1AmongMany

After sharing my previous post on process, I was bouncing a few emails back and forth with Deb Morrison, one of my former UT professors who’s now heading things up out in Oregon. She’s a mastermind when it comes to inspiring young creative folks, and she spends much of her time experimenting with and teaching the ideals of creativity and creative process. In our conversation, Deb mentioned that she and another former UT prof., Glenn Griffin, are working on a new project about creative process among creative professionals. As part of that project, Deb asked me to draw out my creative process.

The result was actually two drawings, one from a company perspective - a “how do we work” evaluation - and another from a personal perspective - a “how do I work” evaluation. While not necessarily all-encompassing (these were done quickly), it was an interesting experiment to try to put into words and images a process that happens almost without thought. Here’s what I came up with (click to view larger):

How I Work (reads bottom to top):

How We Work:

I’m quite certain that my process will continue to grow and evolve as I move forward, but for the moment, as of this week, that’s a good moment-in-time look at how I work.

I recently spent the better part of a week locked in the small conference room here at POKE preparing a pitch presentation. After a couple days of continuous concepting and brainstorming, I sat down to compile our thoughts into a coherent story. With cuppa coffee in hand and a spare computer coercing my thoughts via iTunes, I set aside my laptop - the research phase was done - and reached for a stack of paper and a Sharpie.

Over the next two hours, a couple of people wandered past, giving me odd looks through the glass door, but all were smart enough to keep their distance. By the time I was done, the room reeked of permanent marker, my hands looked like those of a kindergartner after an intense coloring session, and the walls of the conference room looked something like this:

Our presentation was done. No, we didn’t put it in front of the client in this format - though I won’t deny that, for a client who stated that they wanted to learn how we work, I was quite tempted. But the essence of the story was there.

It wasn’t until a day or so later, after some more scribbling (and quite a few jokes about needing to put padding on the walls of the room) that my Creative Director suggested I include the above photo on my site. It was a unique opportunity to capture the essence of my work style in its undisturbed state - post-it notes and piles of scraps included.

Ladies and gentlemen, this is how I work. A computer will always be a useful tool for digging into the background of a brief. The internet is a world of information at our fingertips. And I’ve certainly used Keynote or InDesign to prepare my fair share of presentations (including the one described here, later in the process). But when its time to put the raw idea into a semblance of a presentable form, this is how I work.

In much the same way that I’ve learned to embrace that moment of “free falling” every time I stand in front of a client to make a presentation (a story for another day), this is my equivalent moment in the creation process.

Assimilate everything you can. Then let it all go and see what comes out the other side. Feel free to give me a shout if you’d like to know more.