Writing Captions

Believe it or not, you won’t remember a lot of your classmates ten years from now. Capture their history with strong captions.

by Susan Duncan

Pine Tree High SchoolLongview, Texas

Yearbook captions are probably the most widely read part of your book.

Therefore, they deserve your best effort to adequately

explain what’s going on in the picture and to give

background information and interesting facts which the

reader will need to get the full picture.

Formula

1st sentence– Tell what’s happening in

the photo in present tense.

During the first leg of the race on the Gladewater course, junior Katelyn Stark establishes her pace.

2nd sentence– Give a sentence of

background information or an interesting statistic- a specific your reader

probably would not know.

This can be in past tense.During the first leg of the race on the Gladewater course, junior Katelyn Stark establishes her pace. The cross country runner finished 15th in the girls’ division and helped the team win the first place trophy.

3rd sentence—Give a second specific or get a direct quote from

someone in the photo or someone connected to the

action in the photo.During the first leg of the race on the Gladewater course, junior Katelyn Stark establishes her pace. The cross country runner finished 15th in the girls’ division and helped the team win the first place trophy. “I love to run the courses,” Stark said. “The early Saturday mornings are a killer though.”

Don’t begin all your captions in the same way.

Vary grammatical patterns. For example, use subordinate clauses or infinitives to begin captions.

Avoid beginning captions with participles, articles, prepositions or a student’s name.

Tips

Avoid “be” verbs as main verbs.

Don’t use gag captions or

state the obvious.

Don’t mention the photographer or the

camera in your caption. If a photo is available, somebody

that photo with a camera so the information is

redundant in the caption.

Identify everyone (not just students) in the photo with first and

last names unless you have a large crowd

shot.

Everyone in the photo should also have an identifier like coach

Bubba Johnson, Superintendent

James Horseradish, senior Jeff Jetson.

Do not use the name of the school, the

mascot name or the school year in your

captions.

Avoid the words “this year.”

Don’t editorialize. (e.g. Way to go!, Go

band., Yeah, Bulldogs., The team had a great year.)

Use strong nouns and verbs.

In the final moments as the football team squeezed past League City, 14-13, they realized they had won their first state championship. The crowd made the stands tremble with its collective jump as the final horn sounded proclaiming their team the victors. “The emotions rocketed, and the popcorn flew like confetti,” senior Jeb Morrow said. “I’m glad no one got hurt in the celebration.”