Designers:Brandon Brown
For my capstone project, I decided to create a picture book to help terminally ill children. The idea behind it is to tell a story about a child looking to return a star to its home and, along the way, meeting different characters representing the 5 stages of grief. Through this, parents are able to explain heavy subjects relating to their situation to the child through a nonthreatening and comforting medium.
This is the design for the cover of the book. I decided to go for a more minimalistic approach, which fits with the melancholy nature of the story. With that in mind, I plan on making a more elaborate and colorful dust jacket to accompany it, which will complement the more minimalistic cover. Overall the design is modest yet charming and fits the theme of the story beautifully.
The following is one of the first spreads of the story and also one of my favorite illustrations. This is where the main character finds a fallen star, which starts off their journey to return it back to its home. The story is very metaphorical, but the main character represents the terminally ill child reading the book. The star represents the hope that I aim to instill into them despite their circumstance.
Another spread that I decided to present as a stand-alone illustration so that all the small details can be seen. This is the first stage of grief - denial. Throughout the story, the child helps the stages of grief come to terms with their emotions. This also helps parents explain the feelings the child may be feeling and how they might handle them.
The main antagonist of the story is the representation of the bargaining stage. In researching this project, this stage is the longest and most challenging to get through, so I felt that turning it into a villain would be appropriate. In this case, bargaining is a witch who has stolen the star piece from the child, forcing them to bargain for it back, Representing the struggle the reader might be experiencing.
