Empire leads NAACP Image Awards race

Empire's Terrence Howard and Taraji P Henson are in the running for best actor and actress

Musical drama Empire is leading the TV nominees for 2016's National Association for the Advancement of Coloured People's (NAACP) Image Awards.

The US show is up for 12 prizes, including outstanding drama series, actor and actress.

Family comedy Black-ish came second in the TV nominations with 10, including outstanding comedy series.

The awards celebrate the accomplishments of people of colour in television, music, literature and film.

Empire centres on a hip-hop music and entertainment company and the drama among the family members that run it.

The show, which has been running since the beginning of year, will compete against Being Mary Jane, How to Get Away with Murder, Power and Scandal for the outstanding TV drama award.

In the TV acting categories, Empire's Terrence Howard is up for outstanding actor in a drama series with co-star Taraji P Henson up for outstanding actress.

The show also earned outstanding supporting actor in a TV drama nominations for Bryshere Y Gray and Jussie Smollett; and an outstanding supporting actress nod for Grace Gealey.

Empire creator Lee Daniels was also nominated in the TV directing category as well as the writing category, along with the show's co-creator and writer Danny Strong.

Creed sees former boxing champion Rocky Balboa, played by Sylvester Stallone (left), serve as trainer and mentor to Adonis Johnson, played by Michael B Jordan, the son of his late rival

In the film category, Rocky sequel Creed received six nods, including one for outstanding film.

It will compete with Straight Outta Compton, Beasts of No Nation, Concussion and Dope for the title.

Overall, Straight Outta Compton earned five nominations while Beasts of No Nation - Netflix's first original feature film, starring Idris Elba - followed with four along with Amazon's first feature film, Chi-Raq, directed by Spike Lee.

In the music categories, Janet Jackson leads the contest with six nods, including outstanding female artist, while Pharrell Williams is competing for three awards including outstanding male artist.

The winners will be announced during a two-hour event on 5 February.