|
Yearbook Design/Modular Design
Does anybody have any experience/tips with modular design for yearbooks? I am the editor of the yearbook this year and I am looking for new ideas and tips on anything that has to do with yearbooks and magazines. If it helps, our theme is "Not your average..." and we're carrying it out through the book by saying "Not your average athlete" and "Not your average first day", etc. Thank you!
[ ]
Want to answer more questions in the Technology category?
Maybe give some free advice about: Computers?
Congrats on getting the position. I spent the last year, my graduating year, as chief editor and I tried really hard to make it special for my class. But the first thing you need to remember is that you can't make everyone happy, I spent so much time running around after everyone trying to please them all but realized that complete satisfaction would never be possible so I settled for what the majority wanted.
I like your theme except it's sometimes hard to incorporate something so specific into a yearbook. This year our theme was time. We used clocks as layouts and we used digital page markers. We alternated every spread to fade out in gray to the back of the book. The year before that, the theme was barcode. We had barcodes hidden and imbedded into the book, sometimes waving and morphing into a zebra print. Three years ago, the theme was definition, with the dictionary definitions of friendship all around the book and we scanned and used pages of the dictionary for our backgrounds. I suggest using the "Not your average..." as a general tagline and come up with a stronger theme.
You also need to make sure the yearbook is continuous. The sidebar or header needs to be the same throughout the entire book and so do the numbers. Make sure that a few of the layouts repeat themselves too. It seems like a simple process but keep double-checking. I’ve had a lot of kids just make up their own pages so the entire section ended up looking like AB CD EF CD AB GF EF and it looked oddly out of place.
Make sure you keep editing the pages and checking them over. I had the basic rule that a spread needed to complete four steps before being sent:
1. Finished and checked by creator
2. Checked by three peers
3. Checked by two editors
4. Checked by me or my sub
It’s a lengthy process but it makes the book foolproof and mistakes rarely slip through.
Keep in touch with the publishing company and make sure you’re clear on deadlines and –meet- the deadlines. Last year they published the original copies we sent them without replacing the fixed pages we sent later so we ended up doing 2 months of extra work to fix pages and they didn’t get published.
Lastly, remember to be patient. Don’t alienate yourself from anyone else working on the yearbook or go on a power trip. The rest of the class voted the chief editor out three years ago.
Keep a copy of the yearbook with you incase you have a job interview relating to it. When the interviewer asks you to tell him a little about yourself, plant the book in front of him and say, “I was in charge of creating this book and supervising however-many people et cetera”
Aside from that, good luck. It’s a tough job, but the right person can make it amazing.
]
More Questions: |