This one’s for all you valiant dragonslayers…Each year Arms of Valor, Ltd. designs and produces many of their own swords. For 2007 they would like to give one lucky person a chance to have their sword design made into a real sword. The sword will be forged by Generation 2 with a high carbon spring steel blade and razor sharp edge. Sketch, draw, or paint your design, and scan it. Then use the form at Arms of Valor to file your submission. Please include as much detail as possible – front, side, and top view as well as the measurements. What do you receive if you win? Why, one of the swords, of course!

Along with your design you can also submit a short story or history that goes with your sword. When the sword is produced our artist will create a print of the sword in action (based on your story) that will be included with each sword. You’ll need to email them for the deadline, as none was posted. Visit the site to learn more.

In 1999, Architecuture for Humanity (AFH) hosted an international design competition to develop transitional housing for returning refugees in Kosovo. At the launch they held a press conference at the Van Alen Institute in New York. Around an hour before the conference, Ilja von Nagel and Cameron Sinclair, executive director and cofounder of AFH, quickly scrawled together a competition poster and logo. Suddenly they had a graphic identity and it has stayed the same ever since.

But now it’s time for a change. The ten top designs will recieve the book, Design Like You Give a Damn, and the top team will receive $1000. Plenty of concise guidelines on the site. Deadline is 15 December 2006.

BTW - AFH is looking for a person to serve as Interim Managing Director in Sausalito, California and another to serve as a Project Manager in Biloxi, Mississippi. The second position pays a stipend to the right person. Visit the jobs page at AFH.

If you work for a newspaper, you might dig this news - The Pulitzer Prize Board has established new rules allowing newspapers to submit a full array of online material such as databases, interactive graphics, and streaming video for its journalism awards. An assortment of Web 2.0 elements will now be permitted in all awards except for the competition’s two photography categories, which will continue to restrict entries to still images. Read more about the Pulitzer Prize Board changes at Online Journalism News >>>

The Jolt Product Excellence Awards recognize the most innovative, trend-making, ahead-of-the-curve products. Jolt-award winners are the software products, books and websites that developers should be using today. You may submit a 5-minute Flash video, PowerPoint or webinar consisting of 5-10 examples of your product’s most salient and standout functionality. The examples may be illustrated with static screenshots, real-time animation or an application demo. White papers, customer testimonials and other information may also be made available to the judges. While the supporting product information is not a requirement for submission, it does help for the judges to see what your product does and aids in finalist selection. They highly recommend that you submit any supporting information that is available, as judges only examine and evaluate “actual” products in the Finalist phase.

The deadline for nominations is 15 December 15, 2006. Eligible books and products must have been published or had a significant version release in the calendar year 2006. Visit the site for more information.

Reflecting the tremendous growth of the Mobile Internet, The Webby’s are proud to announce the launch of The Webby Mobile Awards presented by dotMobi, the first and only address dedicated to users who access the Internet through their mobile phones. The Webby Mobile Awards will feature three categories: Listings & Updates, News & Entertainment, and Mobile Marketplace, (which will honor sites selling products and services). Naturally, all entries will be judged on mobile devices.

The deadline for mobile entries is 15 December. Winners will be honored at the 11th Annual Webby Awards Gala in June in New York City. Visit the site to enter.

Adobe Photoshop CS2 for Photographers: A Professional Image Editor’s Guide to the Creative Use of Photoshop for the Macintosh and PC: I picked this book up at a bookstore the other day because I was curious about the amount of copy within this book - in other words, I couldn’t just stand there and read it in the store. But, the copy didn’t detract from the images that were scattered throughout the book - just enough to support the text and to show how to follow photographer Martin Evening’s advice. There are 704 pages filled with content plus 30 pages of Photoshop Shortcuts on the free CD-ROM. And, while Adobe does justice to explaining DNG (Digital Negative) files and its Bridge, Evening goes further to make these tools part of the professional photographer’s personal arsenal. A must have for any digital photographer. The only problem is that I paid too much for my book - it’s cheaper at Amazon.