What was the first thing you noticed about this article? Was it my astonishing writing ability? The natural flow of my sentences? Or the image of Frank West snapping a photo?

You most likely first picked up the picture. Then you maybe noted the headline. After that, perhaps the tags and the bolded words. Finally, you processed the text that makes up the majority of this article.

Whether they like them or not, writers need images to attract readers. But images need writers, too. That's where the caption comes in: to provide crucial context for what you're seeing. Captions are important tools for both print and the web, and that’s why they are the subject of this month’s prompt: Picture Text.

First, you’ll need a screenshot from any video game you'd like. However, please avoid using screenshots with embedded watermarks -- the small logos that sites like IGN and GameSpot use to designate their photos. It should be easy to find similar images using Google searches or through a fan site/Wikia entry -- or even on the game's official website. After that, you’ll take a stab at each of these captions.

1. The short caption

This is the short, one-sentence caption you'll find under most captioned images. It can be funny or expand on what's depicted in the picture -- just as long as the description is relevant to your photo and grabs the reader's attention.

Make sure you craft these particular captions with care, because I'm going to use them instead of the usual description I write for each story in the results article. In other words, your short caption is going to be responsible for getting people to read your work.

One more thing: Like Twitter, I’m giving you a 140-character limit, including spacing and punctuation.

2. The long caption

This paragraph-long description often accompanies pictures when they're standalone photos or part of a gallery. While you’ll have more breathing room than you would for a short caption, you’ll also need to make sure your cutline is informative and gives the screenshot context. Your word range here is 50-100 words.

3. One picture, 500 words

It'd be strange to link to articles that don’t have anything but captions, wouldn't it? So your last job is to take your picture and write 500 words on it. Describe what’s happening in the photo: the environments, characters, graphics, anything -- even the life bars, if you can make them interesting.

You have the freedom to discuss things that aren't explicitly in the image, but avoid going on tangents. They say that a picture is worth a thousand words; surely you can stay on topic for 500.

To sum up:

• Select a video-game screenshot with no watermarks.
• Write a short caption of 140 characters or fewer that grabs attention.
• Write a caption between 50 and 100 words that explains the photo.
• Write a 500-word description covering as many aspects of the photo as possible.
• Post the article with “Picture Text” in the tags by January 31, 2011.

I have an example piece you can view here. Good luck!

This prompt also marks the one-year anniversary of the Bitmob Writing Challenge! Congratulations to Michael Rousseau, who started the series one year ago with his On the Contrary prompt. Since then, the writing challenge has covered editing, personal essays, peer reviews, and even comics. I want to thank all the great writers who contributed to this series in the past year.