Cartoonist scores hat-trick

The Herald's Rod Emmerson has been named cartoonist of the year for the third year in a row - the standout achievement among 19 of the paper's journalists who took honours at the national media awards.

The Herald was a finalist for best daily newspaper, won by the Press, Christchurch, which was named newspaper of the year at the Qantas Media Awards in Auckland.

The Herald website, nzherald.co.nz was also a finalist for best news website, won by www.tvnz.co.nz.

The Weekend Herald's canvas was best newspaper magazine and Tuesday Travel was best travel section for the second consecutive year.

Simon Baker, the Herald's Christchurch photographer, won the photographer of the year title and the inaugural award for best single breaking news picture. Kenny Rodger won best photo for his algal bloom image.

Richard Dale was named best editorial graphic artist.

Weekend Herald investigative reporter Phil Taylor was a grand finalist in both news reporting and feature writing, taking home two category awards. Julie Middleton also won twice for features.

In all, Herald writers won seven news reporting and seven feature writing categories, dominating the fields.

Their work included some of the biggest news stories of the year: Catherine Masters reporting on the Tsunami from Thailand, Simon Collins' pre-election analysis of the benefit system in the Herald's Informed Choice campaign and Wynne Gray's scoop on Tana Umaga retiring from the All Blacks.

Sandra Paterson took the best social issues column for her work in the Weekend Herald. A Herald series on the billion-dollar drug trade and gangs' involvement was a finalist in best newspaper investigation.

Emmerson's success made it three from three for the former Australian who joined the Herald in 2003. It was the fourth successive cartooning title won by the paper, after Malcolm Evans' award in 2002.

Former Herald editor-in-chief Gavin Ellis was honoured with the print industry's outstanding achievement award.

The Herald on Sunday's sports section was best specialist newspaper section and its reporter Amanda Spratt was judged best junior reporter.

Other awards were: Wolfson fellow to Cambridge University, Steve Braunias, Sunday Star-Times; senior reporter, Tony Wall, Sunday Star-Times, newspaper feature writer Tim Hume, Sunday Star-Times; columnist, Finlay Macdonald, Sunday Star-Times; newsstand magazine, North & South; weekly paper, Sunday Star-Times.