Sciences, Uppsala University, Sweden

· Samuel Martin, Department of Geological Science, East Carolina University, USA

· Silvia Spezziferri, University of Fribourg, Switzerland

· Ulrike Hoff, UiT, the Arctic University of Norway, Tromsø

· Laura Cotton, Naturalis Biodiversity Center, Leiden, The Netherlands

· Claudio Stalder, Department of earth Sciences, University of Fribourg *Overall Winner*

· Simon D’haenens, Yale University, USA

· Valentina Hajek-Tadesse & Marija Horvat, Croatian Geological survey, Zagreb, Croatia

· Robin Dyer, Geostrat Consultants Ltd, UK

· Mariane Valerian Gonzalez, Oceanographic Institute, University of São Paulo, Brazil

Calendar Preview

In 2014 The Micropalaeontological Society launched their first Microfossil Image Competition. Its outstanding success was reflected by the submission of over 120 images and the creation of a 2015 Micropalaeontology Calendar. The calendar had two print runs and sold out both times. A summary of the winning images can be found here, whilst a Flickr archive of all submitted images can be found here.

We would like to build on the success of our first year and The Micropalaeontological Society is therefore pleased to announce the start of the 2015 Image Competition. All TMS members are invited to submit images of microfossils. Non-members are also encouraged to take part. An overall winning image will be selected and eleven joint runner-up images will be chosen for use in a TMS calendar for 2016.

We will be accepting images until 30st September 2015. This will provide the competition panel sufficient time to select the best 12 images for the calendar, get the calendar designed and subsequently printed in time for distribution towards the end of the year. Image submissions should be of micropalaeontology-related material. The subject can be an individual specimen or an assemblage. and it can be a fossil or a living organism from a microfossil producing group. The type of image is also entirely open, and can include microscope photographs (reflected light, compound), SEM images or other innovative visual techniques, or more traditional artwork.

Twelve winning images will be selected for the calendar, with one image being chosen as the overall winner of the 2015 Image Competition. The winner will receive €200. All twelve winners will of course receive free copies of the calendar in addition to a certificate!
The society will print a fixed number of these calendars in the first instance, with additional print runs possible depending on demand. The society will charge a small fee for the purchase of a calendar – the price is to be confirmed but will be kept low, enough to cover printing and postage costs rather than to make a profit, and will likely be around £10.

Images should be submitted as high resolution JPEG or TIFF files (less than 20mb) and should be accompanied by your name, basic technical details and a short caption. If you have any problems please contact us.