Where did our creativity go?

Hey everyone!

This post will be an interesting one for me. A few weeks ago I finished reading Chris Orwig's beautiful book, "Visual Poetry". In the very beginning of the book, he talks of children and how their imaginations are limitless and unfettered by practicality and qualifications. I witness this everyday with my own children, as they pretend to be cheetahs, dragon slayers, draw and build things, dance, and are constantly awestruck by snails, ladybugs, butterflies, etc.

In the book, something Chris talks about really resonated with me. He speaks of walking into an elementary school classroom, and he asks the class, "How many of you can draw?" The entire class raised their hands. Then he asks, "How many of you can sing?" The entire class again raised their hands and began singing different songs.

Chris is a teacher at The Brooks Institute in Santa Barbara.After his experience at the elementary school, he came back to his own class and asked his college students the same questions. Only a couple of students raised their hands. The students added a self-imposed qualifier to the question. While Chris asked, "How many of you can sing/draw?", what they heard was, "How many of you can sing/draw well?".  Pablo Picasso said, "All children are artists. The problem is to remain one when you grow up."

So what do we do, if we have all of these self imposed qualifiers, filters, years of people telling us to "grow up" and get a real job, singing off key, drawing poorly, and staying between the lines? How do we work through all of those things, and start to begin being able to express ourselves in a way that pleases us? That allows us to be "creative"? What the hell does "creative" mean, anyway?

Dictionary.com describes creative as:  

Having the ability or power to create: Human beings are creative animals. 
Productive; creating. 
Characterized by originality and expressiveness; imaginative: creative writing

So, based on that definition, if you are making images, you are being creative. If they are also original and expressive, you are being creative. So stop telling yourself your not the creative type!

Now, what can we do to increase our creativity? To make ourselves be more creative? To practice being creative?

I think sometimes just by limiting our options, it forces us to be more creative. Take a cell phone camera, or a disposable camera. Stop wishing you had that 18-5000 f -22 and learn to really use what you have. Do you really think that if Van Gogh only had blue paint and a toothbrush, that he wouldn't find a way to make that work? Perhaps if you were to go out shooting for a day, with only a fixed lens, when you are used to using your zoom, you will force yourself to be creative. If you can't line up the shot you want because you can't zoom in or out, your forced to move your feet, and get "creative". I do this all the time. It also helps you justify having that little used lens in your bag.

What about lighting? How often have you had to improvise to get the look/feel you want? Have you ever shot your flash through a paper towel roll because you wanted a snoot? Used halogen work lights diffused with a shower curtain to look like studio lights shot through a soft box? Used a flash light or a Zippo?

Why don't you try this, grab a friend or family member, and go try some night time street portraiture. But don't bring any lights or flash. Try to find a street light, neon sign, car headlights, and improvise. See what you can come up with.

Bust out your old film camera and fire off a roll. Shoot for an hour setting your camera at 1/125 and shoot at whatever aperture your camera gives you. Cover up your LCD. Try macro shots. Go shoot with your 7 year old, and watch what she finds interesting. Give yourself a theme, like blue, or sad. Whatever you can do to get yourself thinking, and slowing down, and shooting. Have fun, relax, and be surprised by the results.

Spend an hour playing with 1 image in Lightroom or Photoshop. Find out what all those sliders or layers do. Download some free presets from Lightroom Killer Tips, or your website of choice. And let us see the results...

The images at the top of this post were going to be used for a post about vision, but since my experience at the Jerry Ghionis seminar, I have scrapped the original concept, and am working on something new. So what you see is the original scene, and how I interpreted said scene.

Creativeness often consists of merely turning up what is already there. - Bernice Fitz-Gibbon