STAY CREATIVE PEOPLE!

You must see this cool and inspiring video 29 ways to stay creative by Tu-Fu Motion Graphics Studio. I love the message, it made me want to start a project (or finish one) as soon as it was over. BUT I was extra impressed with the motion graphics and the fact that the whole video was done in arial font. Check it out and get creative!

I've also got some tips of my own that may help inspire :)


1. Try working somewhere new. Instead of sitting in your usual chair at your usual desk, find a new nook to work in. Change of scenery always feels like a fresh start to me. It doesn't matter how big your home/office is, you can find a new environment (work outside, on the floor by a window, in the bathtub, on your roof)


2. Get a new sketchbook. If I feel like I've been in a creative funk I treat myself to a new sketchbook. I do the same thing with gym clothes, if I've been bad about working out, a new racer back tank top will put some pep in my step. Because of this habit, I buy small notebooks so I don't feel guilty if I can't fill up all the pages and I often go back to old books.


Attached to this idea, I like to buy different shape sketchbooks every now and then. This challenges you to spread across the pages in a different way than your used to.

binderwerk, quattro, molskine, rhodia pads, heritage wirebound

3. Sketch in pen. This was taught to me at SCAD and while it's very frustrating in the beginning the pay off is worth it. Since I've started to brainstorm and sketch in pen I have become more comfortable with mistakes and confident when I put something down on paper. Without the option to erase you learn to except your mistakes and power through them. A faster pen on paper gives your mind the opportunity to continuously spit out ideas.

4. Pick up a magazine outside of your medium. I am an interior design magazine junkie and always pull a random handful out of my inventory to flip through when I start a project. Lately I've been looking at food, travel, fashion, knitting, even yoga magazines for inspiration. I think you can pull a more abstract idea from these images; a perfume ad turns into a color palette, a knit pattern into a wall treatment, a photograph of a cupcake starts a mood for a room. The more obscure the magazine, the better exercise for your brain!

I hope you're feeling the creative juices flowing. Now go out there and make something!