The awards are now open and accepting entries from today until Wednesday 1 September 2021.

Ade Rawcliffe, Group Director of Diversity and Inclusion at ITV has come on board to Chair this year’s Craft & Design Awards, which will announce the winners in November. Welcoming entries from both broadcasters and individual crafts people, the awards celebrate excellence in broadcast television and aim to recognise the huge variety of skills and processes involved in programme making.

Entries are now open across all 29 competitive categories ranging from the Casting Award, now in its second year, to Production Design – Drama and Lighting for Multicamera. There are also two additional awards presented at the discretion of the RTS, the prestigious RTS Special Award and the Lifetime Achievement Award.

Chair of the Awards, Ade Rawcliffe, said: “Despite a challenging 18 months for the industry, we have also seen great innovation, determination and resourcefulness. The country locked down, but many of us kept going, so it is an important year for us to come together to celebrate the incredible crafts people and content the television industry has produced. I am so pleased to be Chairing the awards, and we are keen to receive submissions from the broadest range of talent possible. We want to recognise the depth of world-class practitioners we have here in the UK, and who come from all types of backgrounds.

The juries take into careful consideration production differences, budget and time scale involved and, in line with other RTS awards, the RTS stresses that entrants should show awareness of the need to recognise diversity in the industry and the wider community when submitting their content. All entries must have been first transmitted between 1 September 2020 and 31 August 2021, and the deadline for submissions is 1 September 2021.

For more information and conditions of entry click here.

Please see below the full list of categories:

Casting Award

Nominations accepted from any genre of scripted programming.

For this award, we are looking for excellence in assembling an entire cast, so we would ask entries to provide the following information:

A full cast list 
A supporting statement that outlines what the original casting brief was and how that is interpreted in the final work including any specific challenges. Additional information such as how the tone, style and methodology of the director was accommodated and how the casting director collaborated with the producer will enhance the submission.  The team's approach to new talent and diversity is also important to the submission, please provide evidence of the impact of the casting, such as reviews and press pick up.  The supporting statement should also provide clarity on any roles that were cast before the casting director was appointed.

Design 

Nominations and Awards will be made in the following three categories.  These can be for graphics, animation, live action etc:

Trails & Packaging – Entries are welcome from any programme area
Programme Content Sequences - Entries are welcome from any programme area
Titles - Entries are welcome from any programme area

Make Up Design (incorporating all areas of make up including hair styling and wigs)

Nominations and Awards will be made in two categories:

Drama - including Single Drama, Drama Series, Drama Serial, Drama for Children’s and Educational programmes, Comedy Drama, Dramatic Reconstruction and Drama Documentaries
Entertainment & Non-Drama Productions - including Arts & Music, Documentary/Factual programmes and Situation Comedy

Costume Design

Nominations and Awards will be made in two categories:

Drama - including Single Drama, Drama Series, Drama Serial, Drama for Children’s and Educational programmes, Comedy Drama, Dramatic Reconstruction and Drama Documentaries
Entertainment & Non-Drama Productions - including Arts & Music, Documentary/Factual programmes and Situation Comedy

Production Design

Nominations and Awards will be made in two categories:

Drama - including Single Drama, Drama Series, Drama Serial, Drama for Children’s and Educational programmes, Comedy Drama, Dramatic Reconstruction and Drama Documentaries
Entertainment & Non-Drama Productions - including Arts & Music, Situation Comedy, Factual programmes, News and Current Affairs, Sports and Events

Effects

Nominations and Awards will be made in two categories from any area of programme making.

Effects (this includes electronically or graphically created effects as well as physical production mechanisms eg. pyrotechnics, explosions, stunts, animatronics etc
Picture Enhancement (Nominations and Awards will be made in this category for manipulation and improvement.  It is aimed at those who take the original material and enhance and improve it, thereby making a substantial contribution to the ‘feel’ of the piece.  The category covers electronic or film images and is aimed at colourists/graders, matte work/glass shots, blue screen/chromakey etc.  Entries may come from any genre of programme making.

Director

Nominations and Awards will be made in four categories:

Comedy Drama/Situation Comedy
Drama
Documentary/Factual & Non Drama Productions
Multicamera (all multicamera work, except sport is eligible) including Arts & Music, Situation Comedy, Factual programmes, News and Current Affairs, Entertainment and Events.

Photography

Nominations and Awards will be made in two categories:

Drama & Comedy - including Single Drama, Drama Series, Drama Serial, Drama for Children’s and Educational programmes, Comedy Drama, Dramatic Reconstruction and Drama Documentaries
Documentary/Factual & Non-Drama Productions - including Arts & Music and Factual  programmes

The Photography Awards are designed to recognise location based single camera work.

Lighting and Multicamera

Nominations and Awards will be made in three categories:

Lighting for Multicamera (all multicamera work is eligible) - This Award is for a Lighting Designer.
Multicamera Work (all multicamera work, except sport is eligible) - including Arts & Music, Situation Comedy, Factual programmes, News and Current Affairs, Entertainment and Events.  This Award is for a Camera Team or Team Leader as appropriate.
Multicamera Work – Sport - This Award is for a Camera Team, Team Leader and/or Director as appropriate.

The Multicamera Awards are designed to recognise those who work in studio based or OB multicamera programming across all genres.

Sound

Nominations and Awards will be made in two categories:

Drama - including Single Drama, Drama Series, Drama Serial, Drama for Children’s and Educational programmes, Comedy Drama, Dramatic Reconstruction and Drama Documentaries
Entertainment & Non-Drama Productions - including Arts & Music, Situation Comedy, Documentary/Factual programmes/Outside Broadcasts/Sport

These Awards recognise the whole sound team and both recording supervisor and mixing supervisor should be named on the entry form.

Editing

Nominations and Awards will be made in four categories:

Drama - including Single Drama, Drama Series, Drama Serial, Drama for Children’s and Educational programmes, Dramatic Reconstruction and Drama Documentaries
Documentary/Factual
Entertainment and Comedy - This Award is designed to recognise skills in all areas editing within entertainment and comedy.
Sport

Music Awards

Nominations and Awards will be made in two categories

Original Title Music - for a programme/series titles or a network or channel ident
Original Score - for a programme or series

The titles or score must be specially commissioned for a specific programme

RTS Special Award

This Award is given at the discretion of the Royal Television Society.  It can be awarded to either an individual or a group, from any area of programme making, and will be given in recognition of an outstanding contribution to television craft or design for the innovative use of new technology, within the current criteria year.  The Society welcome suggestions and recommendations. This Award cannot be awarded posthumously.

Outstanding Achievement Award

This Award is given at the discretion of the Society for an outstanding achievement of creative craft or design in the industry.  The Society welcome suggestions and recommendations.  This Award cannot be awarded posthumously.