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photo contest At Vertical, we always look forward to putting together our final issue of the year. It is, without doubt, the one that is most fun to create — and the one that, more often than not, causes the most heated debate in the office. The reason being that for the last nine years it has played host to our annual photo contest, in which we have the unenviable task of combing through hundreds of spectacular photos of helicopters doing all kinds of things in locations as broad as the imagination — and picking the best of the bunch. It’s not an easy job. Last year, we broke our own record with over 750 entries. This year, we had over 1,400. And the quality, as you’ll see over the following pages, was simply outstanding. We pride ourselves on producing a magazine that’s as visually appealing as it is informative and are lucky to see jaw-dropping photography on a regular basis, but some of your photos even caused us to shake our heads in disbelief. We’d wager it’d be hard to flick through the next few pages without exhaling in awe at least once. This year’s Grand Prize winner is Maur “Muzza” Mere, a freelance landscape and adventure photographer. Congratulations to Maur, and all the winners across the three competition categories. The contest was was open to any photographer over the age of 18 — amateur or professional — and was free to enter. We accepted entries through our website from Aug. 18, 2017, to Oct. 27, 2017, and each entry was then submitted without the photographer’s details into a digital folder. Vertical’s editors then whittled the more than 1,400 entries to just 20 finalists in each of the three categories (Beauty Shots, Helicopters at Work, and Military). We then handed it over to our sponsors: Bell Helicopter, Airbus Helicopters, Bambi Bucket, Eagle Copters, Metro Aviation, PHP, Safran Helicopter Engines, and Wysong Enterprises. Their representatives, along with Vertical staff, voted through a secure website for their three favorite photos in each category, and the votes were tallied automatically. Mere’s photo secured the most votes, and has won the Grand Prize of $1,000 and appears on this issue’s front cover. The first-, second-, and third-placed photographers in each of the three competition categories have won prizes of $500, $250, and $100, respectively. Thanks to everyone who sent their work to us, and to all our photo contest sponsors for their support and helping to make this contest such an outstanding success. PROUDLY SPONSORED BY gr and prize winner 98 Ver tical Maga zine Grand prize SPONSORED BY: