Our Photography
All of our campus partners help us tell Ole stories authentically. We believe that authentic photography is a key component of all of our marketing materials. We cherish the opportunity to help you capture events, projects, classroom shots, and other academic and non-academic activities that are part of the St. Olaf experience.
We have a team of photographers (students, staff, and contractors) who help us cover as many requests as we can.
Creative Development Guidelines
Photography needs to capture St. Olaf’s beauty, traditions, people, and community — on the Hill and beyond. For any visual representation we follow the next creative development guidelines.
Video Production
Video has become an increasingly important element of our marketing and communications projects.
We recognize that it can be a great resource to tell relevant stories that engage audiences in a compelling way and we want to work with our partners to identify opportunities to feature their amazing work.
Video can also be a great way to tell Ole stories authentically. It allows us to give a voice to those featured and to capture more details, perspectives, and context relevant to the story. In order for us to be able to prioritize authenticity, we have a process that includes the following considerations:
No Scripting – We shoot our feature videos using a documentary style. We take the time to have long-form conversations with the people featured to give them the opportunity to talk about their experiences at length and in their own voice.
Pre-Production – It is important to us that those featured feel comfortable with the production process. We try to include a pre-production conversation before our video shoots to ensure people are clear about what will be expected of them, share our process and vision, and to answer any questions that they may have.
Post-Production – As part of the process we assure everyone involved that they will be given the chance to approve the edit before it’s published and shared. We hope to keep building a relationship of trust with every member of the community by giving them an opportunity to review our work before it’s shared with the public.
Digital and Print Design
Type
Optimal type size varies depending on medium, audience, amount of copy, etc. In general, larger types are better. To improve readability:
- Avoid hyphenation of words (e.g., do not wrap text).
- Use sentence case for body copy.
- Be mindful of kerning and leading.
- Avoid column widths that are too narrow or too wide.
- Use left-aligned type for long text.
- Break up large amounts of text into chunks by using headlines, subheads and bulleted lists
Color
For readability, there needs to be substantial contrast between the background and text. The best results (i.e., highest contrast) are typically black, navy or blue text on a white background (or vice versa).
Gold should not be used on a white background (or vice versa) because the contrast is not high enough.
To check color contrast, you can turn your computer to grayscale; if the contrast is not high enough, the type will blend into the background. You can also use the color contrast checker offered by WebAIM.
Web and Social Media
To comply with Section 504, a civil rights law, St. Olaf is committed to ensuring individuals with disabilities can acquire information and perform tasks online.
Web Interference
The website interface (design and navigation) was built to comply with WCAG 2.1 AA standards. All pages built within WordPress are accessible from a technical standpoint.
Images
Individual content owners are responsible for ensuring any content added to the website is accessible. For example, adding alternative (ALT) text for images is a key element of web accessibility. In general, alternative text should be contextual, succinct and accurate. Tips about alternative text can be found on the WebAIM website.
Documents and Materials
Content owners must ensure any materials — including PDFs, Word documents or PowerPoint presentations — posted online or distributed electronically are accessible. There are many Follow the PDF Accessibility Guide when creating documents that are accessible for online use.
Videos
All St. Olaf videos must include captions. Video captions make audio content accessible to people who are deaf and hard of hearing, and they also allow all individuals to easily consume the content in environments when their sound must be turned off.
Educate Yourself
Continue to engage in personal and professional development around diversity, equity and inclusion. This could include reading books and articles, following more diverse voices on social media, or attending workshops/conferences.
It is the work of each employee of St. Olaf College to ensure we’re continuously learning more around DEI topics.
We are here to help and support you
We know that this can feel complex and intimidating, but there are multiple ways to collaborate with the community to make sure you are approaching things the right way.
As a general best practice, using students, faculty, and staff as a resource is always recommended. Take advantage of how engaged the Ole community is in conversations that relate to your work. Ask questions from the community and don’t be afraid to start a conversation by admitting a mistake. Being comfortable with being uncomfortable is a great way to grow and develop steps to remain authentic, aspirational, and, yes… inclusive.