how it began.
About a year ago today, I gave myself a challenge. I doodled all the time in meetings, waiting for meetings, waiting for people to come to the meetings, in taking notes, in drawing out user flows, IAs, concepts, characters, story boards. My life in full time employment, left me with an awful lot of doodle time. Last year I took a photo with the Hipstamatic App of one of my doodles. Dumped it into Photoshop and started to play around creatively. Thats when I said to myself, ‘I’m going to create one of these characters every week. So I did. Still working full time, married and raising 3 kids. I kept doing an illustration a week. Week after week I managed to finish one. Sometimes I’d get behind do to vacations away, completing my work obligations (earning a living). In all fairness, I didn’t complete the full digital finals all in 2011. Yes, I had to finish off a couple of weeks, in the new year. However, I’m not changing the title to 53 weeks =…
if you’re going to say it.
This is however a challenge met and fully completed. For all my years in the graphic communication industry I have met hundreds of “creative” people. Quite a few of them have told me about creative projects outside of the 9 to 5 that they are currently doing or even more common, WANT to do. Friends from college, peers and friends in the industry, all types of people have projects like this 52 weeks challenge. Yet they all don’t follow through, and so we as the friends and peers who said “that sounds like a great idea.I’d love to see that when you’re done!” Never get to see it, and that’s a shame.
you have to mean it.
So I say to all creative people or better yet to all people in this time of new year resolutions. Make yours a creative challenge to yourself. That if you have a creative idea that you’d like to express. Don’t just think about it, make it real.
Everybody always has great ideas, great creative thoughts, great little projects to do in their spare time, outside of the 9 to 5. However to actually accomplish this you have to mean it by making it part of daily life. Personally, I set out a plan to have doodled something I like by Wednesday of each week, that allowed me a couple of days to create the final digital piece. It was doable, an attainable timeline. Then all I had to do was, DO IT.
self accomplishment.
For some people it easier said than done. The reward however of self accomplishment, pride and not to mention something to blog about and share. Plus, you’ve done it because you wanted to and it was fun. This is a feeling that so many people I have worked with over the years, don’t get to feel. Yes, we accomplish creative projects, but we need to wait to see if it wins an award, or if the clients are finally happy, does it win us the business. All admirable accomplishments, but was it your own idea? No outside influence what so ever. Just you and you alone being creative and showing the world what you can do. This is an accomplishment that gives a meaning of being.
Yes, I’m creative.
walk the talk.
So many people have the word creative in their title, they work in the “Creative Dept.” Yet outside of the 9 to 5. What creative project are you work on? This is a question I have asked people for years. For those of you who are showing portfolios, are you showing off how creative you are as a person, or the creative you’ve done as a part of the “Creative Dept.” When I review portfolios, I look for the creative, period. Work examples everyone has those, I want to see what makes you really creative? I hope that the person can accomplish the type of work that is done in the “Creative Dept.”. That’s a given, that’s why a project like this 52 week challenge is more useful than one would think. The fun of working in a creative industry, is that you have the opportunity to bring the passion of your own personal creative expression into your daily job. The more this crossover happens the happier your life can be creatively, the really great self accomplishments come into play on a more regular bases, before the award shows. Try it, show how creative you are.
To view all 52 Characters They are HERE. Enjoy.
