Design.
Knowing and effectively following principles of design is an invaluable skill in an age where people are saturated with media from the moment they wake up to the moment they go to sleep. Whether it is print or digital, media that is iconic and aesthetically pleasing will not only catch the reader's attention, but also elevate the content it is presenting.
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Here are the ways I kept this mind while designing elements of the yearbook and our social media pages.
Yearbook.
A walk through all of the design processes involved in creating a yearbook.
Theme
Theme-building
A yearbook publication has the unique challenge of encapsulating the key events of an entire school year while staying true to a central idea, or theme. The theme, which can be a single word (such as our 2021-2022 theme, "Rewind") or a phrase ("We Are Braswell"), is meant to be an overarching idea that is clearly evident from the cover, to the spreads, to the endsheets.
Let's take a quick dive into the thought process behind The Ambush's last two themes.
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Graphic created by Reagan Netherland.
Why "Rewind"?
"Rewind" was my baby. I chose the theme name, designed the cover, created verbal spinoffs, and chose the colors and fonts. My adviser and I wanted a theme that would defy the current expectations of our publication.
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While making my way to class one day, I kept noticing just how many students wore headphones during their 5-minute walk to the next period. I became inspired by this idea of each person's life having a sound track, with their time in high school being one of many playlists. A yearbook, therefore, was a "rewind" to a previous point in life.
Every year up until the 2021-2022 school year, our yearbook cover had been one of our school's three main colors: red, black, or white. With that in mind, I swore off those colors and found inspiration in a TV show popular with my age group, Stranger Things, which uses very bright neon colors characteristic of the 80s in its second season.
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Examples of visual and verbal spin-off indicated by red boxes. Click the image to magnify it.
Key visual elements:
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Stripes, horizontal and diagonal
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Film strip-esque designs on dividers
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Play/pause/recording buttons seen throughout book
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Four theme colors used mark sections in book (such as blue being used for the Dec. - Jan. spead above)
Key verbal elements:
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Several instances of songs/song lyrics throughout pages (both modern and olde)
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Riffs on the word "rewind" (Ex. "fast forward" on our post high school careers feature page)
Examples of visual and verbal spin-off indicated by red boxes. Click the image to magnify it.
Why "We Are Braswell"?
"We Are Braswell" is the theme that The Ambush is currently working on as we wrap up production for the 2022-2023 school year. "We Are" is very near and dear to my heart, not only because it is the last high school yearbook I will ever work on, but also because every staff member contributed something to the end design.
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As a team, we agreed that Braswell High School lacked school spirit, largely due to how new the school is (est. 2016). We wanted this year's book to be a culmination of every moment, big or little that BHS students could take pride in. This idea that Braswell is united by our shared moments and accomplishments, or who "we are", is what we hope to encapsulate when this book goes to print.
Check out the images to the side of this section to see the reasoning behind my design choices.
Key visual elements:
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Red is primary color (school color + symbolic of life)
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Squares, rectangles and lines
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Minimalism - let the photos shine
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Outlines around mods or photos
Key verbal elements:
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"We are" phrase is very flexible. Ex. ("We are livin' it up)
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Heavy focus on "us" and "you"
Working with Josten's
Another unique aspect of yearbook production is working with the regional representative for our printing company, Josten's. Our rep, Tiffany Estes Sheffield, meets with us after we have generated several theme ideas (using brainstorm sheets like this one) to help us expand on visual and verbal elements that could go along with said theme.
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The whiteboard has been home to many brainstorming sessions with Tiffany Estes Sheffield, Josten's representative for Braswell Media. Staff members were encouraged to share as many of their ideas as possible. "No idea is a bad idea in a brainstorming session," Sheffield said.
Covers
Design process
While creating designs for a yearbook cover, I had to keep two things in mind:
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Fidelity to theme: The cover should be obviously related to the theme.
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Price: The more complicated a design is, the more expensive it is to produce.
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Once I was satisfied with three or four drafts on paper, I would take my designs to Yearbook Avenue to recreate them digitally.
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The team voted on which cover design, and the winning cover was sent to Josten's design department for finalization.
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Graphic created by Reagan Netherland.
Rewind
While building the "Rewind" theme, I played with the idea of every person's life being a mixtape of memories. While choosing a color palette was heavily inspired by the bright colors of the 1980s, I married these two ideas together and began to see a vision of a mixtape, which later became the main feature of the cover.
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The horizontal strips on the mixtape and the diagonal stripes going outwards from the spine of the book were placed with the intention of repeating them throughout the book to maintain a consistent feel.
Cover by Reagan Netherland.
We Are Braswell
Though I can take credit for the choice of red and linear motifs, the "We Are" cover belongs to the entire 2022-2023 yearbook staff. Since the "We Are" theme was born out of a desire to increase school spirit and a feeling of tradition, we wanted our cover to have a slightly vintage feel while keeping those modern lines.
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Our Josten's representative recommended burnishing the cover, a suggestion that I fell in love with instantly. One of the reasons I love this cover so much is because it demonstrates that a cover doesn't have to be flashy to contribute to theme.
Cover by The Ambush Yearbook staff.
Spreads
Creating a spread
I designed all of the spread templates for the 2022-2023 yearbook. In the graphic below, I explain some of the design decisions that went into one of the chronological spread template.
Spread template by Reagan Netherland. Click the image to magnify it.
Social Media & More.
How we maintained a consistent, iconic look throughout our media.
Branding
Canva is the primary tool that Braswell Media uses to create graphics for its social media accounts and broadcast productions.
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Select Braswell Media staff members (such as myself or our business managers) have access to a team on Canva. From there, I have access to two key features that allow me to maintain a consistent look in our graphics: the color branding kit and our collection of official school/organization logos.
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Something as simple as maintaining the same color scheme or having high-resolution logos goes a long way in keeping our accounts looking professional.
Canva's branding kit tools allows Braswell Media's graphics have a consistent aesthetic.
Examples in social media
Yearbook sale story created in Canva by Reagan Netherland and Mr. Carr, adviser.
Staff introduction post created in Canva by The Ambush business managers and edited by Reagan Netherland.
Weather advisory on Instagram story created in Canva by Reagan Netherland.
Examples in broadcast
Lower thirds graphics created in Canva by Reagan Netherland and Mr. Carr, adviser.
Athlete statistics graphic created by Reagan Netherland in Canva.
Transitional animated graphic used in BHS NOW All Access. Created by Reagan Netherland through Canva.
The gist.
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Good design elevates good copy.
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Being able to unify projects, whether an entire yearbook or a small blurb on social media, under common visual motifs and themes is a critical skill for any person going into media production.