How did Federico Fellini use his dream notebooks while making films?

Federico Fellini utilized his dream notebooks as a vital creative resource, serving as the raw material for his cinematic visions. As his career progressed, he increasingly embraced fantasy, and these notebooks—which he filled with lavish illustrations of his nocturnal imaginings—allowed him to translate his internal world onto the screen.

Fellini famously described his process by stating, "I close my eyes, and the festival starts," referring to the vivid imagery he captured in his journals. These records became essential tools for realizing the dreamlike and hallucinatory sequences that defined his unique style, particularly as he moved away from his early Neorealist influences toward a more personal, visionary approach to film direction.12