Christmas cover star 2019

We had already selected this image as the winner when we learned it had been shot on a phone! Goes to show how astonishingly good the quality of phone cameras is nowadays. The high-key quality of this image is lovely and the blue tone gives it an icy quality. There's plenty of space for the masthead and cover lines, without losing any of the image's detail and focal point.

We received an awful lot of landscape-format entries into this competition, but this is one of the few that could be made to work on a front cover, as it is easily cropped to the portrait format. The blank background has the potential to fit plenty of cover lines, and few things say Christmas more than a robin redbreast.

If it weren't for the pleasingly soft peach tones in the sky, it would be easy to assume this was a black & white image, such is the overall effect of the blanket of snow. The top of the frame leaves plenty of room for the masthead and the lead-in line of the foreground path takes the eye through the frame nicely.

A great example of hair, make-up, accessories and styling all coming together to create a considered, well-thought-out image. It could easily be a still from a production of something like The Snow Queen. This is an image that certainly has the potential to make an impact on the front cover.

With a little more work, this image has potential. If shooting for a cover, the photographer would have needed to shoot in portrait format, and be much closer, almost (but not quite) filling the frame with the rear view of the woman. This would make the image stronger and remove the distraction of the fencing. But the lovely soft background of snow-laden trees works well, and we love the flakes that are caught in her hair.

A very well considered image, with the fence providing a pleasing lead-in line. The processing, whereby the frame is quite low-key and muted, with the multicolours lights really standing out, works extremely well. There would be plenty of space for cover lines if it were to be used as the cover image, which is always a big factor when making our selection.