Yearbook Students Attend Conference

On Wednesday, September 11, six yearbook students and their advisor, Maya Kehr Yoder, traveled to Coralville to learn from two yearbook professionals. Their first session was with designer John Cutsinger. Cutsinger’s lively presentation gave students strategies for conversational reporting, headline creation, design basics, and more.

After lunch, students heard a second presentation from yearbook teacher and professional photographer, Kyle Carter. During the day students learned the fundamentals of photography, especially how to use a DSLR camera to its full capacity. Carter stressed the importance of avoiding the fully automatic setting, but instead focusing on the three most important variables: aperture, shutter speed, and ISO. He also focused on sports photography and gave us tips on the best locations for each sport (so, if you see yearbook students standing closer to the courts or fields, you’ll know why).

Many photos in Carter’s presentation came from his high school students’ portfolios, including a photo from a Brad Paisley concert that one of his students was paid to shoot.

The yearbook staff is grateful for this opportunity to learn from professionals, apply that information, and improve our photography and design. The Hillcrest yearbook group came away a bit closer than they were before and were able to develop their yearbook theme at the conference and came away with many good ideas. Students invested and engaged the content well.