Tag Archives: drawing

Free Writing and Free Sketching to Music

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Original Drawings by Keith Chapman

Original Drawings by Keith Chapman

 

One of the most surprising and most productive creativity exercises I’ve ever tried (and continue to use frequently) is free sketching or free writing to music. It’s a simple exercise that surprises me with great results every time. Here’s how it works. Go to your favorite music service like a Spotify, iTunes, Pandora, or whatever you prefer and find an album or collection of songs that you are unfamiliar with. They can be in a genre you like but really try to find something you haven’t listened to before if at all possible. Then start drawing to it or writing to it. That’s it. There is no plan, no plot, no structure.

For free sketching, consider this a superdoodle or a thematic sketch driven by what the music makes you draw. So, if you are listening to heavy metal you should likely get an aggressive drawing of something. If you listen to classical music, you might get something traditional or sophisticated. Who knows. That’s the beauty of this exercise. You have no agenda. The music leads you to draw whatever you are feeling. It might turn out super abstract or really precise and it is different every time. You might end up with a nice rough draft of something you want to develop into an actual art piece. You might end up with a doodle that any high schooler would have created during class. Just keep the pen moving and enjoy the process.

For free writing, I recommend choosing instrumental music so you don’t get looped in to the lyrics. It is completely possible to write to music with lyrics but for the first couple of times you do this exercise, it is easier to do it to instrumental music. One really interesting approach is to listen to a soundtrack to a movie that you have not seen and write to it. Keep in mind there is no plot or outline or plan. This is sloppy free writing. Characters won’t be well developed, the story will have big gaping holes in it, and scenes may be overly descriptive. That’s ok. It is still incredibly fulfilling to so this type of writing. Let the music set your mood, then whatever pops into your head first is what you write about. You can evolve it with the music. Try to get a story arc in there but don’t be too concerned about it. The resulting story is usually a bruised and battered shell of an idea duct taped together and held in place by the thematic music but what you end up with is an incredibly creative narrative that can be reshaped into a story that you may want to invest in. You might just have a first draft of a story. You might just have complete rubble. The process is exhilarating though and you’re exercising your creative muscles. That is the point.

I often design products to music as well. This is especially relevant to my line of work since I design musical instruments. The inspiration of the music helps incredibly though. If I am designing for a specific genre or artist, I specifically listen to that style of music. It drives a theme through the design and provides inspiration that I otherwise may not be able to conjure up. The key to designing product or brainstorming about product designs to music is to choose your music wisely. If you are designing medical equipment, you should have very calming music to work to, something that naturally heals when you listen to it. If you are designing demolition equipment, find your way to the death metal section. It really can influence your creativity and has been a key element to my success as a designer and author.

Whatever your discipline of creative work, try it to the appropriate genre of music and see if it enhances the process. I am convinced that you will at least get a new influence or new movement in your creative pursuits. And after a few sessions of free writing or free sketching, try it to music you know really, really well and see what happens. Your life influences and memories start merging with the creative influences of the music. You end up with really personally influenced art and that’s where your passion for the art form starts to emerge. So, if you find yourself drained, burned out, or out of touch with your creative side, try this quick exercise to one song or to one album or to a stream of music and get back to your own creative self with added influences and inspirations.

Now go. Create. ~ The Mission Creative

Change Your Scene

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Image by Keith Chapman

Image by Keith Chapman

One incredibly easy and simple way to spark creativity is to change your scene. Change your surroundings. Where do you do your creative work? In an office? In a room? At a coffee shop? Take a look at where you are most productive and take a look at what is around you. If you are blocked, go elsewhere even just for one small creative session. When I was writing my first novel, I hit a major lull. Until that time, I went to write at a bar and grill type restaurant over lunches that granted me free wi-fi access. Then I hit a wall. I was lost in the book. I didn’t remember how I got into the weeds but in the weeds I sat staring at a blinking cursor.
Finally, I closed the laptop, gobbled down my food, and left. I went to a local coffee shop, ordered an afternoon coffee and sat down for just another 15 minutes and opened the laptop on a whim. Nope. Blinking cursor sucking my creative synapses right out from under me. Then, totally out of the blue, two well-dressed business ladies sitting near me had a conversation that I could not prevent from overhearing. One lady was complaining how their meetings were so unproductive because people felt the need to talk to fill the air. She went on to say if a meeting is scheduled for 30 minutes and it only needs to take 10 minutes, then be a doll and give the time back to your people. Oddly, this resonated in more ways than one. It well stood true in my own experiences with corporate life but deeper than that was the nudge I needed on my book. I was hung up on  making the dialog of my parody go through this entirely boring scene line by line. I ditched the whole section and summed up the many, many paragraphs by replacing it all with a simple, snide commentary. It shortened the chapter significantly, became more direct, and most importantly removed the logjam. This would not have happened as easily as it had if I had not relocated. Changing it up gives you a chance for newness. This means the muse in each of us gets new input which in turn can result in different outputs. If nothing else, it keeps you moving.

Constraints Unlock Creativity

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Image by Keith Chapman.

Image by Keith Chapman.

Contrary to basic intuition, complete freedom of design can greatly hinder creative design. Think of it this way. In your personal life, outside of your business or job, you can pretty much design or write whatever you want, at any time (non-competes withstanding). Total freedom of design. No constraints. Every possible idea is out there. Sit down with your sketchbook, your blinking cursor, or your canvas with nothing in mind. Now draw, write, or paint a masterpiece immediately. It’s difficult. You may end up with a doodle, an averagely boring sentence, or a blob of paint at best. Well, if this happens, then I guess you have indeed started something – a scribble, a theme, or a background but not very inspiring. Worst case, you remain staring at a blank page, screen, or canvas.

However, if you apply constraints within a scope of even a loosely defined project, you get a start, an inkling, or a basic concept no matter how primitive. The nice thing is that almost every project you get assigned or assign yourself will have built in constraints by the very definition of the project having some scope.

Now here is the catch. I strongly believe that the stronger the constraints, the more creative the result. Hear me out. This is counter-intuitive. A very loosely defined project scope leaves a large world of flexibility and ideas out there as candidates for the one result needed. Sifting through those ideas, heck, even generating those ideas is a daunting task and chances of you stumbling on a flash of brilliance is slim at best. Tighten the parameters on a design or scope and you limit the ideas and develop guardrails for your thoughts. This means focus. This means directed thoughts, condensed energy brought to a smaller concept which in turns mean that creative energy is no longer dispersed across a vast landscape of infinite possibility but driven towards a defined purpose.

Ideas are like a gas and the concept or project scope is the vessel containing that gas. Put those ideas into a very large vessel and you get very little pressure on the concept, little interaction, nothing noticeable. Make that concept a very small vessel and you get high energy interactions creating a very noticeable pressure. Perhaps you can make the vessel too small and leave no room for the gas at all… a vacuum… no room for ideas but that more or less defeats the purpose. That means the concept or project is complete and requires no creativity at all in the first place.

Here, try it for yourself. Whatever your art is… draw an equivalent. Draw, write, sculpt, design the following and see how your creativity increases with constraints. I’ll choose drawing for this example.

1. Draw a dog in a scene.

2. Draw a Dalmatian at a fire house.

3. Draw an older, aging Dalmatian named Buster at a frantic brick fire house in Queens, NY as the alarm bells are ringing loudly at 2AM.

I hope you find the level of detail in your drawings goes up as you consider each of the above project scopes or better the style of your drawings changed dramatically. This is usually where the nay-sayers come in and say “you’ve removed all creativity by defining so much”. Possibly, from one perspective in the sense of raw art, maybe. Maybe. But consider this. I did not specify what style, colors, materials to draw on or with, or many other important artistic parameters. You can certainly create a wonderfully creative work in the first and second project scopes but magic happens at the third and it is often quicker to arrive. Greatness is attracted to a well defined project. Also, consider that in most areas of creativity, we are trying to bring in some commercial value one way or another so arriving at the “one” early in the process has huge benefits.

So, do yourself a favor and next time you are assigned a project or you assign yourself a creative project, demand that as much detail as possible be defined before you start to create. Give yourself some sacred cows and golden handcuffs. Limit your parameters deeply and see what emerges quickly.

And one final tip. In my personal career, I have found great innovation, ideas and design emerge freely when I fictitiously add constraints to my project when I don’t get enough definition. You will know you do not have enough definition when you find yourself staring into space or that blank page for too long. Add your own constraints. For example, if you are designing a washing machine. Set a design goal whereby you cannot use any screws in the design. Now start the design. That constraint is unrealistic (most likely) but keeping your energy within that guardrail will prove to demonstrate amazing results. You rethink the norm. You force your energy into new areas and something you could never have thought of any other way surfaces immediately. Hold true to your constraints until that idea emerges. If it doesn’t add more constraints. The washing machine cannot use any metal material. No screws. No metal. Yikes… but these constraints free previously held energy. Now an idea emerges that has no screws and no metal. You redesigned something and it could actually be revolutionary. Now that you have that, release the constraints and get to the commercial, manufacturable and marketable design but with that one nugget of an idea to make the entire product revolutionary. It works. Try it and provide some feedback! I would love to hear if this helps you in your mission.

Now go. Create. ~ The Mission Creative

Journal Your Way Out of a Mess

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Image by Keith Chapman.

Image by Keith Chapman.

Word of advice: If you do anything creative (and that should be everyone) be sure to stock up on journals. A journal can be a nice Moleskine, a Baron Fig, a composition book, a giant sketch book, a stack of scrap papers stapled together, within an app on your phone, Evernote, or a pile of multi-colored Post-it notes. It really doesn’t matter. In fact, I use several of the above simultaneously, usually for different purposes.

If you are having a creative block, a nasty problem in front of you to solve, or feeling invincibly creative, you will benefit greatly by logging ideas (even the prematurely self-judged bad ones), complaints, problems, solutions, research, doodles, and random facts, quotes and general goofiness. Even if it seems absurd, stupid, ridiculous, impossible, or embarrassing write it down anyway. If nothing else you will make room for better ideas by purging the “bad ones” onto paper.

I really recommend a bound paper journal with a nice, easy writing pen that feels good in your hand, writes smoothly, and encourages you to keep using it. I use journals at my job and have for decades as an engineer and designer. Looking back, I’ve had some crazy ideas but some have turned into products and popular products at that. Seeing the incubation of ideas on paper turned eventually to product is one of the most satisfying things I’ve experienced. I recently took to journals for my hobbies, side projects and art as well. It has made those hobbies and art much more fulfilling. In fact, I wrote my first novel, Sushi Wars: A New Roll, entirely in Evernote because it kept distractions to a minimum and I was able to create notes immediately from my web research and story issues.

The benefits of writing journals are numerous but there are, admittedly, a few challenges that creep up. There is the dreaded false start. You buy a nice journal or you simply get a pad of paper and… fail to start writing in it. It sits there staring at you pristine, unopened, clean, blank, and perfectly smug. Do yourself a favor and bust through the seal and dirty that first page immediately. Write anything. It doesn’t matter. Just dirty it.

Another challenge seems to be continuity. You dirty that first page (and maybe that was easy for you) and you’re writing in it for a few days, maybe even a few days in a row and then life creeps in and you skip a day or two or twenty. Now you have a well-intentioned journal with only 3 dirtied pages. Pick up where you left off even if the entry is “I have no idea where I left off.” and go forward.

I use journals for product design complete with bad sketches and barely legible writings all in pen. I list research topics I want to get to and benign to-dos and action items from meetings, the more utilitarian side of journals. Where my journals really shine though is in solving seemingly unsolvable problems or combating dead ends (i-dea-d ends?!?!) and fighting through the monotony of the same old ideas rising to front of mind. I sometime doodle to music to free things up. Let your mind wander with pen in hand and you will quickly stumble onto ideas so good that you won’t understand how they actually got embedded in you in the first place.

My process includes writing about the problem or goal first and scoping out the issues completely either by drawings or words or a combination of media. Then, I typically doodle in the margins around the issue using symbols or pictures associated with the problem or goal. I find this drives the issue into a deeper level of understanding and likely stirs some subconscious fires and redirects thoughts and energy at the issue. Then I start listing actions I can take to step towards the goal or solution even if ever so slightly. It may simply start with “I have no ideas. I’ll have to research the term _____ on google just to get started.” I will keep listing actions I can take until I run way deep into crazy land and keep going until I’ve exhausted the crazy in me. Next, I look at the list and the doodles and I pick the best of them, even if they set camp up firmly in crazy land. I refine those few select ideas and concepts and iterate on them. I equate this process much like sanding a piece of wood. Take the rough edges away a little at a time and eventually you will get a shape that starts making sense. I keep repeating this process until I land on a fully actionable idea that is doable, makes sense, and strikes me as novel, innovative, or, at the very least, mildly impressive. If I haven’t been able to get there yet, I keep sanding. Some ideas take weeks, months, even years because i shelved them. But here is the important thing. I shelved them in a journal that can be picked up later, years later, and revisited. Then I find myself in a different place with new experiences and can quite possibly find a solution, iteration, or creative element from the original problem or goal that I can use.

Just keep writing, sketching, doodling in many, many journals with your ideas, concepts, and get your crazy on paper. Go nonlinear, go stupid, go without rules and see what happens. You’ll feel quite creative and hopefully feel much happier. I always do.

Now go. Create.  ~ The Mission Creative