Hello. I've created this blog for the Kickstarter website, in order to provide more information about myself and the project I'm requesting funding for.
Prior to this, all of my work has been on my computer's hard drive. Here I hope to present what I'm able to share with you at this point in time, which will hopefully be enough to be approved for this project.
About Myself:
My name is Micah Wakabayashi and I work with middle school students with moderate to severe intellectual and physical disabilities in Honolulu, Hawaii. During my free time, I enjoy photography. I have enjoyed taking pictures and viewing them on the computer monitor for the past 5 years. Presently, I feel that it's time to take the next step and have the photos go to print for more than just my family (my wife, our 3 year old son, and myself) to enjoy.
3 years ago, as a long term class assignment, we started a garden at my school about. In it we have grown daikon radishes, tomatoes, cucumbers, aloe, and more. We started this garden from nearly nothing, and now it is a wonderful place where both students and adults can enjoy.
About the Project:
In brief, this will be an A to Z book with 26 pages (featuring each letter of the alphabet). Each page will feature a poem and photos about something in the garden. After this is completed, I will put the book into an iOS format for the iPhone and iPad, with the same photos, as well as voice-over narration for all of the poems. Finally, I'd like to integrate a website with the book where visitors can enjoy more photos, as well as more detailed information about what's in gardens.
There are 3 important points to this project that make it so unique:
1. Photos - What will make this book stand out from other children's books is that every photo was taken by me. I sorted through about 2000 garden related photos that I took before I thought about this project, and have taken about 2000 more photos for the sake of this project. I hope the photos in my book will be interesting and enjoyable to the children as well as the adults that open it.
In virtually every mass produced children's books with photos, all of the photos are purchased from stock photo companies. Nothing is wrong with this, but it just means that an editor is given a bank account to purchase and assemble a collection of stock photos. These individual photos are often not unique to any book and could even show up in multiple books from various publishers and editors, websites, or company newsletters. Hopefully supporting my project indirectly shows support for other photographers who want to present a collection of unique images for others to enjoy.
2. Poems - Many of my poems are very simple rhymes, but the were all written by me, with young children in mind. It was actually a challenge to keep the rhymes simple enough for the targeted audience, keep on theme (related to gardening), and feature words of each letter of the alphabet. Poetry has been a passion of mine since I was in high school. I'd like to characterize my words as influenced by Seuss, Dickenson, Nirvana, and Weezer.
3. Children - This project was started with the students I work with in mind. I work with students with severe disabilities, and although this shouldn't be the main selling point of this project, I hope that others will see how my heart was put into this project. Due to privacy reasons, I was only able to include photos of my son in the photos.
In addition to exposing the readers to rhyme, the contents of the book, for the most part, are factual. Thus, this project could be viewed as having some educational value to it. As my school's garden was the original inspiration for this book, I'd love to share it with my students as well as with students with and without disabilities all over the world, in school classrooms and in their homes.
Sample Pages:
Here are the samples of the first 4 pages. They will be printed on 7x10inch paper. Font size is Optima. Although these images might look small on the screen, it actually comes out rather large on 7x10 paper and even the smaller photos are viewable at this size. The featured letters are bolded.
The flowers in the main section, as well as the group of pink flowers are Cosmos and are from our school garden. The orange flowers are Marigolds and from the garden in the yard of my apartment.
The pictures of the butterfly and bee were taken at the garden at my school. I love the picture of the bee as it literally walked from one flower to another.
The letter C features cacti. I actually put some research into this book to discover that the plural of cactus, "cactuses" is also an acceptable form (in addition to cacti). Cactuses seems easier to say.
For the letter D, it had to be dirt. This is a picture of my son when he was 2 years old. I was hoping to get a more updated picture of him, but this one really fits the bill. In letter G I advocate the use of gloves in order NOT to get dirty, but boys will be boys. When looking at the picture, you might think that it was a staged shot where I might have ordered, "sit there and pour dirt out of your hand." Unfortunately for his mother who has to wash his clothes, this is something he can and will do for an hour if you'd let him.
I hope that's a great preview for now. As far as the rest of the book is concerned, I have about 3 more letters to take pictures of, and 4 or 5 more letters to write poems form. Also, I need to work on the cover. When this is done, I hope to release the book and then immediately begin on the iOS version of the book. Prior to completing the book, I also hope to have a small website set up, so that I can include its address in the book as well as the iOS book.
If all of this is a success, and I meet any goals that I might have set for myself, I have 2 other A to Z books that I would like to begin. If this garden book is successful, then I would not need to request any more funding, as it would help to fund the next 2 A to Z books that I have in mind.
