View the finalists’ list here. Marisa Dobson, NSPA contest and critique coordinator, provides the following report on last weekend’s judging, with comments from the judges:
The first weekend of February saw four individuals at the top of their respective professions congregate in Minneapolis, at the NSPA/ACP Headquarters, to select the 2007 Yearbook Pacemakers.
After an initial culling round, each judge spent hours at tables scouring thousands of pages for inventive design details, clean and stirring copy, crisp photos, and thematic harmony. Judges ranked each category separately on secret ballots. NSPA/ACP staff then tabulated the rankings to produce the list of finalists. There is no quota for each category, nor limit to the number of Pacemaker winners.
There were over 380 entries in the 2007 Yearbook Pacemaker contest. This is a bigger pool than both 2006 and 2005. Of those 380, 54 were selected as Pacemaker Finalists. Roughly half of that number will be winners.
The Pacemaker winners will be announced at the awards ceremony at the Spring JEA/NSPA National High School Journalism Convention in Anaheim, April 17-20. Register online for the convention on the NSPA Web site.
“This is not an easy contest to judge,” said one judge, “you agonize over books that are really great and deserving of recognition. Photography has improved tremendously! Some of these photographers should consider careers in the industry. Also, it’s great to see everything in context of other similar-sized books.”
The Judges took time after making their selections to discuss the elements of a Pacemaker book. Excelling at the basics is always most essential, and this can be done in an original fashion. Below are tips and comments straight from the judges.
The bottom line is that a yearbook is about story-telling. When it comes down to it, those that build and weave the students’ lives into the book in a broader context of the activities of the year are successful.
The basics never change: good photography, strong writing, good captions and multiple points of entry. No opinion should appear in copy. Avoid use of adjectives and rely on nouns and verbs to tell your stories. Sports copy needs action. The reader needs a sense of the action: what took place on the field of play. Reporters should be going to games and be familiar with the sport.
We saw good alternative forms of writing: focused, first person, illuminating stories that extended the personality and created engagement for the reader. It pulls in the reader and makes the reader feel like they are part of the year.
Things to avoid: cluster captions; really tiny type that is difficult to read and discourages readability; no hierarchy of information where it’s hard for the reader to follow; design that seems to drive the content instead of vice versa; little restraint with graphics and color; some colors don’t work well with type; some colors cutting through type interfered with the readability. Type on top of type is really hard to read.
Pacemakers should lead the pack: they should be books that we all aspire to create. Readers need tools of navigation that lead though the book. A well thought-out and detailed book that is logical and creative.
Some staffs completely broke away from templates in fresh, innovative ways, which was really good to see. When staffs have the freedom to take the pictures and the words and let those elements determine how the spread will look, that’s golden. That’s the way it should work.
What’s the best picture? Build around it. What’s the best way to tell the story? Just because you can, should you? What’s the purpose of your design? What’s the purpose of the words? It all has to fit together in a tangible way.
Books with good copy had great sights and sounds leads that painted strong pictures. Much better use of depth in quotes; some that even played on our emotions and made us connect to the story.
A trend to watch: designing individual spreads that grow from the spirit of the content and let the spreads look unique and different from spread to spread. The continuity is through type and color.
Copy should be honest: report accurately the story of the year. Don’t be afraid to be honest, especially if the reader knows the difference.
Staffs should try to find their own voices in their book: don’t write for your AP English class. Write honestly for your real audience. Engage them.