year long project - 3rd year

 Back in September (my focus moved onto other projects once the year started), I did a quick visual & textual mind map to start the thinking process on what the project could be. I really like the idea of doing different sections, maybe four or five, each based on a different environment - ocean, forest, desert etc. I think that would be a good way of achieving a flow through the book, either that or the four seasons. I'm not sure how the seasons would work, whether I would base the book in one location and perhaps what we can do throughout the year, or change the location to match the season perhaps - the desert in the summer, North Pole in the winter etc. I'll need to do a fair bit of research really before I can get an idea about what will and won't work. I think I want to use the board game aspect as the space for the puzzles and games, rather than a completely separate game as such. I think that could work really well as a way of engaging the reader and making it a...

 A week ago today I visited the story museum in Oxford for some inspiration! I attended a short movie on the history of stories in Oxford and whilst it wasn't that inspirational one thing definitely prevailed from it - the famous, successful books are those set in a world created by the author/illustrator which can't be a coincidence! It makes sense - a world of imagination and excitement to draw the reader in and make them excited to read more. For the idea I have now (getting onto that fully soon enough) there does need to be a connection/relation to the real world for it to make sense but nothing would prevent me from basing it around the 'ideal world' and how to achieve it! Here are a few photos I took at the museum that inspired me: (not in chronological order but it works well enough) This was the first room in the museum, that you are led into by a worker at the museum - after you have chosen a character to be which is an important thing to note - who has taken o...

 With a mind map, that started slow and then suddenly took off! During the summer up until now (June & July) I had many ideas on what I could do and got them all down on paper alongside my general interests, to build upon. I then went to the story museum in Oxford jn the hopes of gaining a bit inspiration which is when the mind map really took off: Straight away I had decided it was going to be a children’s book, with pop-up/interactive elements because I really enjoyed my final project last year and I want to expand on the skills I learnt! Initially I thought about connecting the emotional side of being a kid - wanting to grow up like yesterday, wanting freedom, wanting to do everything your older siblings or parents are doing, compared with pretty much every adult that wants to be a kid again! Or looking at ways in which kids can accept who they are and embrace potential differences as opposed to feeling as if they need to be the same as everyone else to be accepted. These ar...