Student Competition FAQ

Okay, so the holidays are almost over and other than celebrating (and recouping from) New Year's Eve, you've got some extra time on your hands before the spring semester starts. Why not get 2009 off to a productive start and work on your SPD Student Design Competition entry!

In case you haven't heard, winners get internships at top magazines in NYC, cash prizes and the Adobe Creative Suite software, not to mention inclusion in the SPD 44 Annual with all the professional winners (click here for more on this past year's Annual).

So, to get you motivated, here's a list of some Frequently Asked Questions about the competition. If you've got others, post them here or email us at spdstudentoutreach@gmail.com. And don't forget, the deadline is Monday, March 2. Click on for answers to your questions...


WHERE CAN I GET THE ENTRY FORM AND RULES?
Follow this link and it will download as a PDF for you. Entry forms, additional instructions, easy as a click. Do it. You know you want to.


I DON'T LIVE IN THE U.S. IS THIS CONTEST STILL OPEN TO ME?
Heck yes! We've had entries in previous years from as far-flung as Lebanon and Paris... if you represent Canada, Japan, the UK, where ever, we say bring it on! Our requirement is just that you are an enrolled student at an accredited school.


WHAT'S THE DEADLINE? AND CAN I GET AN EXTENSION?
The deadline is Monday, March 2nd, 2009 by 5:00pm. FedEx it, mail it, bring it by our offices yourself ... all of those are great ways to get your entries in on time! And no, there are no extensions, no matter what.


DO I HAVE TO KEEP THE HEADLINES/SUBHEDS THE SAME AS WHAT IS LISTED ON THE ENTRY FORM RULES?
Pretty much. Our goal is to make the playing field as level as we can here -- we want to be sure that the judges are distracted by your visual work and not an attention-grabbing headline you might create.

Now, that being said: of course we get that with most of the categories, you're dealing with a particular place, person, activity or thing, so you might need to change it up a little bit ... as long as you keep the same format/structure, feel free to change the descriptive words a bit.

For example, in the REGIONAL/CITY category, "The hottest BBQ" might not apply so well to, say, Vancouver, so if you decide to change it to "The best skiing", then go for it!

Again, we get that you might feel tied down by these restrictions. Believe us. But we want to see what you do with the DESIGN, not as an editor.



IT SAYS IN THE INSTRUCTIONS, 'YOU DON'T HAVE TO WRITE THE STORY...' BUT WHERE AM I SUPPOSED TO GET THE STORY FROM?

Ah ... the glories of dummy text. Basically, you want to flow some text in there, so that the story is part of your piece, but for the competition's purposes, we don't care about what's actually written there.

We recommend using Lorem Ipsum (also known as "greeking") text, and we encourage everyone to take advantage of the brilliant feature in InDesign that lets you do just that: use the "Fill with Placeholder Text" option under the "Type" menu at the top. Using Quark or another program instead? Then check out the website lipsum.com. You can generate anything you'd like there, in any length. It's a lifesaver.

But, if it helps you in your design to have real copy in there, then feel free to use a story you or a friend wrote, or something you found online. Just make sure that if you take it from a publication or website, then don't use the same photography/imagery they used. This should be your creation, not a reworking of someone else's.


WHAT ABOUT CAPTIONS, SIDEBAR HEADLINES AND OTHER DISPLAY COPY?
These don't have to be brilliantly written, but do make sure your display copy correctly identifies what it is pointing to.

For example, if you have a caption for your main photo of Taylor Swift, then make sure her name is in the caption. The rest of it can be Lorem Ipsum text or you can use a caption from another publication or make it up yourself. Or, if you're doing a sidebar on local politics, make sure that sidebar's headline says something like "Local Politics".

The display copy doesn't have to be well-written or anything more than labels, but it does need to help us understand your intention for the layout. 


IN THE OUTDOORS MAGAZINE CATEGORY, DO I HAVE TO REPRESENT ALL 10 DESTINATIONS IN MY 2 SPREADS?
You certainly can (see last year's winning entry to see how it can be done), but you definitely don't have to ... what we're looking for is for you to establish the direction the entire story would take.

So you could have an opening spread featuring the top destination and then have destinations #2 and #3 on the 2nd spread and then we'll assume destinations #4-10 would be handled the same way. You could even do an opening spread that is more of an intro to the story and doesn't feature any of the destinations on it, and then use the second spread to actually start the story.

It's all up to you ... we just want to see an overall design scheme and pattern.


GOT A QUESTION THAT HASN'T BEEN ANSWERED HERE?
Then email us at spdstudentoutreach@gmail.com or post a reply here. We'll get back to you asap and add your question to this list if it seems helpful to many.

Good luck!
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