So I finally figured out what I'm going to call the AP who's supposedly overseeing the production of the yearbook: the Word Nazi.
Invariably, when looking at a yearbook spread, the first thing out of Word Nazi's mouth is "LOOK at all those... WORDS!" Her tone is one of horror, disgust, or, if it's been a particularly good day so far, mere dismay. Her ideal book would be filled with spreads that are comprised of LOTS of photos and a headline. (And maybe a pretty swirled background.) No copy, of course. And no captions. No captions! WTF?!
Now, I am not willing to budge on the captions. There is no fucking way I'm going to have unidentified photographs in a book that's got my name on it ANYWHERE. I will sacrifice my job for that if I have to. However, I think I'm going to have to ax the copy. I already cut the word requirement in half for this year, and it's not remotely enough. The copy is going to have to go.
What do I do? I think it's possible to make a decent book without using copy... I'm just not sure I can do it.
After This Is Over–a Prayer
1 day ago
3 comments:
Ask her to take a look at her high school yearbook and see if she can remember all the students in the pictures. Can she remember the activities and events? Can she remember the prom or homecoming theme of her senior year? It's unlikely.
I agree with happychyck. Our 2005 book--mostly photos, pull-quotes & captions, was not well-received. Is your AP young? Some of these "youngsters" think they don't like words, but when they see the resulting product, they don't like that, either. I'm happy to say that in 2006 we returned to the way we've always done it (words, photos, captions, headlines, etc. all working together), and we've been happy campers ever since.
Are you serious? You'd imagine an AP would look at the words as evidence that the students CAN read and write. That's the stupidest thing I've ever heard of. Grr.
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