Alma Staklin

The main character for my children's story book, Alma Starklin. She's eleven years old, but that doesn't discourage her from following after her dreams of becoming a great scientist. She carries around her feild journal with her everywhere in case anything where to happen. She finds great comfort in the outdoors-well more the sky more than anything. She lives in a flying house that harbors herself, her old Grampa Jean, her mom and her grandma.Alma's quite the adventurous girl as expected of someone aiming to be a scientist. but because she's still quite young she's naive to some aspects to the world around her and doesn't take the time to stop and think about her actions.

Storybook rough draft

• (The word count with the first part comes up to about 1400 words (aka, I did good)
  
  
  The story is told in a diary format as a field journal (think a la Diary of a Wimpy Kid and so on so forth
• Story holds a type of stem focus- this one being physics concentrating on flying
• Story’s main character is a girl named Alma (10-12 years of age) whose documenting her experimentations with trying to fly so she can see the world like the birds she’s been studying
• https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3So7OMwNgy8 - (note to use this link when learning explaining flying and how animals like birds do it)
• The second main(-ish) character would be Alma’s strange Grandfather who is a scientist. He’ll help to push Alma into learning the Science behind flying

(Note: There’s a little opening sequence establishing the setting and character of Alma before first Journal entry)

June, 26 Entry #1

Hello! If you’re reading this it means you’ve just wandered into the field journal of the Great Scientist Alma Starklin…...well I guess I’m not exactly a scientist yet, but one day I will! The thing is to be a scientist I actually have to do experiments and stuff right?.....Well I don’t have anything like that, but I will! It’ll be amazing everyone will see.

June, 30 Entry #2

So sorry for not writing in my Scientific Diary ( my siblings keep saying it’s just a journal, though that doesn’t sound nearly as cool in my book). I think i’ve made a breakthrough though and this being where all my thoughts can be kept, I think I can share it here. Okay, okay enough stalling from this inventor….I’m going to fly. I know, sounds sorta weird right? I can’t help it though I mean have you ever just seen a bird soar across the sky and just think, why can’t that be me flying so high up above the sky. But I’m an inventor. I’m not just suppose to think, I’m suppose to do. Maybe I should tape my sketches in this page?

         July 1 Entry #3

Greetings from bird women Alma! (I’m really liking the ring to that: Great Scientiest Bird Girl Alma Staklin!...maybe that’s a bit of a mouthful though? Naming’s so complicated). Anyway, I started making my very own wings! Who’s going to fly if they don’t have a pair of wings on their back? I don’t have much to work with, but I was able to scrap some carboard boxes from mom aannnndddd even found some glue and feathers. That is all you need to fly right? It’s time to get to work either way

     July 2 Entry #4

Well my loyal readers things didn’t go as I planned…...persay. Actually they didn’t go at all like I planned which is a huge bummer. I don’t really understand. I jumped like I was supposed to. I waited until the late afternoon breeze was picking up like I was suppose to. I had my wings secured like I was suppose to. So why didn’t I fly? Instead, I fell back onto rubbery ground like I wasn’t suppose to do. I got in trouble like I certaintly wasn’t suppose to do. And now I’m writing this from my room as the birds pass me by and fly off into the sunset while I sit by with my arm wrapped and bandaged which is never what I expected to happen.

But I’m okay.

July 5 Entry #5

I sat on my swing at the edge of the world for what seemed like hours very frazzled. (Note: no my swing isn’t actualy at the edge of the world, but when you sit on it it surly looks like it and at the moment it’s the closest I’d be getting to flying). That’s when Old Grampa Jean came around with his beard scarf flopping awkwardly in the wind. It was hard to make out where his mouth was or for that matter if Old Grampa Jean even had a mouth, but I could hear him begin to speak to me.

Him: Someone out here has a long face and I’ll give you a hint: it isn’t me. What’s wrong? Isn’t the great scientist Alma suppose to be out gathering new knowledge?

Me: I am!...Well I was. It’s complicated. Sorta. Kinda. No. Yes it is.

Him: Seems you’ve yourself in quite the conundruem (Notes: I’ve found this means a situation).  What’s the problem you’ve found yourself trapped in.

Me: I can’t fly! But I should! I did everything right: Glue, cardboard, feathers. I still can’t fly though.

Him:....hmm Alma have you asked anyone how to fly?

Me: No, why would I? I already know how the birds and such fly.

Him: How so?

Great Scientist Alma’s theory of Flying: Flying is very simple. All you need is a pair of big wings and some wind. If you have wings these little bit sized fairies come under your wings and lift you up so you can go as high as you want without falling and then they lift you down when you’re ready to stop

He laughed.

The actual Science of flying: It’s not magic. It has nothing to do with fairies. It doesn’t mean it’s not an amazing thing. Birds are perfect to look at when thinking of flying, that part is right. Their wings it’s what allows them to fly. Look at a bird’s wings very closely and what do you notice? They all have this sort of curve to them, but don’t overlook it, that’s actually very important. When flying through the air that curve allows for more air-not fairies- to catch on the bottom of the wing rather than the top. More air below the wing means the bird is being pushed up which means that little guy can fly.

I think maybe there’s still hope for me

July 6 Entry #6

Happy news from great scientist Alma! Old Grampa Jean isn’t as completely uncool as I thought. So far he’s letting me into his old workshop to work on “usuable wings” as he puts it. To me the place just looked like a pile ‘o junk and metal, but Old Grampa Jean showed me differently. He scrapped up a few metal sheets and went to work.. I was astounded as he changed the clunky metal scrapes into a tiny unmoveable bird.

Me: How do you do that?

Him: Time, patience, and work

I started to get to work on my own project-with the help of Old Grampa Jean of course. We set the metal for my new wings. Old Gramps Jean says it’ll be the “Frame” for my wings or something like that then brings a more flexible material that’ll go in between the frame.

That night I stay up all night because honestly I’m too excited to stop.

July 8 Entry #7

Well it’s time now.

My new wings are ready.

My clothes are smoothed and ready to ride the soft breezing wing

My harness is ready

My heart is thumping so hard I could probably hear it if I stopped to pay enough anttention, I could even make a song out of the fast paced beating

My head feels dizzy as if I might puke or maybe I’m just excited?

I wonder if I’m ready?

No that’s not possible, I am ready; I’m the Great Scientist Alma!

----

It’s amazing. The wind’s tickling my face and lifting me up in a way just a few days ago I didn’t think possible. When I look to my left and right I can see the birds flying with me as if I was just another bird on another early morning flight. I feel as if I never want to come down never want to stop. In the sky is where I belong.

That night I’m sitting on my swing at the end of the world. I’m swinging back and forth feeling the air hit my face. It wasn’t quite like flying, but it was pretty close. Old Grampa Jean came around out of the house with a plate of food- probably some dinner. He handed me a cup of chocolate milk.

Him: So you got what you wanted?

Me: Mhm

Him: Why do you look so deep in thought then?

Me: Thinking about where I want to go to next

Him: Go to next?

Me: Mhm...When I was up there I saw something….I saw planets...I know what I want to do next.

Dragon Concepts

These are Dragon concepts for the robotic's team new direction, an animatronic dragon. They were thinking about key features such as horns, Asian inspired sort of (a la the way it's colored/color selection and the furry esque whiskers).  They were also thinking about an ice dragon witch is why the two at the top have some heave blues going into their skin tone.

The 2nd quarter propsal

As first quarter of school has come and gone, I have to look back on everything I've done so I can plan out what my second quarter will look like. These first weeks I've gone in a few things: I started a character month where each month I'd plan and map out a character (had to be discontinued because I had a lot of other things to get done, but I did enjoy it), I started concept designing for the robotics teams, designing dresses for the TSA Fashion team and starting on my own TSA challenge, a children's storybook. As well I also had to work in photoshop to do "Digital Selfies" or redoing a picture of ourselves in photoshop to add a cooler effect to it. Looking back I really enjoyed doing all of that. Now looking to what I'll be doing for second quarter I'm thinking of mostly buckling down and focusing on my storybook- at the moment it's the most important and encompasses what I love to do the most; as well in my spare time I want to learn how to work in photoshop's photo manipulation tools since I feel knowing how to photo manipulate and warp an image with composition and such will benefit me in the long run of my concept design and knowledge of photoshop overall. Of course I'll keep doing concept work- especially because robotics team has started a wwwhhooollleeee knew concept about dragons and I'm not missing out on a chance to design a dragon- because I know that's what I want to do with my life. I want to design things whether it be for video games or fashion or robotics or books or even simple animation. I just love to see the things that I create come to life.

Children's book update

Having gotten a name and more of a personaility for my Children's book character, I began on drawing her final look after looking through the roughs I drew for her. I went with the concept of her being in this more victorian era dress, but bundled with warm clothing because of the high altitude she lives in.

As well, I'm about almost done with the "script" a.k.a the rough draft for the story. So far I'm up to 6 entries with barely 900 words, which means I'm doing pretty good since I have to have at least 11 pages with the whole book coming up to 1500 words or else I'll get penelized.