As part of our ‘object as a narrative’ workshop we were taught the importance of mind mapping at the start of creative projects, to help enhance our creative process and generate as many ideas as possibles before settling on one.
Whether working alone or part of a group mapping and brainstorming preliminary ideas visually is a good way of quickly and effectively generating and recording ideas. It’s there to facilitate the design process. It both affirms the aims of a project and leads to discoveries that can form a base to further activity.
We were given the task to mind map our objects, thinking loosely and instinctively on what words or phrases we associate with them. Not thinking too hard to deeply. And then we tried to make connections within our maps, with the end point of circulating ideas and
Mind maps have the freedom of being whatever you want them to be. They can be very visual and creative, messy, wordy, organised, descriptive, systemed etc.
It is a very popular, common practice within the realms of art and design, especially commercial graphic design.
Before delving into this task I already used mind mapping as a means of starting my projects; academically and personally. But it was really useful and interesting to learn the science behind them.
Yolanda Wafaquani’s Graphic Design Blog 