Ever feel like there is a giant creative block wedged into your brain restricting all those great ideas from coming through? Or maybe you just haven’t written a blog post for your team in a couple months.
Here are my top 5 creative resources to access if you are feeling blocked and maybe, just maybe can get those creative juices flowing again.
5. Creative Bloq: A great resource for the casual break between projects. It’s great to keep up-to-date with current trends and features interviews with your favorite designers or ones you have yet to hear about (but already have seen their work). Not only that, but it includes full tutorials and resources for designers to use. It’s a one-stop collection of creative inspiration.
4. Tuts+: My go-to resource for tutorials and design packs. The range of tutorials is so extensive it constantly blows me away. Whether its photo-realism, typography, cartooning, or edge code, Tuts+ will have what you’re looking for. Although it’s a monthly subscription it’s worth every penny and then some. Pick up a subscription and invest in yourself.
3. Deviantart: Many people consider deviantart to be out-dated and replaced by other bigger-better sites (*cough* Behance *cough*). But the community remains ever-loyal and the range of art is more humbling. You’ll find amateurs artists, mid-level creatives, even the professional “holy -s*$@, how did they do that?!” designers present on the site. In this community, everyone is looking to offer a helping hand and support those who work hard at their craft.
2.Other People’s Portfolios: There’s a fine line between plagiarism and recreating for creative purposes. I can’t tell you how many times I’ve seen a design or graphic from one of my favorite designers and tried my hand at recreating it from scratch. The sole purpose is to fine-tune my craft and better learn the tools available. A rare few designers are able to a style their own (Jon Contino is an example of one of those people). Keeping a stock-pile of other’s portfolios is a great idea but never use their art as your own (even if you did create it). Even if you feel your design is separate enough, a friendly-email asking for permission goes a long way.
1.Behance: aka “The Holy Grail”. Behance is one those sites that comes around and changes the playing ground for all those involved. The style is simplistic and features some of most premier artists/designers/coders/everything-and-the-kitchen-sink. The greatest thing; you can be one of them! You can feature your work and it will make its round through the creative community. Amassing likes and follows is a great asset for designers to find out and support one another.
So whenever you feel a little low on creativity, take a break, visit a site, and just look.
Who knows maybe you’ll find the breakthrough you’ve been looking for.
#CreativeSummer15
Day 80/93
