Behind-The-Scenes of The Most Difficult Elective At AISG

On Wednesday afternoon, an eerie and tense atmosphere surrounded the collaborative workshop elective of the Yearbook class. In the far corner of the room, the five-person template-and-design team rushed to make last-minute edits, scampering over graphic designs that looked out of place or headline typography that lacked creativity. For the past month, the templates team focused on revising their work, but it was no doubt that there were changes that still need to be made. Before the team could finish their final modifications, Yearbook teacher Mr. Bott called for a rapid-fire critique session from the entire class.

Since the photographers’ and writers’ teams were seeing these templates for the first time, the rapid-fire critique session allowed for immediate critical responses to further improve the design and layout features. Soon after the printed copies of the InDesign templates were laid out onto three separate tables, consisting of Schoolwide Events, Clubs & Organizations, China Trips, Athletics, Fine Arts, and Academic spreads, the Yearbook class quickly began circling suggestions/errors/possible corrections on the templates with red markers.

The session consisted of critical interactions between the template designer and other students as they exchanged feedback and made suggestions.

Due to the fact that the yearbook prints over 1,000 copies to be distributed to the entire AISG population at the end of the school year, the class consists of a packed schedule and numerous deadlines. The students are in charge of collecting information on events and organizations for articles, taking and filtering hundreds of photos, and creating an interactive and design-filled spread. Additionally, the class has been recently collecting information for feature articles: a Q&A formatted interview about a unique individual at AISG and a 500-word article consisting of an AISG topic, event, or club. All in all, the yearbook class has been constantly tackling multiple up-and-coming events, as well as learning about template design, candid photography, and journalistic writing.

Jae C., a freshman and a member of the writers’ team in Yearbook class, had quickly begun providing verbal feedback to the templates team during the rapid-fire critique session. “It was extremely exciting to see all my fellow friends’ work on yearbook templates, mainly because Mr. Bott gave us the chance to critique them. It took great courage [for me] to say my thoughts out loud because some of the layout people had great confidence in their work. I found out that I had a great interest in critiquing others’ work, and I hope there would be more opportunities for me to do that [in the future].”

A member of the layout team and designer of the Athletics and China Trips spreads, Veronica Y., expressed her ideas on receiving feedback. “When I saw my work printed out and laid on the table, I was really proud of myself. It was also very fun and stressful at the same time when all [my] classmates were arguing over the suggestions made for the templates.”

However, the head of the photographers’ team, Sharon C., pointed out a few flaws that she discovered with the templates during the session. “My first thought about seeing the templates was how similar they looked. They had a standard box-like format, which was a typical yearbook style. I think that the layout group can improve their work with the feedback and suggestions we gave them.”

All in all, the Yearbook class continues to progress their skills while formulating the 2019-2020 yearbook.

Scroll to see more photos of the Yearbook team in action.