Mind Maps
The first one i found, and the most simplest one i found was mind maps. Now mind maps in my opinion are the best ways to help generate an initial idea whether its online or on paper. This way of planning will help branch off ideas and break things down into sections when needed to help stay organized. Another point i would like to bring up about this is that anyone can do it anywhere they would like to. What i mean is that you can create a plan based on pen and paper which is an easy equipment piece to bring around with you when you need to update something thats on your mind. Another way of doing this is online and one website i like to use a lot is Miro.
This site is fantastic for those that like to create a nice looking and well detailed piece of plan. On Miro you have freedom of how you would like your plan to look. I use this site all the time for mind maps as it is one of the best ways to stay organized and a great way to store all of your knowledge without having to take up any space on your computer as this is purley all online. Another great thing about Miro is that multiple people can work on the same planning board as each other. So that means if you want to create a group project with friends then you would be able to hop on Miro and invite your friends to the same planning board as you. This way you can create a great time plan and mind map of your ideas with your friends and be able to stay updated.
Here is a screenshot of one way i used mind maps to help me with a set of models i need to make for this project. This is such a quick and simple way of creating your own mind maps and its fun to do. It is a great way to entertain yourself while planning out some projects. I used note pads to make for that appealing look to them but it allows for a more vibrant plan rather than a boring black and white pen and paper plan. To bring this even further i want to show off how you can organize your work into sections if you would like. So for me, on the bottom image i put my mind maps into a seperate box named specificly mind maps, so that way i can keep track of where my work is rather than having everything all over the place, this just allows me to get to my work easier and no looking around a bunch of images and words trying to find a specific something i need.
Mood Boards
Mood boards is another great method of planning that i ended up using to help me gather some resources to get a better help of my plan. The different types of mood boards i made where the one for all the cars that i will be modelling and this will help me to understand which car is in which class and which ones i should model first. This gave me a great understanding of how long i should take to model each car as this mood board shows off how much work i got to do with these cars. In the end me and my team decided to knock it down from 8 cars to 6 cars as we were slowly running out of time.
For the other mood board, i created this to get me a better understanding of what tracks i want in the game and what style of track in terms of it being a Formula1 track or an off road track. I managed to take a few screenshots of different tracks that would give me a wide variety to help me in the near future. I made sure to get different styles, whether its race style, country side or dirt road. With these images in place it gave me an idea of what models i need to think of to fit the style of track, i noted down some structures i thought were necessary to make sure i have everything down that is important.
Sketches
Another method of planning i used was sketches. Sketching is a great way to plan out something to help get a rough plan of what it is you are going for. In terms of our game we used sketching to create rough ideas of tracks which helps us to understand how big the track needs to be and what the corners are like which will help in the near future for the AI car.
Sketching is a great way to make multiple concepts for one idea which is another reason why i will start to use sketches in projects. The whole idea of sketching give off the idea of coming up with an idea and re sketching until you are happy with it which shows your progress from the beginning to the end.