Formstorming is a creative process in which artist’s and designers gather information and/or material that will help to form creative ideas. The idea of formstorming is to help designers think outside of the box so-to-speak, and see things in unique and unorthodox ways by triggering ideas that go beyond familiar.

In this image taken form Linda Barry’s What It Is, she poses the question, “What is a story made of?” This is a great way for a designer to begin the formstorming process, by asking a question and grabbing visual representations of possible answers to the question. The more possible answers and different angles of approach used, the more unique, creative, and groundbreaking the ideas that are triggered will be. You can see that she has compiled several images around the question that are possible answers to what she see’s as elements or iconic images in storytelling.