I Designed A Presidential Campaign Without Losing My Mind.

[I am sad. I typed this once and it all deleted. So I am back.]

Does anyone actually like campaign season? I kind of hate it.

For those that don’t know, every spring at my illustrious HBCU surely as daylight savings approaches you can guarantee that some brave soul will rise up and strike the first GroupMe message inviting you to join their campaign team.

These brave candidates are commencing what we call Campaign Season. Campaign Season is a two month stretch where students campaign for our large on-campus organization executive board positions. Student Government Association (SGA) kicks it off, followed by Student University Activities Board (SUAB) and Resident Housing Association (RHA).

Along with inquiring help from friends, family and our local community, candidates scout the brightest photographers, videographers and graphic designers on campus to help create their materials.

Before the pandemic on top of creating digital assets, candidates would dorm storm. Dorm storming is when candidates and their teams storm on-campus dorms, knocking on each door to promote themselves and the platforms they are running on. For obvious reasons that method of campaigning hasn’t been the most efficient, so the importance of digital materials has skyrocketed.

This year even with opportunity to dorm storm again, I still felt the anticipation and a bit of anxiety about the season.

Campaign season places an immense amount of pressure on the artist and creatives tasked with creating flyers and graphics. If we take on the job we have to push out a ton of work, on tight deadlines with very limited budgets.

This is why I have always steered clear of campaign season.

Beyond reposting flyers, I have never wanted to direct or shoot an SGA campaign solely because of the stress that comes with it.

This year was different.

Since January I have been applying and interviewing for an internship for this upcoming summer. That process was long, tiring and extremely draining. For one single position there could be up to 3 rounds of interviews and within each round I would have to speak to 1-3 different people in the department.

I say all this to say, I knew once it was all over I needed my announcement to be big. I wanted to present it in a unique way, considering my last internship announcement was one of my most liked post on Instagram last year.

For a while I was really set on a draft night theme. I thought it would be cool to announce “where I would be taking my talents,” but when I declined my interview with the NBA and accepted another offer I thought the concept might not make the most sense. So I put it back on the shelf to revisit another time.

Ironically, the week after, I sat down with one of my besties, Caiya Wiltshire, because I promised I would help creative direct her campaign concept.

When she told me she had been thinking about some kind of basketball, draft night theme, I knew it was a match made in heaven.

After one of the best, most thorough planning sessions we were able to fully flush out our idea.

From the location and wardrobe to our photo inspiration and the shot list we made sure that we both had something to physically reference for preparation and while on set.

Even though we didn’t do everything, the fact that we had it all down in detailed writing helped me to be more confident going into the first shoot.

I knew that this would be a large, multi-part project so I wanted to make sure that I didn’t get overwhelmed. (Spoiler alert, I still got overwhelmed)

First we met on the blacktop.

I personally think this shoot could have went a lot better. I wasn’t as prepared as I could have been. Before the shoot I should have practiced with my external flash on my newer camera, but unfortunately I didn’t carve out any time for it. I brought both my canon eos 50d and my 5DS to shoot with. The problem I ran into was the lighting. We knew it would be dark outside so I planned on leaning heavily into my flash. When we got outside and my external flash wasn’t working I had two options. I could either use my older camera and skimp out on the quality or I could shoot with my newer camera that would capture more detail. I opted with no flash and shot with my 5DS.

I think the photos came out okay, but they were a bit too grainy for my personal taste and we didn’t get all the shots we intended.

I forgot to bring my spare battery so I wasn’t able to capture all of the movement shots before my battery died. I got some, but I didn’t love them.

It was a struggle to capture sharp images of her movements with the lack of light. The lower my shutter speed, the brighter the images, but they weren’t sharp because my shutter was open for too long. The longer or smaller the shutter number, more light entered but you could see the movement in the shots, and that is not what I wanted.

Overall I don’t hate these photos I just know that I can shoot on the blacktop again & they would be much better. I could have edited them better as well, had I had more time to sleep on the edits and come back with fresh eyes. Maybe next time I can do something more conceptual and hopefully with my flash.

For our studio shoot, I wanted to be more prepared.

Though the first shoot wasn’t bad, it also wasn’t amazing. I did not feel as excited as I could have, and that is very important for me. If I don’t feel the passion and energy from start to finish the execution will not translate through all the assets.

Going into the second shoot I made sure that both of my batteries were plugged up first thing in the morning. I packed my bag and even printed out our initial outline to reference. I was feeling good. With both my camera’s ready to go (or at least I thought) I headed to Picture Studios to create our own little Draft Night.

I’m just gonna start off with the fact that I LOVE these photos.

I thought my camera batteries had been charging all day, but I came to find out that there was a shortage in the charging cord. This forced me to get creative and think on my toes. Thankfully we got in the studio a few minutes early. During set up I replugged my batteries, made sure they were charging and got a little bit of juice.

During the shoot I changed out my batteries as they died and surprisingly it did not affect my performance. I shot with confidence. No need for the flash because we had studio lights, we maximized our full hour. Zooming through our shot list, I was able to find a rhythm.

There was only one hiccup with the lighting. Whenever she would put her head down it would get really dark. I’m sure that If I had more time in the studio I would have been able to play around with my settings to find my sweet spot.

I think the photo of her leaning on the basketballs makes for good BTS.

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In regards to editing the photos it took quite a lot out of me.

For some reason I just couldn’t decide on what colors.

I was having trouble finding my balance and still telling the story.

When it comes to my digital photos, I like to look at them as a canvas from a coloring book.

I give myself the space to paint a picture over something that already exists. While I am in the studio choosing my angles and checking off my desired shots I am also keeping in mind the choices I will make in the future with my edits.

I love film, but I don’t edit those photos. What I see is what I get and I am okay with that. That’s the reason why I didn’t go with that route for this project. I wanted to be the one to curate the colors, lighting and contrast. I needed to be hands-on so that I could tell this story from start to finish.

My butt was glued to my chair for a few days. For some reason I couldn’t get my colors the way that I wanted them. I teetered between deep blue-green and warm orange-red highlights, tones and shadows. Both felt a bit too dramatic for this set of photos.

This was Caiya’s draft night not her first time at the circus. Though I like my photos to be playful and saturated this particular set needed something a bit more muted. I didn’t want her skin to be washed out though, and that’s really where the challenge lived.

After about six different versions and a lot of bouncing around, I finally landed on the color grade and from there everything was smooth sailing. I corrected my lighting, contrast, brightness, highlights etc. and I was ready to turn the photos into flyers.

I actually really enjoyed making these flyers.

Extremely time-consuming it took up my whole weekend & spilled into the beginning of my next week, but I enjoyed every minute of it.

Mentally locked-in to my computer, I designed a total of 19 graphics using a combination of Adobe PhotoShop, Phonto, Picsart, and Canva.

I am sure I could get it all done in one program, but some programs were easier for certain functions, and like I said before I was on a time crunch. I opted to do what was easiest for me and that required bouncing from program to program depending on the specific graphic I was creating.

From Adobe Lightroom I imported a few of my photos into Photoshop to be stretched out. I needed more surface area to use for the background so I could cover it with all the required information. I used the Free Transform + Dissort tool.

After that I imported the edited photo into Phonto on my iPad. I am a very hands-on person. (Literally) When getting to the small details, it was just easier to use my fingers to place the words where I needed them to be.

The only graphics I made in Canva were there backgrounds from the story game post. (Those were also imported into Phonto so I could add the text)

The initial flyer got great feedback! Caiya shared the metrics with me and I was so happy that so many people not only loved it but were eager to share in support of her campaign. I think it is truly amazing to know over 300 people shared this flyer with their followers. There is no telling how much the total reach actually was. And this is not counting her other post that followed.

Also we have to keep in mind that she was running unopposed. All of our work was purely driven by passion to connect with more people and share our creative ideas.

After digital materials went live I just waited for a while. I knew that I wasn’t going to post about my involvement until the campaign was completely over. I wanted to give Caiya the opportunity to share everything first. (Obviously)

This gave me a chance to look at the other candidates campaign materials.

This year, like the others, candidates came with their A-game. From Princess & The Frog and Hidden Figures to Telfar Bag Security and Dream Girls, there were a ton of strong concepts. I am sure if Caiya had opponents she was running against her rollout would have been more extravagant. Some candidates had music videos while others had giveaways. I could tell there was passion behind their yearn to win.

When given the oportuntity to meet potential voters up close and personal in one central location they did not disappoint.

This led my camera and I to the Meet The Candidates Rally.

I wanted to be a fly on the wall capturing students in their natural element. Interacting with each other desperately hoping to connect in the span of two hours.

It was a challenge to become completely embedded into my environment and capture the physical world around me, but you can read more about that HERE.

As announcement day came upon us I was excited to hear who would take the crown and reign next school year.

A few days after the rally, candidates assembled with their teams in the student center with one last hope of convincing students to vote for them.

I honestly hadn’t seen that many students in the student center during the day in a while. I could taste the excitement and see the faint wrinkle lines from forced smiles. Dressed in business professional, I could tell the candidates a part from us “common folk.” They walked with their heads held high.

And at approximately 6pm we gathered for the moment everyone had been waiting for.

Student spilled on and over the railings as the winners were announced. I watched as the candidates accepted their victory or defeat. Cheers and chants rang through the student center as students populated every inch of the iconic yellow stairs. Some of the members from the current e-board joined us to witness who would take their spots for the upcoming year.

Caiya was not in attendance because she already knew the position was hers and she had a prior obligation at the same time. When asked about how she felt about the campaign went she told me, “I absolutely loved campaign season, but more specifically, I loved my flyers. I was so proud of my flyers because it drew people's attention to my campaign and my platform. I am so excited for the next school year because I truly want all of the seniors to reach their goals next year, and I believe I can help them achieve it!”

Caiya’s passion for serving our school and community is apparent and I am equally as excited to see all the many great things she will do as senior class president.

Courtesy of Lindsey Dobson

As for me, this project has taught me patience.

I usual pump out projects in a matter of hours, maybe a few days, but never working on something consistently over a month when life is really doing its thing on me.

With every small photo set that contributed to this story I was able to explore a new skill, learn a bit more about myself and tell a smaller story within the larger one.

This project served as an escape for me when I was overwhelmed with school and my internship.

Walking away from this experience I am excited to collaborate more.

Before this project collaborating always looked like someone guilt tripping me into executing their idea. People have this sense of entitlement over me and my skills and frame it as admiration.

My photos are my art. I am artist and when I pick up the camera I want to create something that I am proud to share and add to my portfolio that will exist far beyond my physical existence. I am not a service provider. I don’t take photos to make a living. I use those photos in other mediums to make my money & it works for me. So if I am going to work on a project I want there to be fire and passion behind it from start to finish.

This experience was refreshing, but I don’t think I want to do it again.

For now I am more than okay never revisiting campaign season outside of being a voter.

Courtesy of Lindsey Dobson

It took me more hours than I can remember over the course of a month and 6 days to complete this project. I spent about 5 hours shooting the photos for the four different parts of the project, and a ton of hours editing each set of photos.

This is the longest and largest personal project I have done this year.