ファブリス Wrote:Haha, I like the welding man sketch (dissolve).

I've been thinking often of what RtK would look like as a picture book. In particular I'm wondering how effective it could be. I think the quality of the artwork would make a difference though, so far as it is not drawn by you. It would have to be striking, but it could be like watercolor with a "dreamy like" atmosphere, or really saturated and bright and full of angles. Or maybe the style could change per image to really sink the emotional appeal of the story. It would certainly be awesome to browse through. But it would take a lot of effort and I think the artwork could make it or break it... come to think of it... perhaps the artwork should be utterly simple and even childlike, as that would leave more room for imagination.

It's not the same as that kanji picture book, where you liken the shape of a character to that of images. That's definitely not RtK approach. A RtK picture book would be like a picture book of a memory palace, each picture represents the "code" used in the characters and thus the primitives would appear again and again, but as we know in RtK just because a primitive is called "box" it doesn't have to look exactly the same way each time.

Does anyone know of such attempts been made before ? Books of visual mnemonics ?

Nukemarine Wrote:The Kanji-Pict-o-Graph is pretty close, but he drops the ball big time. When I think about it, doing an abbreviated version of say Grade 1 and 2 Kanjis (in RTK order or close to it with additional kanji and primitives to cover them) as a RTK pictograph and story book would sell very well. Parents would get it for their kids, then realize they can use it too.

Actually, I really think that a Flash version of stories would work also. What I picture in my head is the picture version of the story animated in the background, the actual stroke order done in the foreground while a narrator tells the story and gives any extra information (such as what the keyword actually means and other stuff to insure accuracy along with memorization). Such a thing is beyond any ability of mine, but I can see it being the best way to get this method to a wider public (posting it on Newgrounds or something).

skinnyneo Wrote:I think that because I am drawing these myself that they stick. If the pictures were done by another person and you just looked at them they would have to be done in a very vivid style so that they would stick in your mind. Kinda of the "do" method of learning compared to the "sponge" method.

nac_est Wrote:

skinnyneo Wrote:I think that because I am drawing these myself that they stick. If the pictures were done by another person and you just looked at them they would have to be done in a very vivid style so that they would stick in your mind. Kinda of the "do" method of learning compared to the "sponge" method.

It's not really who draws the picture that matters, but whose the concept story is. It's the same reason why heisig's own stories don't work as well as personal stories.
As I said, I had my girlfriend draw a few stories that I provided her, and that worked fine.

Katsuo Wrote:Here's one for koro/goro 頃 "about that time" no. 2791 (quite a common kanji that's in RTK3).

Story: An alarm clock with a unique design: You set it for, say, 7:00 am, and at about that time the clock reaches out with a spoon and hits you on the head.

ファブリス Wrote:I've been thinking often of what RtK would look like as a picture book. In particular I'm wondering how effective it could be.

nac_est Wrote:It's not really who draws the picture that matters, but whose the concept story is.

Matthias Wrote:Here is a good example of the combination of the two concepts:
http://www.mystere-des-kanji.com/

Nice, isn't it?

I guess it can be very effective: A picture says more than a thousand words - and obviously helps to remember.