Feedback from Meeting No. 1

We had our first meeting with Mike today, and all in all I would have to say it was a success. At this moment in time we have been faced with more questions than answers, but any progress right now is heading in the right direction. Again Maya was assigned note taker, and took down anything that seemed of significance. Bullet pointed noted from the meeting can be found below. The yearbook will be relatively small.

• This is the first year that DFGA are having a proper yearbook.
• The yearbook will show the students graduating from the foundation course as well as the degree course.
• There are 22 foundation students graduating and 13 BA students.
• The course is changing as of next year so that it is only a BA course, rather than the first 2 years being a foundation course.
• Multidisciplinary course (storyboarding, sequencing, etc.)
• Think of ways of separating the 2 graduating years. There needs to be some kind of division.
• They try to encourage a good mix of students on the course (not just males). For this reason, the colours need to be softer. Avoid gender issues by gender neutral design. The yearbook should celebrate the foundation course, but the main sell is BA (Hons) DFGA. The yearbook should also work as promotional material for the new course, but it shouldn't come across as though the graduating year missed out.
• The focus of the yearbook should be on the students leaving.
• The DFGA website can be skinned to work in coordination with the yearbook concept/style. Focus on DFGA.
• Consider an identity for the course.
• The course focuses on core skills that apply to all of the disciplines. It only focuses down in the 3rd year.
• We can go for anything in terms of the look and feel of the yearbook.
• It could be something abstract (not necessarily representative of the course, but it gets away from stereotypes).
• Storytelling, journeys, trans-media (taking something from one media and developing it to work across others).
• Avoid literal representations and cliches.
• The course started in 1996 and a HND. The foundation course started 5 years ago.
• Don't approach the concept by the number of years that the course has been running as the focus should be on the fact that the course is becoming just a BA (Hons) course.
• Within the year groups, students could be split by pathways/discipline/etc.
• Not bothered about the word 'digital' as we are living in a 'post-digital society'.
• Look into tying the digital elements in with the yearbook with the use of QR codes. This could lead to the students' personal websites or a special Vimeo account could be set up so that Mike can control what gets shown.
• DFGA website: www.DFGA.leeds-art.ac.uk This will not show work from all of the students though.
• Mixture of work on the course - diverse (e.g. sound pieces (how could these be represented?), cinematographers, model makers...). This year's students are even more diverse than usual. This could be something that we could represent.
• Will need a maximum of 500 yearbooks printed. At least 200 of these will be sent out. Consider rack damage.
• Anything in terms of stock (could be recycled).
• Not going to be able to get 300dpi images in most cases. This is something that will need to be considered in terms of the layout as images won't be able to be too big as they will be pixelated. Perhaps photos of the work in context could be used in some cases to get round this.
• Will we be organising photographers?
• Look into colour QR codes.