Episode Transcription Season 3 Chapter 7
Have you ever felt stuck or uninspired staring at a blank page as designers? It is literally our job to be constantly inspired and be creative on demand, which can be really overwhelming. I know because I’ve been there feeling like my last good idea was my last good idea on Brandy. See, I’ve been designing for over 20 years and I believe that every designer deserves to have a process that will get them past creative block.
The process I’ve developed uses a powerful words. First method. This online course will give you powerful tools to craft Epic concepts, unlock your own inspiration research in new and exciting ways and so much more. The strategic process essential course has everything you need to stop wasting time. Get past creative block and create work that gets noticed.
Get a sneak peek of the course@brandyc.com slash courses.
Welcome to design speaks. We’re here to empower you to unlock your own inspiration so you can take control of your creativity. I’m your host, Brandy C. And this week’s bonus episode is a conversation between myself and special guests. Amber Anderson. We’re going to be talking about the strategic process course.
So stay tuned for that.
everyone. Welcome to design speaks podcast. Today. I have a really special guest, a member of the design speak slash BrandiSea community. And her name is Amber welcome Amber. So were you shocked when I told you you were going to be on video?
I was because. I didn’t know you were doing video.
Yeah. Surprise.
I asked you to be on. And then last minute told you, you were going to have to show your face. So urea. Okay. So today I just really wanted to talk to Amber about my new course and the process and her experience, because she has been such a long time fan follower of everything that I do here. And so it was really valuable to me to hear her, her input and her insight on the course that she took and the course that I am still currently offering.
So today’s just going to be real chill, just kind of a conversation between us about the process and her journey. And I’ve got coffee and I think I saw she has coffee show you mug. Yeah. So Pantone, is this your favorite Pantone color? Black.
It’s like my favorite color.
Yeah. I, if we go by what’s in our closets, I have probably more black and gray than anything, but I really love color.
So I don’t know.
Really. I feel like I see you mostly in bright colors.
Surprise. Yeah. My closet is about two thirds, gray, white and black. And then the other third is all really bright colors.
Well, mine’s 90% black. Yeah. Okay.
And, and my, this is pretty much a reflection it’s like this wall is all black and white and then color and that’s, that’s pretty much me, so.
All right. So first of all, tell us a little bit about yourself. ,this is your little, , who am I and what do I do? And all that stuff.
Yeah, well, you already said my name, but I feel weird not saying hi, I’m Amber, but I am an art director at a stock photography studio. And so we are a large contributor to Getty images and I stock.
And so I just kind of oversee all of our photos and videos. And then we also have to create our own graphics because know people’s branding aloud. So and then I also am a graphic design professor. And so that’s my side gig and it’s challenging and fun at the same time.
Yeah. So you’re basically in charge of a lot of creatives, which is pretty exciting because a lot of times the people that are wanting to approach my course are more beginner level, but I, I have found that my people.
You are my person, the kind of people that I really want to take this course are, are people that have early in the process. Yes. They should definitely learn this, early in the journey, I should say of being a graphic designer, but even more so, when you are further along in your career, and maybe you don’t know these things and you do lead creatives or you you just want to learn a better way to, to boost your work.
So I think my, two target audiences are really , people like you, that lead a lot of creatives and people that are not brand spanking new, but like in their career just a little bit, although as, you know, everyone can take this course and it is good for everyone at every level. So how did you first, find this podcast and where did you enter this?
World of crazy that I am in charge of.
I think I just discovered you on Spotify. I think I, if I’m remembering correctly I actually feel like you were saying, you feel you have two different target audience. And I am like both of those things. I am actually very young in my career. I have only been out of grad school for three years, but I immediately became a professor after grad school.
And then I’ve only been an art director for a year, almost a year now. But yeah, I,
After school, I, you just kind of have to start learning on your own. And so I have never been a podcast person and so I decided to try it. And so I just. Search design podcast on Spotify because I love Spotify and I found you, and then I became kind of obsessed with your, your podcast.
So that was kind of how I found you. And then I started following you on Instagram though. I realized today I don’t follow the actual design podcasts, so I need to
change that. That’s okay. Because truthfully I’ve been questioning whether I can manage the design, the podcast, Instagram, as well as my own.
It’s just a lot, but it’s not a big deal. You, you see, you see where things are. So when you, when you first started listening what was the surprising thing? What was it that kept you listening to the podcast? Because you said you’re not a podcast person, this is like a total sidebar. I’m just really genuinely curious.
What kept you listening? what was it that was different about design speaks compared to other things that you had heard.
I think , I mean, a large part of it is the content to me, it was a lot of things that I went through a small design program, so it was a lot of things that I didn’t really hear or learn in the program.
But then also just at that time, the podcast was, I can’t remember her name was,
huh? Was it me and Michelle?
Oh, I totally was going to say Michelle. She worked at the church. It was a video person or, yeah. And I loved, I loved that idea of talking to a normal person and a graphic designer. And that was so fun to just listen to.
So yeah, I think that’s kind of what, what hooked you. Yeah.
Awesome. So through the course of listening, let’s do the podcast. So for those of you who don’t know, or if you’re maybe new to the podcast, I don’t know how you don’t know this, but I talk about this thing. I call the process a lot and I’ve always talked about it.
It’s something that I developed over all the now, golly, I’m old 20 years that I’ve been doing this. And I would share it over time, like in pieces and stuff through the podcast. And I did like, from Michelle’s prompting, like an intense seven week series, I believe it was something like that where we went through every step in the process.
And I sort of talked about with how it works and what to do and stuff, but even that was not everything. It wasn’t every single nuance. And honestly, even the new course that I have is the essential. That’s not even the super in-depth for just. Just to throw that out there. But so like giving you guys everything I can’t, you would just, you would drown in all the knowledge.
So when I launched the course you had said that you kind of already sort of knew it. So tell me a little bit about like, how that went for you what you learned from the podcast and then we’ll kind of go from there.
Yeah, so the podcast episodes were really good. I remember listening to them to, and from work and home for my commute.
And having to, once I got home relisten to it, so I could actually take notes cause I’m such a visual person. I’m not. Auditory learner. And that’s one reason why podcasts are a little bit hard for me.
I’m always thinking, getting notes too. If I’m listening to something I need to learn from, I have my notes app open, like, okay.
I need to remember this later.
It’s I wish I was in auditory person sometimes, but Oh, well so I don’t know if it’s because I am a visual learner and I think going through the course, you do have so much more tidbits and knowledge and stuff like that in the actual course, but yeah. Some things in the process are a little bit hard to maybe wrap your mind around if you’re not used to it.
And so I remember struggling with some things in incorporating into my own process from the podcast episodes, but then whenever, and I worked through those struggles, but going through the course was kind of , Oh, I actually figured it out correctly, but it would have been so much easier. You would have people who just went through the course would immediately be able to understand, I think cause you have the beautiful benefit of those
video.
Yeah. Not just my voice. Yeah. Cause it is, it’s a visual, obviously it’s a visual process too. It is, it is words which are spoken or, you know, written, but ultimately starting with words is writing them down and seeing, seeing this whole map of life come to be. When you’re, when you’re starting out.
So, so you just kind of figured out the process on your own. So something that I really love about the process is that and I, I have had, so I want to hear your feedback on it, but also there’s been people that have I’ve done this in workshops, so I’ve, I’ve done workshops on the process before and people that have been in a few different camps.
So one is like, Oh, I already have my own process. I don’t I’m, I’m cool. I don’t need this, or , my process looks sorta like this. I, I have a process of things that I do, right. I have a method of how I go from a, to B. Okay. Well, that’s not the same thing as having a process or it’s just. Kind of, I don’t understand why I can’t just do something when I feel like doing something. So, but what I love about the process is that once you learn it, the whole thing, once you learn the whole thing, you can take pieces, right? Like this is, this process is not my attempt to , force upon anyone.
You need to use this whole thing. Exactly. Like I do a to Z and implement it. Can you do that? Absolutely. And will it work great if you do that? Absolutely. But I love that you can take pieces of it and implement that into maybe the process that you have to make your workflow even better. So where did you kind of land on that spectrum of taking the whole thing and putting it into place or incorporating bits and pieces and which pieces had you taken maybe let’s say before you did the course.
And then we’ll talk about how that, if that changed or what that looked like after.
Okay. Yeah. I would say that, I don’t know if I had a process before listening to your podcasts which is kind of mind blowing to me because it was a struggle, but didn’t
know what you didn’t know.
I don’t want to ever go back to those days just to be
honest.
Yeah. Nobody would no one likes to struggle to be creative. It’s just, it’s supposed to be good.
Well, recently I even, so at my school we have the art honors society and I’m the speaker at it. And so I was trying to make presentation sign. And I wish I had done the process for that. It sounds so simple.
Oh, I don’t need to do a design process with this, but I spent so long on it because I was struggling. And the whole time I was thinking, if we had just gone through the process, wouldn’t be hating ourselves.
Yeah. I know. And I love, I love that you see that now because it is sort of like lifting the veil, right?
When you don’t know, it’s just , you just see what you see and it is what it is. But as soon as you learn something, whether that’s my process or other things, like I’ve had this experience where I’m learning something new from someone else and it goes , Oh, I didn’t know. My glasses were dirty all this time.
Yes.
Yes. So I think from specifically from the podcast episodes, It was the word map. And the same that I had to really figure out was how to pull your concept from the word map. That one was that specifically, it was what was more challenging to figure out from the podcast. So from the course, I think it, it sounds like little things, but little things kind of add up, I think.
And it’s
just, it’s in the details.
Yeah. I had never thought about you really, even in your podcasts, music is a big deal. It’s a big component. And so in the course I’d never thought about how music could potentially help you with the brainstorming. And then. The research, not going to lie.
So let’s talk a little bit about, let’s talk a little bit, the word map first. So anytime I teach this or talk about this you know, some people just want shortcuts, right? And so there’s been times where I’ve talked and said, look, if you want just one thing that will completely change how you work in this process.
If I could only teach you one thing, it would be the word map. And all of these other pieces just make it exponentially better. And your work will just skyrocket from here to here, if you do all of them. But if you can just grasp this one thing, and that is what I used to tell my students when I was teaching at the college too, was , we’re not going to go through my whole process, but I’m going to teach you how to use this word map, because this is going to be foundational for you.
So you didn’t have a process. So did you sort of. Take the word map and then build your own process with that as the first step. Or did you sort of implement a lot of the steps that you learned from my process and,
well, I guess I would say, I mean, I guess everyone kind of has somewhat of a process and, and I’m like a mix of illustration and graphic design.
And so I, I definitely did a lot of thumbnail sketching and, and sketching in general. So the word map was just kind of it brought in the idea of having an overall concept rather than just a composition in your illustration or your design. So that was kind of the, I think that big switch for me was just.
Figuring out a deeper concept or meaning, or idea for what you’re creating. And then the actual sketching side and can
pleading and how those and the same together. Yeah. Yeah. So then you took the course and you gave me a lot of really great feedback. And we won’t give away all the secrets, but I’ve talked about how I researched a ton.
And so I want to know, , what was, what was that, how was that different for you? Learning that differently on the course versus what you’ve heard me talk about before maybe. And how has that changed? Because you just took it what, like a month or so ago. Two months, maybe. I don’t know really about a timeline you took it recently.
That would be a fairly recent implementation into what you’re doing now. So tell me about that.
Ah, I mean, I remember you talking about the way you’ve research in the podcast and I think it was just one of those things where I don’t know, the human brain is kind of weird and you’re just like, Oh, that’s cool, Brandy, but not for me.
That’s what a lot of people tell me.
Oh, I don’t know.
Maybe you just weren’t in a place to receive it now. I didn’t actually talk about it on the podcast the same way I did in the course. So you probably,
maybe, and maybe Again, visual. I’m just going to say that and not give away anything.
A lot of designers and creative professionals are visual learners, which is part of why I wanted to do a course and part of why I do a lot of workshops when we’re not in COVID times is because it just, it resonates.
It resonates when you can see the magic happen. Yeah.
Yes. And I think from the course, I, I better understood how you do the actual physical research. And so then whenever I, the thing that I like about the course is that it’s at least one chance, one stage in your life, I guess, where you just go through a hundred percent your process to learn it, and then you can decide what.
You want to implement into your own process? What works for you? What doesn’t work for you because we’re all unique and our brains are unique. And so I think that’s another thing that you just are kind of forced to understand things that maybe your initial mindset would have been. That’s not for me.
And so that gives you an opportunity of, Oh wow. This is something that I actually really love and it does work for me and I want to incorporate it into my design process. So that’s what their research step kind of became for me.
Yeah. So how did you, how did you sort of research before and. How are you doing?
How, and have you implemented differently or I guess I, I’m totally fine with you giving away a little bit of this because I’ve talked about it before and I talked about it on design tips and things. This is just a piece of it. So I do, I am very interested in , what was it that resonated with you in the seeing how I research and how that works?
That sort of was a little bit more of a light bulb this time?
Yeah, I’m embarrassed to say I relied too much on Pinterest.
Well, just kidding. All of us have at one point or another it’s and I still, I mean,
for my job, I still look at Pinterest and the hands and stuff, because we had to make sure that our stuff is
current.
Okay. I’m going to just sidebar with you for a second before. I just make everybody feel bad. It’s totally fine to look at all of these places and in general to just take in stuff from everywhere. It’s when you’re looking at it for specific projects that it comes that it becomes a negative for you.
So if you’re just like, man, I just want to look at some really cool posters on Pinterest, because I love looking at poster design or book covers or Albemarle or whatever logo design, if you’re just chilling, scrolling, looking around saving stuff. Cause you think it’s cool. Totally fine. Same for B hands and all of those things.
The trouble is you go, I have a, I have a magazine layout that I need to do. I’m going to get on Pinterest and look at magazine layouts. That’s that’s the delineation. So it’s not like Pinterest is evil. I have tons of Pinterest boards of things that I love and. Projects that I’ll probably never do in my house and things like that.
But I don’t look at those when I’m trying to come up with an idea for a client. So I know you probably know that, but that’s for the general public to go, you don’t like Pinterest? I love Pinterest. I love Behance. Everything in its place, right?
Yes. And in moderation, yes, I will say. But you say that made me think, , look thinking back to doing the course and doing the way that you researched.
I, I think just relying on Pinterest, you get a little overloaded because you’re scrolling and you’re seeing a lot of pens that you might not actually want to see. You don’t want to be inspired by them, but your brain is still taking them in. Whereas going through physical books or going to Barnes and noble, or just going outside and doing your research that way.
I think he can be a little bit more, not so overwhelmed visually with what you’re you’re seeing and therefore taking. And so doing this sketching side, I think I was able to recall my inspiration a little bit more clearly.
Plus you probably slept, right. So what plus you probably did the sleeping trick, so
right. You slept in between right? Crickets. I’ll just answer it. Cricket sound right here. Yeah, no, you’re totally right. Because and I do talk about this. I’ve talked about this probably ad nauseum. I feel like, but there’s a lot of people that have definitely not heard it before. When you’re, when you’re searching online, you just can scroll forever.
Ultimately no matter what platform you’re on the internet is. Is such now it’s not like when the internet was first around in the nineties, it’s , Oh, I hit the end. I hit the end of this search query. You can never, it will never end. You could dislike die scrolling because it will never end on that can be super overwhelming.
Even besides the fact that you’re probably taking an inspiration that you probably shouldn’t be, or you’re going to inadvertently copy someone else’s work just because that’s all you’re looking at. But when you have a set amount of time, if you, if you absolutely must look online for things, you set amount of time that you do it.
Or if you’re looking at books, a certain number of books and things like that, to make sure that you are, you don’t need hundreds of thousands of things in front of your eyes to get inspiration. So that’s really cool that that was a really, that was a sort of a shift for you. So are you. Are you feeling a little bit more like you have a grasp on the full thing now that you’ve gone through the whole course?
Yes, definitely. And I I’d say I have pretty much implemented, at least 95% of what you do.
So just curious what parts you did not resonate with? I want to know,
I do the sleep thing I do. I just don’t do it where you say to do it.
Okay. Okay. So let’s talk about that then. So the sleep thing has to do with how your brain takes things in. And basically the method that I have always used is to do research.
Whatever that looks like. I like to do it before a point of brain rest. So for me, that is literal sleep. So I often, when I can do my research as close to nighttime or bedtime as I can, and then wake up in the morning and then sketch because then your brain has a chance to, to make the soup, as I say.
And so what is, how is it different for you? What, at what point do you implement the sleep?
I have always implemented the sleep after finishing the design. So before you show clients anything kind of so I do take a break from the project at the point where you would put sleep. So. Research and sketching.
But usually because my brain doesn’t shut off at night, it wants to problem solve. So I mean,
right. That’s part of the point is your brain wants to problem solve. So you let it do the problem solving while you sleep. It’s like you’re working while you sleep and you can see no sleep,
but I won’t believe it takes so long for me to go to sleep, but maybe I should just give it a try and see if I get a good night’s sleep and advice
solve problems.
And he has totally different sleep patterns and stuff. So what I’ve, what I’ve said , cause there’s also been times where people say , well, what if I can’t sleep? What if I have a project due the same day that it’s given to me? And obviously just this process can be, can be as long as you need it to be.
If you have three weeks to do a project, it can take three weeks. If you have a day, you just basically truncate all of the. The timelines of each step. And so when that’s the case, I always suggest that, like I said, you take if you can even take a 15 or 30 minute nap go or cause for me just taking a break, quote, unquote, doesn’t work for me.
I can’t shut my brain off when I’m awake. If I’m tired and I want to sleep, it’s easier to implement that step. So if, if I have something due that day, I either need to take an actual physical rest of some kind or do something that engages my brain completely so that I can not think of the project. And that kind of acts as the same sort of thing.
But there there’s lots of science that shows what your brain does when you’re sleeping. And so that’s part of the thing that I have learned over the years is that a lot of, a lot of the things that I had done in this process that I developed. There’s actually science to back up a lot of the steps that I found later in life that is really, really cool, because then people can see that this isn’t just me going, Hey, this works for me.
, this is just something that works for me. And it might work for you because they’re on some level humanity. There are a lot of commonalities, a lot of our brains work, very similarly certain tactics, certain things work well. So I think that that’s another really important thing for people to know about the courses that there are a lot of levels of it that are actually based in science.
Yeah. So where, where bla, bla bla bla, we’re going to start over. Cause apparently I need more coffee. So how much easier do you think it would have been for you if today you didn’t, you had never heard of anything and You, you heard the podcast and then you heard the course. Do you think that you would have still chosen, at the point you are in your career now do you think you would have chosen to take the course or just sort of still try and figure out if you had the choice?
So right. When you learned the process, there was just the podcast. So now there’s an actual course and the podcast that you can sort of get a lot of this, for free. But then there’s the course. So what, what would you, do you think this is purely hypothetical? What do you think you would have chosen?
Had you had the choice, you heard about it on the podcast and then it’s , Oh, by the way, there’s also the course.
I’m not dissing the podcast at all, but hands down the court.
No, no deaths received.
I just, I mean, if you. We want to go the easiest route. Right? So
the path, of course,
the course is so much easier to understand for me.
And then it just has a lot more information too. So it’s kind of , you get more bang for your buck, but yeah.
And let’s just talk for a second. You were talking about the music. So something that I, I created exclusive to people that take the course is I think there’s six, six or seven playlists that I curated specifically to go along with each step in the process.
And that’s also a science based sort of hack thing that I learned that I do, but that actually works and there are certain kinds of music. So. How have you felt about those playlists? Because they are only available to people that have taken the course. Have you listened to them and what have you, what have you felt, have you felt your brain tingling?
So because I was doing a song like an album haven’t listened to all of the playlist, but that is a good reminder that I need to go, the next project that I do listen to them. But I did listen to the word map playlist and I loved it because that’s just kind of my type of chill ish music.
And so I saved it to my PI to my Spotify, why brary and that’s. You talk about listening to the same, even if you don’t listen to your playlist, listen to the same one while you were doing the word back. Cause it’s just so much easier to get your brain in the mode. And so I just keep listening to it to get my brain in the mode.
Good. Yeah. So what she’s talking about is she was working on an album cover. And so and I have definitely talked about this before on the podcast, when you’re designing for a musician, I always, which I’ve done quite a bit, it’s really important that you listen, you really immerse yourself in their sound.
So if they have a full album, just listen to that album on repeat, it’s a little harder when it’s a single, which is a lot of what I’ve done. Cause then you just listened to the same song for kind of a long time, but you will be, you will be so shocked at how the, the vibe of the. The music and the musician or the band or whatever comes through when you do that.
So the fact that you didn’t listen to the playlist is, is absolutely what you should not have done probably for this, because after the word map, it’s like, you’re trying to get the vibe of that, that musician, that band. And once you’re through the word map phase, you, you don’t have the detriment of hearing the words and having those words accidentally come out on your page when you don’t want them to.
So once you’re past the word map phase, then you can kind of be a little bit more free with the stuff that you’re listening to. So in the show notes for this episode, I’m going to put, so Amber was, was kind enough to send me pictures of the stuff, the steps that she took while she was taking the course.
So I’m going to just post like the pictures. Like the process. And so you can see she worked through a project that she was doing. So I’m gonna let you tell us about that project so that they can know like what they’re seeing in the show notes and how that went for you. So you did, you started on a brand new project just for the course.
Yeah.
Yeah. I just, it wasn’t a client project. I don’t want it to seem like this artist paid me for it. It was just our love of music up and coming artists. And I, when I shared it on Instagram, I was like, see this as fan art. And he was like, Oh my gosh, my first fan or,
Aw, that’s pretty great. He’s going to hire you next time.
I love it.
So yeah, it was just, I did a I think, I know he’s only putting out singles anyway, so, but I just focused on one song of his anyways, he’s he is Korean, but he grew up in Australia. So what I really love about his music is that he puts out his songs in Korean and in English two different versions because he understands that translation doesn’t quite translate.
So I love that, but yeah, I just went through the process of trying to make an album art for him for one of his songs. And I don’t know how in depth
you want me to go on as in-depth, as you want, it can just be an overview.
So the S the saw, I mean, okay, the artist is called mood, and I think of any artists that I’ve ever heard their name and listened to their music.
It just fit his, his music is very moody. Okay.
So he’s on break on brand new.
But yeah, and the song is called break me. It’s actually one of his Korean songs. I love Asian stuff. But yeah, so
Korean, Oh, wait, what? You’re learning Korean. Yeah,
it’s hard, but I’m trying
well side projects personal projects are usually things you’re passionate about.
So continue true.
True. I didn’t include any Korean, Hungle I didn’t include any Hungle in the project though, English. But I did have to look up a translation of the lyrics to understand what was going on and from what I understand. It, the song has just about a relationship that’s ending that he doesn’t want it to end.
So that was interesting. And just being inspired by, I mean, since I had listened to the song a lot before even deciding to do this project, even with the word map, I, I knew what the song was about and it wasn’t like some of the words that I included in the word map kind of came from the lyrics as well.
Nice. So it’s a really unique design and really no unique. And I don’t use unique and the nice way to say we like ugly or something like unique is a very high price for me. So I think it’s really unique and something that I think is really lost on people that don’t give this process a chance is the opportunity to create something that is.
Uniquely you because any, any average, your average run of the mill designer, and you probably know this because you work with a lot of other designers and you teach upcoming designers. A lot of the work looks the same. Right. And so often it’s like, okay, well, where are you in here? , where is your, where is your voice? where’s your personality? Where’s why would someone hire you instead of this other person? Say your skill level, your design aesthetic is exactly the same. Your pricing maybe is exactly the same. What sets you like, what sets you apart? And so what I, what I loved about your design is that it feels like you but I definitely got that.
It I listened, I listened to the song and it feels, it feels. Like it works. Like it sounds, Oh, what is it synesthesia, right where it, it feels like it’s, it’s all encompassing. Like it works together. And so something that I have not talked in depth about the way that I teach in the course is how to actually like, find in, use your own uncommon inspiration without giving away secrets.
Like, how did you feel about that module? And is that something that was like any, anything new to you or was it really just kind of like, okay, I kind of already knew how to do this. And how, how did that play into this particular design that you did during the course?
Well, I just have to say for that, I think it’s interesting that you think that the design feels like me because when I look at it, I don’t think it feels like me at all, but that’s what I love about it because I, I, I love that from the word map and the design process, what comes out is something I never would’ve initially done.
I wouldn’t have chosen those colors for that song, but somehow it works for that song, even though it’s a sad topic, it still kind of has some more cheery
vibe. It, the tonality of the colors you chose still feels a little bit melancholy. And I think that that, that comes through well, and I say, it feels like you, it doesn’t look, it doesn’t look like you right now wearing all black with black art and a black lamp and black everything.
Like it has, your list is going to sound really goofy. But like, it has like your spirit, like your, like your personality. Like I can. I can see you in it. It doesn’t have to be like a direct correlation to like the colors you wear or anything like that. And that’s, that’s, what’s really important about people understanding what their creative voices.
It’s not like the clothes that you have in your closet or, you know, the way you decorate your house. It is what’s inside of you that you infuse into your work.
That’s true. Also, I’ve never really thought about how my personality is very different from how I dress or decorate my house. You’re welcome to a little bit more cheery.
You’re welcome for the therapy session.
Okay. Okay. So you said uncommon inspiration that I really loved that module. It was not new to me because of Instagram, because you’re all about travel and like, Oh, I did this thing because of traveling and inspire me. But I think. For me, I don’t really know.
I think it’s just, I rely too much on Pinterest. And I do believe I said this in my feedback to you where like, even if I went to Barnes and noble and I saw a book cover that I was like, Oh my gosh, I love this design. Call me an idiot. I don’t care. But for some reason I would just go try to find it on Pinterest and pin it there,
which is instead of buying the book.
Well, if I didn’t want to buy the book, you know, I don’t know camera, but yeah, I know maybe it’s because now I have a lot of storage options on my phone. I don’t know, but I have been starting taking pictures of like that stuff instead of. Pinning it and it’s probably cause I’m moving away from Pinterest a lot.
Not that, like you said, I’m not breaking up with Pinterest entirely. It says a lot. I’m breaking up with some
object. Some people need to break up with Pinterest, like take a break. Some people need to take a break from Pinterest. Like, like you take a break from the boyfriend. That’s like, I don’t know if we’re going to work out or not.
So we’re going to take a break.
But Oh no, I just love it. I feel like I talk to my students a lot about keep your eyes open, but it’s more geared towards designs and designs in the real world and stuff like that. And so for me, it’s kind of shifted from, yeah. Keep your eyes open to everything. Like I was on campus the other day walking and I was looking down cause you’re all like, I love taking pictures of my feet for some reason.
And. We have like a quad area. That’s surrounded by these trees that have no leads on them right now. And the shadow was so cool. Like, and I love shadows. My favorite thing in photography is when we go to shoots that have Austin windows and when I’m color grading, there’s like a color gradation in the shadows and I’m like satisfied soul right there.
I love
shadows that part of your own uncommon inspiration right there. You need to have a folder in your phone full of just shadows.
I will do it now. I took a picture of those avid meeting to share it that I haven’t yet. That’s
okay. No, it’s okay. It’s for me, shade. Just shadows. Just kidding. No, that’s good.
And I think that a lot of, like you said before, a lot of these things are. Things that no one talks about in this way and opening your eyes is literally like what I want to do through this whole process. It’s like there are, while it seems rigid, right? Like I think this process is the best way, the best, most efficient way to not only have good designs, but to get to them quicker and all of like the logistical, like bullet point things, you will get X, Y, Z from taking this course, but also like becoming just generally more aware and more intuitive to your surroundings.
I also was taught and in design school, like design is everywhere. And that’s part of like where I started when I first started blogging and like 2014 or 15 was like you from the second you open your eyes in the morning, everything you see to the moment you close your eyes, some everything’s designed.
And so that was like part of my sort of thesis at the time was like design is everywhere. Design matters. Design speaks like all that came from that idea. But over time, as I realized how, you know, finding your voice and how inspiration should really work so that you can really set yourself apart and own your own voice, especially in the world where everything is so homogenized now is like understanding that you and I can be in the exact same space and find completely different things.
Interesting and inspiring. And that’s what you take into the word map and into your process that will make both of our designs completely different, even if we’re designing for the same client. So what have you, what have you decided to teach your class now that you have this whole idea about not just looking for design in the world?
So right now into gene letter and topography, but in the fall, I’ll teach graphic design one. And from going through your course, I do just want to change some things with your
permission. We already talked about it. You’re good girl.
Just because I do, I think students rely way too much on the internet because they’re so used to it.
It’s always there for them. It’s the best friend that has never let them down. And they just
don’t know it’s already letting them down. Yeah. It is currently letting them down.
Yeah. And that’s like I have a student that I last year, last fall I always talk about your word map process and the very first lecture of DocuSign one, and she just like attached onto it and started listening to your podcast and like, she absolutely loves your stuff.
And I think it’s interesting. I saw her doing a word map for my class last week or this week actually. And her roadmap looks completely different than what I do bird maps. And I was like, Oh, this is fascinating that I taught you how to do this. And you do it differently than me. Anyways.
Everybody’s word maps, look a little different, like how they connect things and like whether they’re in squares or circles or zero shapes and like, yeah,
yeah, hers were just like work to look very Webby.
And I was like, I love this, I love it. But I just find the students that don’t rely on the internet, their work that they turn in seems a lot more. Clean to me a lot more professional level and like feels a lot more original. And then and so I definitely wanted to figure out a way to encourage them.
Like, they’re gonna hate it if they’re going to struggle and they’re not going to like me for it until we get through the struggle part. And then they’re just gonna be like, Oh my gosh, I love this. And this is so much better. And I’m so much more confident and proud in my work. Yup. And that’s how I feel about my work now incorporating your design process because I can see all of the meaning there and the hard work and just, I’m a lot more proud of the stuff that I produce now than.
When I see my
stuff right. And something I’m not proud of. It. We’re all proud of our work. It’s different. It’s a different kind of product goes from being like, look, my made this. I’m so proud of it too. Like, look at this thing that has staying power and I don’t even have to study. I know exactly why I did every single thing that I did on this page.
And that like, especially, especially for like pres presentations for students, whether you’re presenting like for a project or like for your job, if you’re presenting to peers or superiors, it’s like before, you know, most people are like, Oh my gosh, okay. I got to put this thing together. And what if they asked me questions?
Like, and it’s like super stressful, right? Because I don’t know what I’m going to say. I chose this typeface. Cause it felt right. No, no. Nobody cares. Like nobody cares that it feels right. I’m not paying you for your feelings. So why did you choose that thing? And when you go through this process, it’s like, okay, I chose this typeface because it goes with my concept and I chose this concept because it comes from this.
And then I chose this because, and you literally can backtrack through the map which is also, it just like ends up being a really cool thing that it’s called a word map, because it is a map for your design that you can literally follow and trace backwards, just like you would, if you were walking in real life using Google maps.
And it’s like, okay, I know I looked over here for this thing. And then I looked over here for this thing and you can show your path and your process, and that gives you confidence, but it also shows your peers, your superiors, your potential clients. This girl knows what she’s doing and she is worth, I would pay her more.
Like I would pay you more money because you obviously know what you’re doing as opposed to yeah. I could get on Fiverr and pay someone way less for just giving me whatever they wanted, because they were really into sea green that day. And you know, that day that’s, that’s sorta how it feels.
Yeah. Well, I think, I mean, who doesn’t want to put something that they like into their design, but when with your unique way of getting inspiration or your, what do you call it again?
Common, inspiration, uncommon inspiration. That’s where you get to put you in there. And so you’re kind of satisfying that feel that artists and designers. Always there. Like I want to
yeah. And it is hard and that’s where it’s like, I’m not, I, I didn’t really start incorporating this idea, very tangibly into the process until the past, like two or three years.
I knew that I did it. I knew how I incorporated me, but I wasn’t entirely sure how to teach people how to do that. Because I definitely thought it was just something unique to me. Like it’s just how my brain works and I can’t expect other people to work like that. And that was sort of like, I was trying to just be really nice.
Like I’m not going to push this on anyone because it’s just how my brain works. And then I was like, this is something people can learn. Like you can learn how to be more awake and aware. You can learn how to be more self-aware you can learn how to like, understand what you like, just like you do in any other part of life.
And then it was like, okay, if I’m not sharing this, I’m actually like. Keeping something from people that they could really, really use and could be really impactful for not just your work, but like your creative, emotional, and mental wellbeing.
Yeah. I think for me too, it was kind of a, not that they needed permission, but sometimes we just don’t think about, Oh, I see these things in the world.
I’ve been seeing them. I just never documented them. And possibly like had a database that I could pull from for when I’m creating. And so it was kind of a, okay, Amber, we’re already seeing them
document do something with it. Yeah. Don’t let it go to waste. And I think that on some level my process does, does give designers and creatives permission because.
Especially when you do go to like a formal design institution, I know I was taught and didn’t even really understand how to find my own voice for at least a decade out of college, because I was taught when you are a designer, you basically have to morph into whatever client you’re working with and take on their persona and your ideas, your thoughts, your inspiration, like your own personal, anything goes away.
And so for a long time, I was definitely in that boat. And then I started understanding how this could work and have found this happy middle ground, because you should not do the whatever you feel like, but you also do not have to just be a tool like a literal tool or the bad version of don’t be a tool.
You can like sit in this happy middle place, if you know, how to, how to do it, where you do still know how to use the client’s brand voice and all of that stuff, but then implement your own stuff into it in a really unique and interesting way that makes you stand out from everyone else. And so I think that we do sometimes need permission because we are told one thing and especially out of school, right.
You just want to do everything right. And you just like, I’m going to do everything I was taught. But this process, while I’m telling you, you need to learn it. It’s, there’s a lot of freedom in it. And that’s another thing I talk about a lot is like, there is more freedom in a box than out of it. Like when you know what you’re working with, you know, what you can make.
Yeah. I actually when I first became art director, I was like, how do you lead creatives? And I found a book That is called herding tigers being the creative leader that created salon or something like that. And he talks about that, like .
Huh? Is that Todd Henry that wrote that book? Yeah. I saw him speak when he actually launched that book.
Oh yeah.
I love it. It’s a great book. If you want to be a leader as a kid. But he talks about that. It’s like, you can’t just give designers created free reign because then it’s like, okay, the landscape is way too wide. And so often within boundaries is whenever we really find our creativeness or a lot more creative ideas kind
of come out.
Absolutely. So we’re running up against time now, but I guess I would say my last question is who would you, who would you recommend this course to? Like, what kind of people do you think should take this course?
Oh, man. That’s kind of hard for me because I, I can think of a lot of people and I’m not just saying that
like, cause I’m staring at you.
So you’re not just gonna say that cause I’m staring at you.
So no, I, I’m not trying to like overly hype you or your course either. I just am so thankful that I discovered you very soon after graduating out of college, I, it has helped me in so many ways. And then yeah, so I would say like people who, if you have young designers or beginner designers, Andrew, you, this would be a great course to go through because.
It’s kind of, I mean, you can definitely learn things to incorporate into your own design process, but how to help the people that are under you as well. Because we all go through life differently and we’re all like on a kind of different creative journey. And so you never know what they know and what they don’t know.
And then just, I would say beginner designers, or not even necessarily beginner designers, like, I don’t even know what that means, but just like, I don’t know if you find yourself in a rut or if you find like it’s really hard to create and have fun creating, then I would definitely take this course because then you might find yourself having fun, creating, and it not being so whack your head against the wall.
I will quote you on that. Yeah. This is like, there is just, so everybody has this, this feeling from time to time especially when you don’t have like a reliable process of just like, I’m never, I’m, I’m going to stare at this page forever. Like, or, you know, I had a really good idea last week and I turned that in.
It was awesome, but that was probably the last time, like, I don’t think I’ll ever make anything as good as that again, we’re tapped out, tapped out. Like I think, I think all my, my muse has left and the thing that’s the other thing that’s really awesome about this process is like, it doesn’t matter if you feel creative today.
Like, it doesn’t matter if you like. Have that, like, I woke up feeling like I’m going to make something today and it’s going to be awesome. It’s like most, most of the design world does not have that choice. Like we do not have the option of like our boss coming in and going, Hey, Amber, like I could really use a really great design today for something.
Are you feeling that, are you like feeling, are you feeling inspired to make me something today? What, like, that’s not real. That’s not real life. So what, what if you don’t have that option? If all you do is personal projects all the time. Sure. Yeah. Wait for that. Sure. You, you wait all day for that inspiration to come, but that’s not how you get paid to do real work.
And so the process gives you the ability to get to a place where you eventually do. Feel creative, but you have to start first and it gives you a start, no matter how you feel one way or the other, you can sit down, turn on the playlist, start your word map, and like run with it. And eventually those feelings of inspiration of motivation.
Do come, have you experienced that
CA kind of, I would say for me, it’s been a, like if I get a project that I’m not really hyped about, I love the creative process so much. I think it’s like making a word map is so fun. Sometimes I start projects because I wanted to do a work map. That’s how nerdy I am apparently. But I like when it’s a project, I’m like, I’m not very excited about this, but I’m going to do it.
Eventually along the lines, it’s like, Oh, this isn’t so bad. You feel a lot more into it. And then you still have something that you’re proud of at the end of it.
Word maps can be art. So if all you, if you can see, if you can see that you’ve actually created something in the word map, because it is, it’s like a big deal to, to finish one of those.
And I love seeing them. So I feel free to share all of your word maps and with your student’s permission, all of your students’ word maps. And I think I should tell them to share
that with me too. And then it’s like, are you making a word map and you’d be making a word
map. Yes. Awesome. Well, Amber, thank you so much for, for having this chat.
I hope that everyone listening got some, something out of it. And I just really was excited to talk with somebody that has gone through the entire course. And had some, some thoughts about it because I definitely have some people that are currently taking it that have not learned it before, like from the podcast or are otherwise.
And so their feedback is going to be completely different from yours. But because I think some of the pushback or some of the apprehension, maybe that some of my followers slash listeners slash community have, is like, Oh, I I’ve already heard all about your process in the podcast. And I’ve kind of learned this already, so I don’t need to buy the course.
And so it was really interesting to me to hear your insight on both sides. So I appreciate you coming and talking with me today.
Wow. I. I’m just happy to be here and help you in any way I can, because honestly, I don’t know, like you, I’ve just always loved following you and your, your knowledge and your sharing of knowledge has helped me.
And I’m sure so many other people, so thank you for what you do.
Awesome. Well, I appreciate that. If, if I was like a blusher, I’d probably be blushing. Cause that’s very kind and I appreciate you so much. So I hope that that everyone will go and check out the course. If you want to visit it at brindisi.com/courses, you can get sort of a sneak peek, take a look at the outline and see all of the things that it comes with.
And we didn’t even talk about all the extras like there’s downloads and printables and guides, and it’s like some extra stuff that I have in there that Either is only available to my subscribers on the, on my newsletter or is like, actually like something you buy, like my color guide and things like that.
So yeah, go check that out. And the course actually closes for registration until further notice at the end of may. So as of today you have, I don’t know, I don’t know when this podcast is going to go out, but end of may is like your deadline, so you better get on it. So I hope that everyone has a great day.
And we’ll talk to you soon, Amber.
Thank you.
All right. Well, that’s our episode for today. Be sure to leave us a review on iTunes and you can always send us a note on Instagram. At design speaks podcast, you can find all current and past episodes at design speaks. podcast.com. Design speaks is produced by Kenneth Niffin and Dakota cook.
Shout out to Collin from Vespertine for our incredible theme music design speaks is a project from me, Brandy C and is recorded in the shadow of the watermelon pink Sandy mountains near Albuquerque, New Mexico, as always. Thanks for listening.
