Paige Smaga knows how to catch a person’s eye.
Gilroy – Paige Smaga knows how to catch a person’s eye.
Her talent as a visual maestro has helped land her a job as the new night editor for the Dispatch, a role that involves designing the layout of almost every news page.
Crafting a visually pleasing page involves laying out photographs and stories with an eye for balance and symmetry, and highlighting important material by adding boxes of informative numbers and other visual elements. Smaga, who also writes headlines and double-checks stories before pages go to press, said there should be multiple “entry points” into news stories.
“Every day it’s kind of a balancing act,” said Smaga, who graduated in May from New Mexico State University, in Las Cruces.
College gave the 24-year-old a chance to sharpen a range of journalism skills, from editing her school paper to a summer of shooting photos in the highlands of Guatemala. Though she also took courses in public relations and writing, a passion for the visual side of news led Smaga to Gilroy.
“Layout and design are my loves,” she said. “I think we’re definitely becoming a more visual society. … The thing about newspaper design is, the majority is classic, conservative. That’s not a bad thing, but papers are starting to take more chances.”
While editor of NMSU’s school paper, she helped bring its Web site (therounduponline.com) into the 21st century by replacing a clutter of news links and menus – standard fare on most newspaper web sites – with an edgy new look, one that relied on big photos, sound bites and videos.
“Paige has a very creative sense of design and great experience in terms of college and community newspapers,” Dispatch Executive Editor Mark Derry said. “We look forward to her sharing that creativity with our readers.”
Moving to Gilroy was a big change for Smaga, who grew up in a small mountain town in New Mexico. Community papers around her home in Cloudcroft – population 1,000 – offered a possible entree into the world of journalism, but Smaga wanted to head West.
She’s enjoyed trips to New York, Washington D.C. and most recently San Francisco, but Smaga said at heart she’s a small town girl.
“I’m really glad this is my starting point,” she said. “I would love to stay at a small daily like this. I love how they’re so in touch with the local community.”
Smaga takes over the night editor job from Andi Joseph, who after two years moved to the position of assistant editor for the Lifestyles section.
