Help me get motivated on my newsletter!

Miscellaneous and Personal Stuff I Must Share
1

See, I’ve got this big Department newsletter to work on. I’ve articles to review and edit, some to create, a format to design, pictures to work on in Photoshop. Ugh.

I’ve got everything I need to get started. Except knowing where to begin.

This is my first big job. My first real test (at least it seems to me) of what I can do with Pagemaker and Photoshop, two programs I’m not entirely comfortable with. Plus, everyone keeps saying, “Oh, we can’t wait to see what you’re going to do. The newsletter is always so boring.” They’ve all been thrilled with my work so far - no complaints, nothing but compliments.

See, the gal that did it before me (who is no longer here) never changed the format or the layout. Never. It’s remained the same for the last 5-6 years. She’d simply drop in new articles and pictures and shoot it off to the printer. And ugly? Shoot, “butt ugly”, if I do say so myself.

Oy! What have I gotten myself into? I’m feeling intimidated. I know the routine: one thing at a time. I’m just not sure where to start. Pick out the font first? Review the articles? Work on the pictures?

Help! I’m open for any ideas and advice that I know our ever-wise Dopers will have.

Also, the rassin-frassin Board is like crack so when I start getting worried or anxious about where to start, what do I do? Yup, go read posts. Practicing my “less work by avoidance” technique. :rolleyes: I’m going on vacation on Thursday and Friday and planning on taking all the articles with me to review, so hopefully I’ll get something done then, but still…

2

  1. Read over the articles. See how much text you’ve got to work with. Think about how you will group them together on each page, how many pages there will need to be.

  2. Design your format. Set up your fonts and master page layouts. It will be soothing and comforting to do this.

  3. Read articles again, do any text editing you need to.

  4. Import articles into your layout. Tweak. Play.

  5. Print draft newsletter, see how it looks on the page. Tweak more. Proofread one last time.

  6. Set it up for the printer, woman!

I am jealous, I love layout and design stuff, I want to learn more of it so I can get a real job.

3

Good ideas, mags.

While getting my oil changed over lunch, I thought I’d print out all the articles, pictures, and tidbits for the articles I’m to write and stick them in three separate files. Then I can start working on them bit by bit. I’m organized to the nth degree and have to have stuff “just so”, sometimes, when I get a little overwhelmed.

Thank you, thank you, thank you!

I like the design aspect too!