Stuck in a Creative Rut? Try These Tips to Re-Gain Your Momentum

We’ve all been there: the project is due, the clock is ticking and you’re drawing a blank. Before panic sets in, here are some suggestions to propel your creative ideas:

Get out of your usual environment. Sounds simple, but it works. Get up and take a walk or a drive. Try a different route than the one that you usually take. Studies show that doing something as simple as taking an alternate route to work now and then not only helps you to view the familiar in a new light, but also heightens awareness to your surroundings and staves off dementia.

Refuel your creative cache. Think of your brain as similar to the  gas tank of your car. Just like your gas tank, your creativity reserves need to be periodically refueled to keep the machinery (or in this case ideas) flowing. Visit your local book store or library and page through art and design books for ideas, or go to your local art museum and  just spend an afternoon feasting your senses on the abundant banquet of visual delights. Flip through old magazines or surf the web to find sources of inspiration. Keep a digital or physical file of some examples of ideas that you find, and look through it periodically to recharge the creative juices.

Just do it, already. When all else fails, just plunge in and put something, ANYTHING down on paper. Just get it out and don’t worry about being too critical initially. Let the words or design flow and go back to edit afterward. The key to making deadlines and overcoming creative block is to fight the urge to stay stuck by getting the momentum going. That first step is often the hardest part to overcome, and once you do manage to get the inertia going, ideas begin to flow more freely and in turn inspire new ideas.

Being a creative professional requires having the discipline to work through the inevitable creative roadblocks that we all occasionally encounter. It also requires the courage to explore the unfamiliar and occasionally make mistakes along the way. Artistic block is often a bi-product of the fear of failure, and the worst mistake that one can make is to remain paralyzed by inaction. It takes an initial push to get moving, but taking the first step forward is the most difficult and most important start towards building creative momentum.

Logo Inspiration: Espresso Rescue

While driving around on the east side of town recently I spotted this interesting logo example. Espresso Rescue is a business that specializes in repairing commercial coffee brewing equipment, and their logo combines the concept of coffee with the ideas of “rescue” and “emergency,” as indicated with the appropriated use of the Red Cross logo. Espresso Rescue also extends this concept through their building, which bears a striking resemblance to a fire station and a van that looks as though it could be an ambulance parked outside. I find this a great example of post-modern use of humor through a recycled symbol that is a well-established part of our cultural visual vernacular.

Rock Posters as Art

Poster art by Victor Moscoso

Recently, I caught a local showing of  “American Artifact,” a documentary exploring the rock poster as art. With so many great examples of event posters out there, I decided to dedicate a blog post to the subject. Rock posters are terrific examples of graphic design, because they so often blend an inventive combination of imagery, typography and color to command a viewer’s attention from a distance.

Gaining ground as a counterculture movement (as so much influential design often does) during the 1960’s, artists such as Victor Moscoso and Stanley Mouse defined the visuals of their generation by creating posters art that vibrated and pulsated with color. Today, rock poster art styles are as varied and diverse as the styles of music that they represent. Visuals range from the “down and dirty” simplicity of Hatch Show Print and Print Mafia to the striking comic-themed  illustrations of Justin Hampton.

Possibly the most appealing aspect of rock posters is their ability to capture their subject in such an imaginative form. Few other examples of design are as experimental and receptive to risk taking, and few other examples are as inspiring to view.

Graphic Design Quote of the Day

“Design creates culture. Culture shapes values. Values determine the future.”
— Robert L. Peters

Color Inspiration in Everyday Surroundings

Creative inspiration is an essential component of the design process. As designers, we are constantly tasked with developing new ideas and solutions to design challenges. One way to do this is to draw inspiration from our everyday surroundings; to re-examine the places and things that we frequently see with a fresh perspective.

Consider “sampling” your environment for color palette ideas. The process is simple: take a digital camera with you on a trip around your neighborhood to collect photos that can be later referenced. After downloading the photos onto your computer, open in Photoshop or place one of the images into an Illustrator document and use the eyedropper tool and the color library to sample areas of the photo, building a set of custom swatches that can be saved in your swatch library and referenced for future projects. If using Illustrator, create a new color group on the swatches palette from your selected hues, and choose “save swatch library as AI” from the palette options. This will allow you to open this library for reference at any future time.

As a designer, it’s important to constantly collect inspiration that fuels our imagination and stock our idea cache. Often, this is as simple as seeing what is already right in front of us. Creativity can be found in taking something that is familiar to us and examining it from a different angle, which in turn allows us to see a wealth of possibilities that had previously been hiding in plain sight.

Magazine Interior Layout Design: PowerPoint Presentation on Slideshare.net

Dymanic Magazine Design: Part 2

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Developing Dynamic Magazine Covers: PowerPoint on Slideshare.net

Dynamic Magazine Design: Part 1

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Targeting Your Audience: How To Design with a Specific Market in Mind

Even the best design is only effective if it reaches its intended audience. Here a few useful tips to apply when targeting your layouts to  a specific or niche market.

Define Your Viewer: Begin by defining who your audience is. Retirees? Urban dwellers? Members of the NRA? NPR listeners? Generation X?

Put Yourself in the Mindset of Your Viewer: Look at the media that your target demographic typically reads and watches. Which newspapers, blogs, magazines, books, websites and T.V programs do your audience members consume?

Learn Their Vernacular: How do members of this group speak? Are there key phrases or terminology that members use?  Understanding the language of your audience will resonate with viewers and will help your message come across as more genuine than terms or slang that are unfamiliar to the average group member.

Put Yourself in Their Shoes: Try to see things from your audience’s perspective. If you are not a member of the group, this requires pretending that you are for a few moments. What makes this group tick? What are values, goals and even obstacles that this group faces? Do your research on these issues if necessary.

Talk Directly to Your Audience: Try arranging for a member of this demographic to look at your design ideas to see if your message is on target. Doing so will give you valuable perspective, and will let you know if your design is headed in the right direction. This is a simple step, but one often overlooked by designers. Doing so can save you a lot of time, disappointment and failed marketing dollars.

Follow these steps, and you’ll be well on your way to creating poignant, relevant designs that hit a bullseye with your intended audience.

Tips for Designing Business Cards and Letterhead

Letterhead Bizcard

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Creating Dynamic Logos

A logo is the visual identity that publicly represents an organization; an identifying mark that makes a brand instantly recognizable to an audience. Although deceptively simple to the casual observer, there are a number of factors that go into the development of an effective corporate identity. Here are some traits shared by exceptional logos.

Appropriate: A logo conveys information about the company or brand which it represents. As, such, it should set a brand apart from competitors while simultaneously conveying a message to its audience about what the product is or does.This doesn’t require that the designer use literal imagery; carefully considered font and color choices can tell an audience whether a company is conservative or cutting edge; earthy and organic or sleek and streamlined. As a designer, be aware of the messages that your design choices send.

Simple: Ever notice how the most memorable logos are often times the simplest ones? An effective logos should be clean and not too visually complex. It should reproduce well and retain legibility at a variety of sizes, ranging from  billboards to business cards. For this reason, avoid complicated photographic images or gradients when designing logos. Opt for clean vector images that re-size easily; avoid photographic imagery, which doesn’t offer the same amount of versatility and can become too visually complex.

Witty: Logos that use humor or visual puns can make a design engaging and memorable. An image that goes beyond the expected solutions can grab the attention of a consumer and make a lasting impression.

Enduring: A corporate identity should stand the test of time and not be overly reliant on the current trends of a time period. The most effective logos are ones that are as relevant now as they were when they were first designed, whether that was yesterday or fifty years ago.

Consistent: A logo should use a core color palette and font(s). These design choices should stay the same every time a logo is reproduced to maintain a consistent appearance and build brand identity. If the design is only one or two colors, consider using Pantone swatches (spot colors) to ensure accurate reproduction and cost-cutting measures when printing.

Truly great logos are the resulting combination of the above factors. They require a real investment of time and creative energy to develop. Consider collecting examples of great designs in your archives for inspiration. Online site such as logolounge.com and logopond.com can spark great ideas, as can looking at the masters of 20th century corporate identity design (Paul Rand, Milton Glaser and Raymond Loewey are good resources).