Coming Up With Ideas:
Harnessing Your Creative Juices
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In my office, there is a wall near my desk where I pin up important information. Held by a bright yellow thumbtack is an aluminum foil chocolate wrapper with a quote printed on the inside. It has been carefully flattened, preserved, and pinned on my wall because of the message it contains. It says: The best ideas come after you think you've run out of them.
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This has motivated me in three important ways: First, to come up with new ideas when I thought there were none left in me; second, to harness my creativity and apply it to my work; and third, to push myself to create successful graphic solutions I had never tried before.
What was once used to advertise a piece of candy has become to me a daily reference for problem solving. Fortunately, it has also been my inspiration for this month's issue of The Graphic Guru. We are going to explore some thoughts on creative thinking. I will share with you some of the ways that I generate ideas and carry them through to a successful finish. Some ideas and pointers on the following topics: Coming Up With Ideas and Harnessing Your Creative Juices.
Extra Tip: It's also a good idea to keep a bottle of Mr. Bubbles bubble-blowing solution near your desk for stressful moments.
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For me, coming up with the idea can be the most challenging process. I find that when I have figured out what I want to do, the doing of it is really very fun and exciting (sometimes a little too exciting when I am under a deadline). But how do we get the idea, the concept, and just the right solution to the problem at hand? Here are some of the methods that I use, consider how to implement them in your creative process.
First, remember that an idea is a unique thing. Only one person thinks the way you do, and that's you! That means that no one else can come up with the same approach to a graphic solution that you will. That should give you confidence. Because they are your ideas, they will be appealing and fresh - different from all others. That's the real beauty of our work. So, the moral of the story is to be confident in your own idea-developing capabilities and in your ability to make them work. If you are, your client will be too, and you will be hired again.
Next, try some exercises in brainstorming and rapid, loose production of ideas. When I say brainstorming, I mean jotting down all of your ideas as soon as they come into your head. Be free with them, and try not to worry too much if they aren't exactly what you want at this point. The purpose of brainstorming is to get your mind warmed up to creative thinking. Brainstorming can be done in a variety of ways. I prefer to write things down. I keep a note pad at my desk all the time in case I get an idea.
Once you have done your brainstorming, you will most likely have a number of possible rough ideas to follow up on. The next step is rapid, loose production of those ideas. This means just what it says, you will quickly put those ideas into a more refined form and narrow down the one that you want to work with. To be loose simply means to avoid wasting time on unimportant nit-picky details that will be cleaned up later after the idea has been decided on. One way to approach rapid, loose production of rough ideas is to create "Quick'n Dirty" Layouts. These are fast design layouts of your idea either on paper (not larger than 2"x2" each); or in your graphic software (as we learned in last month's edition of Graphic Guru) by simply building a quick block-in right on your computer screen. To sum up, keep in mind the following about brainstorming and Quick'n Dirty Layouts: stay loose, produce rapidly, don't over commit to your rough designs, and gauge your time.
By this point you should have developed many powerful idea possibilities! Your mind will be "in the zone," and you should have your final idea selection made. It's time to talk about harnessing your creativity!
Extra Tip: Don't forget you can surf the Internet for inspiration and ideas in color schemes and designs.
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You are creative! Repeat after me, "I am creative, I AM creative, I am CREATIVE!" That little repetition exercise will prove useful to you in the future. In fact, you may want to stick it into your wall with a bright yellow thumbtack for future reference. Speaking of repetition exercises, that leads us into the first suggestion I want to make to you that will strengthen your designs and allow your creativity to run more freely. The principle is Repetition and Variation.
I will explain repetition by using an example. Notice the three graphics to the right. Each was designed to represent its given page within a single web site, but I still needed to tie all of the pages together. To achieve this, I planned to include certain similar elements into each graphic. For example, the shape of each one is the same. Each has a horizontal bar that gradates from one color to another, each has people about their business, interacting with others, and each is the same size.
These are some things I chose to keep consistent, or in other words, I repeated these elements for consistency. Repetition creates unity and consistency.
Variation, on the other hand, creates interest. It is good to have consistency, but it can become monotonous and boring when left alone; this is where variation comes in to make our graphics interesting. Refer again to the above graphics and try to pick out which elements I have chosen to vary for creative interest. So, when you are thinking of how to approach your new idea in a creative way, try applying what you just learned about Repetition and Variation.
Now, I want to teach something in reference to, well, reference actually. Let's talk about using our reference photographs. Reference photographs are photos that we use when we create graphics. These can come from an image catalog, clip art, or our own photography, and they are used to fan our creative flame. I once heard another "yellow thumbtack saying" that goes something like this: Use your reference, don't let your reference use you. I take that to mean that we don't need to wait for the perfect graphic to come along, but we can use the reference we have and make it work for our purposes. Again, I will illustrate with an example from some work I did some time ago. I have laid it out below to show three steps used to create the graphic in the last image.
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In this case, I was putting together a web site for a real estate company, and I needed a graphic that said "Selling a Home." I did my brainstorming and came up with an idea that I wanted someone carrying a box, as if someone were moving. I must have looked through a couple hundred photographs trying to find the right one. I found nothing that depicted someone carrying a box. Well, I was determined to carry my idea through, and so I found a way to make my reference work for me.
As you can see in the first image, I found a man carrying a pumpkin to a truck. I cut out the truck and the pumpkin using my web graphic software, and as you can see in the second image, I created my own make-shift box in his hands. Notice also how in the third image I have shown you a great advantage of the web. I have made the man and box smaller to be about the size they would appear in my finished graphic. Do you see that the make-shift box I created doesn't look make-shift at all when it is brought down in size and displayed on a computer screen?
Let that be a lesson to us all, when we work on the web we have a great advantage over those who work in print or other forms of visual art - we can fool the eye on the Internet. With a little creativity and understanding of the principle of making the reference work for you, you will create any graphic you need to make your idea happen!
Now, look around your office space, ask yourself how this information will be a benefit to you. Think of what you can add to the list. How can you improve your idea production and the level of creativity you employ? You will create outstanding graphics by application and development of these and your own strategies for effective web design. Remember to simplify, say the most with the least, and persist until you get what you want because the best ideas really do come after you think you've run out of them.
Extra Tip: Save all of your candy wrappers and pin them to your wall. You never know what they could do for you.
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