Mr. Cricket’s Secret is part of Emagination Island, a multi-disciplinary learning adventure system that teaches kids to play with purpose so they find a cause to champion and build books, websites, animated videos, podcasts, and theme park rides to learn how to imagine, create, and give.
Jet Blue’s Soar With Reading Program provides free books to kids who live in book deserts through fun vending machines. When we found out kids in Anacostia, Washington, D.C. only have one age appropriate book per 830 kids, we decided to raise money to create our own book vending machines and trucks to inspire kids about what young people can do.
Our teen Emagineer Avril made this animated mock-up of our Emagination Island book truck filled with our charitable books made by kids for causes they care about.
A boy returns from school, discouraged as he just failed his anatomy test. However, a secret message from our Emagineers gives him hope! This animation sequence was originally created for our Mission Kidz4Life project, which won top 20 in North America from a Steven Spielberg humanitarian contest. Our teen Emagineer, Ian Shang, spent 100 hours animating the full two minute segment with his left hand after accidentally falling on his track spike cleats and stabbing his right one! Our teen Emagineer Avril Jensen amended Ian's footage to help us tell the story of Emagination Island.
I painted a mock-up of how our life-sized Emagination Island hot air balloon playhouses would look in retail and public spaces once filled with our charitable books, animated promo videos, and podcasts made by kids for causes they champion. This is a picture of our hot air balloon from the outside.
This is a picture of our hot air balloon from the inside with animal patrons.
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