Doing some researches for a poster project, I stumbled across a book I completely forgot about. Geek, video games lover, and 80’s nerd, let me introduce you to “I love games graphics”, a book by Tsuyoshi Kusano, a book for nerds, by a nerd. The cover is a soft white rubbery embossed game boy, which embodies the content of the book itself: numerous pages of old arcade games and nintendo goods. The book is quite cheap, and really woth the price.

Buy it here!

‘Their is a major disconnect between the life of a design student and the transition to being a design professional.”

Oh yes there is. I look forward to read this book, written by Andre Andreev and G. Dan Covert: sharing the failures and successes of the transition between the paradise of student life and the harsh professional world. There are already a good bunch of essays online,  that I highly recommend  you to read. I love “jobquitting”, “the list” and “how will you know when you are successful.” Everyday, I feel less alone about wondering about my graphic design career questionning. Thank you the internet!

Start anew! Get some resolutions.

I don’t know for you, but maintaining my resolutions trough the week seems unbearable. But… I love to make lists, so let’s try again. ( The point of making resolutions is to discover, at the end of the week, that you’ve been wandering too far from your usual routine to keep them up to date. Isn’t it?)

So this week…

• • Eat more chocolate. Yup, this is a resolution. Reason 1: It’s good. Reason 2: It makes me happy. Period.
• • Finish my sketches on painter. I’ve started a whole lot of sketches a few weeks ago, and never finished them. Painter rocks, and so should I.
• • Do some Wii fit. My mother beated me on the hours spent on the balance board. My gamer’s honor is trampled. Damn.
• • Read the stack of book which is waiting for me. Because it’s time to get some new ones. The bookshelves seems a bit to “usual” these days.

This week’s motto is: stay indoor, it’s raining! Read some good blogs, watch the monthy python over and over again, wait for winter to come and drink a lot of tea. Hmmm, yes this is no help to make an exciting week. But I quite like to be bored. Makes a good conversation starter. 

But please suggest exciting activities for those who are completely depressed by November’s cold and dark days… (Anything other than spending your life in front of a computer might do.) 

Cheers, and stay tunes. This week might be quite interesting.

Too much white space to fill, and no inspiration.

Sometimes, it just won’t work. You get stuck in front of your computer, your paperboard, your painting or whatever… and nothing happens. Creativity is not a constant flow. Sometimes, you just can’t get a drip of it. Sometimes, it just seems that you’ve lost all of your artistic mojo. Sometimes, you feel that it won’t happen again for hours, days, or worst, months.

And that could be quite a problem, since you’re asked to be creative 8 hours/day, 5 days/week. 

There’s not a good and only solution to this problem. A thousand books have been written about this. You know, some kind of “training for the creative mind”, “How to be creative”, “How to be a bright genius”. So what? Does it makes your mind back to work, ready to produce brand new fantastic concepts?
It can help, but you’re probably as unable to produce something brilliant as a few minutes ago.

The mere idea is not to make you back on track in a second. It’s to set you in a better mood, that will probably help you to be a tad more concentrated, and maybe, a bit more creative.

1. Environment is important. Should it be materially speaking or emotionally. When surrounded by stress or by mess, you’re unable to focus on your project. So, maybe a little bit of cleaning may help. Isolate yourself from malevolent people and from malevolent 3 weeks-old pizza slices. Arrange your desk in a pleasant way. Clean your files, and get a brand new nice wallpaper for your desktop. But… don’t clean too much. You don’t want your space to feel impersonal. and don’t forget that something in your mess might trigger some inspiration.  
2. Music is a good way to enhance your creative mood. You should always take a great care of your musical inspiration. Whatever you like, it can have an influence on your creative choices. Setting up a “creative playlist”, respecting your different work phases might help you to overcome your concentration problems.
3. Drink a coffee. Not 12. Or your creativity problem will turn into an addiction problem.
4. Get some inspiration and feed your brain. Look at books, websites, portfolios, magazines, ads, fashion, exhibitions… Anything can trigger your creativity. Make it a way of life: a sharp eye is your first weapon.
5. Go for a walk. Not easy when working in an agency. But make you feel better. In case of real creative lack, go for a walk somewhere farther— foreign country if you can afford it, next town if not. Seeing new landscapes is good for you.
6. Take care of yourself. Designing for someone else can be an ungrateful job. So do yourself a treat and design something for you. Something that YOU like, and that doesn’t fit in the bounds of someone else. And don’t ask advices about it. If you like it, then, that’s good.
7. Enjoy yourself. If you feel that the doomed graphic-designer syndrome will be longer than expected, try to change your way of life. Eat better food, do some sport (yeah, basically, that’s just some kind of random tip) and have a lot of fun. Why? If you are happy and not mourning the decease of your creativity, it should come back within a week. 
8. Don’t let yourself overwhelmed. Just be proactive and do a lot of things. The more you do, the more you get done. It’s worth a try.
9. Share the pain. If you can, share it with the creative team. If you’re alone, then talk to someone you feel confident with. Talking is a good way to have a great weight off your mind. 
10. Listen to your inner voice. Trying too hard to fit in the mold of design trends can reduce your creative power to zero. Try to find your own voice and not to care too much about what others might think. Copying what have already been done might help you for a short period of time, but will probably get in your way at last. That is the most difficult part: Not being re-doing over and over again the same old stuff, but not being too much influenced by stupid trends. Being creative is being able to be yourself, in a sellable way. If your stuck with your designer’s block, it’s probably something deeper that goes wrong. And I am no psych-analyst, so I won’t help you on this point.

If your going trough this right now, good luck. If you’re not, and never have been, consider you lucky! Please share your tips for getting inspired, on a daily basis. Do you watch Tv, play tennis, or sing in the shower?