My third answer for my essential question, what is the most important factor in creating an award-winning yearbook, is also, I believe, my best answer: a strong, defined, relevant theme. This has been stressed through multiple sources. For example, in the article Power by Design, the author, Rick Poynor, talks about how graphic designers overestimate their job. Designers think that they must make the design stand out, when in reality, you should let the theme or message speak, and everything else come afterwards. Better by Design, by Ann Akers and Paul Ender, talks mostly about the marriage of all of the elements in a yearbook through design - and the underlying factor is always the theme. The photography must go with the theme. The copy and the voice must whisper the theme throughout the book. The design of the book must illuminate the theme. The theme is what ties the entire book together. Both my second and third interviews also agree - Mimi Orth, my service learning, says that you must know your school, know your audience, and sell your yearbook to them through a relevant and theme. Cynthia Schroeder also stressed knowing your theme, and keeping it in sight throughout the book. In her words, "[Theme is] what determines what the design is gonna be, the voice, the copy, colors, the coverage. It really determines everything in the book and, you know, what separates the more amateur looking books from the professional, award winning books is the concept."
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