Inspiration is a weird thing. It could come from anywhere at any time if you look for it. The randomness of the things you can piece together can be very surprising and the more inspiration you collect the more lego bricks you have to play with. The random element in the 4 rs is why this works.

Before SCA, my creativity went into 2 different things, drawing and architecture. Whether I did drawings for my own art or drawings for architecture I always struggled with inspiration. I usually always looked for that one source of inspiration for my creative fuel. I now realise that I was limiting myself.

What I try to do for inspiration on my recent briefs is basically collect any visual I like on the internet, in a book or even a photo of something I see on the Street. By doing this I’m slowly creating a vault of inspiration for myself. I mostly get my inspiration from visuals so, I really find this helpful even though I don’t end up using most of those visuals. For me, these visuals don’t only transition to images in my work. They often help me with copying as well.

Our first brief for our first week back for term 2 was to create 3 different poster campaigns for 3 different SMPs. One of our SMPs was unmissable, unmistakable for Rayban. The first thing that came to mind from the word unmissable is someone that stands out in the crowd. That felt like a simple poster idea that could work if it was executed well. So I started searching for images of people that stick out. I ended up using that idea. Then I came across a visual of an empty soft drink can that you normally wouldn’t be able to see because of the dark, but you were only able to see it because of a small light reflection. Then, I realised that there is actually so much more that I could do than a person standing out in the crowd. Unmissable could fit in very different situations. situations that could make something fully stand out or make other things around it unable to stick out. Using light, weather, colour and other different things like that.

Then, another case would be our SMP for Kodak, proof of life. Our idea was basically to find visuals of those moments that are a part of life. What made this interesting was the copy for the posters fully relied on the visuals. The inspiration for the copy where visuals. We ended up doing what I try to with my vault of inspiring imagery. Collecting visual dots is what works for me but, I guess you can do it with anything.

I think that having an Arsenal of inspiration is worth doing for any creative. It’s very natural to feel uninspired at times and when that happens it’s nice to have a place to go to. It’s kind of like asking for advice from a person you recently met. Not every piece of advice you get might work for you at that time, but it’s still worth hearing for different situations.

@alicenanuras