Skimming through magazines tends to be how most yearbook staffs spend their efforts to improve yearbook designs. But those designs can quickly become out of control unless students nitpick the details. Make sure the yearbook spreads are controlled and pop by using one or more of these tips for your design or the design process.
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From the category archives:
Design
Editors and page designers need to consider many aspects of photography and design when selecting the right images for a yearbook spread. It’s about more than whether a photo is simply in focus.
Yearbook staffs devote many hours to creating that ideal cover for their yearbook. It’s usually one of the first tasks the staff tackles once school is back in session, if not earlier at a summer workshop. Now, the Idea File blog can help. We’ve launched our new Cover Gallery under Showcase.
Yearbooks thrive on ideas. Designs, photos, articles, themes – all the elements of a yearbook need them. The thoughts generated from frequent brainstorming sessions are the lifeblood of any publication.
If it is time to upgrade your software, Adobe CS4 is waiting for you. Although it comes only 18 months after CS3, CS4 has a few cool InDesign updates that should increase productivity and improve graphics capabilities.
It is always with some hesitation that a wholly original approach is taken in developing a yearbook theme. Given the diversity inherent to our west Texas border town of El Paso, the 2009 Franklin High School yearbook staff and I sought to reflect the many dimensions of living on a border by choosing a theme relevant to our existence.
Classification
Over 10,000 typefaces exist in several basic classifications. Most faces can be placed into the following seven categories. Before you try to become conscious of the contrasts in type, you should become aware of the similarities between broad groups of type designs, because it is the similarities that cause conflicts in type combinations.
Used by professional designers for years, the grid layout has taken the yearbook industry by storm.
Principles of design including balance, contrast, emphasis, unity, and simplicity.
STEP 1
Choose a Column Plan
Columnar design brings consistency to your publication and is the foundation of all good yearbook design. Depending on the amount of space you leave in the gutter and the external margins you want, the width of the individual columns will change. In the 8 column plan we will be using here, most likely each column will be around 12 picas in width. Notice just two picas have been left in the gutter. If you look closely, most layout sheets already have an eight columnar design marked out.
