On June 23, HBU-UCLan held a symposium on the development plan for Baoding's cultural tourism and animation industry at the C5 Teaching Building. Zhao Shengnan, Director of the Baoding Cultural Tourism Bureau, and Deputy Director Zhang Yuan led their industry team to attend the meeting. They were joined by our college's Dean Lv Yi, Vice Dean Fu Hongyan, Animation Course Leader Charlotte Blacker, Deputy Head of Media Department Huang Fan, and animation faculty.

Director Zhao Shengnan systematically elaborated on the development plan for Baoding's cultural tourism and animation industry, emphasizing the core strategy of empowering urban image enhancement through culture. She shared the design of "龙小保," Baoding's urban anime character spokesperson, which integrates the auspicious imagery of the dragon with landmarks of Baoding, positioning it as a key vehicle for the integration of culture and tourism. In her address, Director Zhao specifically highlighted the need to activate Baoding's ancient cultural DNA through animation IP and to build an industrial ecosystem chain centered on "creativity + cultural tourism."

As a team member in the production of Ne Zha 2 and founder of Wuhan Zhenqishe Animation Company, Yang Siqi (Gery), an outstanding 2019 graduate of our college, provided professional suggestions based on cutting-edge experience in the animation industry. She suggested that the "龙小保" image could be developed into a cross-media cultural symbol by optimizing its visual recognizability and constructing a multi-scenario application system, and she proposed several optimization plans on the spot. Yang stated that Zhenqishe would continue to support the development of Baoding's cultural tourism, animation industry, and IP content in the future.

This symposium focused on in-depth discussions regarding the construction of an animation industry base. Dean Lv Yi stressed the importance of leveraging our college's advantages in Sino-British joint faculty resources and creative practical teaching curricula. Both parties clarified their commitment to advancing the animation industry base and promoting the deep integration of "龙小保" IP derivative development with talent training.

This symposium marks a critical step in the collaboration between our school and the Baoding Cultural Tourism Bureau. Starting with "龙小保," and leveraging the international creative resources of HBU-UCLan, both sides will establish a long-term cooperation mechanism to jointly cultivate benchmark cultural tourism and animation projects with national influence.