Creative Process: From Concept to Creation

Conceptualizing isn’t a difficult process. The thing to remember is that you should start wide. Put every idea on paper or on your computer screen. Get online or go to a bookstore and look at as many different creative ideas as you can. You can find books devoted to logo design, creativity, brochures, business cards, you name it, they make it.

Once I decided on the conceptual direction for MRC, the next step was to begin to narrow down the idea. Considering the market (ministry) and the service (ministry resource provider), I thought about a definite Christian symbol for provision. Wheat? Typically harvest, but usually used in reference to souls and ingathering, not usually for provision. The best Old Testament reference for provision is corn, think of Joseph and the ears of corn. I hope this doesn’t sound like I’m rambling, this is how I start into the process.

The next thing, for me, is to go to the internet. I, along with my creative colleagues, used to keep folders of images clipped from magazines (referred to as a morgue, kind of morbid, huh?) to use as reference materials for ideas. Now, I go to Google and search images (you can set the filter to keep the images relatively clean, but beware, sometimes bad stuff still leaks in). I like to set the image size to large to narrow down the results. So, I searched corn. Thousands of images, but I’ll wade through about the first two pages and find some inspiration.

I found a photo of hands holding corn, pulled it into Photoshop and used my stylus to trace the image on a separate layer. Here’s what I came up with:

I had been kicking around the fonts and colors. I wanted to use a font that is clear and easily duplicated in a variety of different mediums. One thing I considered was the fact that this is a non-profit service entity, so they are going to need to be able to print a variety of collateral material as inexpensively as possible. So, I added the hands to the logo font and other elements and voila, we have a logo. Here it is:

Hopefully, the hands with the grain will be able to be used as an icon within itself. Let me know what you think. Do you go about it a different way? Let us know. Collaboration is the best way to be creative.

-Armando

Questions, comments, concerns? Please feel free to E-mail me!

Creative Procrastination....

I got my new driver’s license today. I’ve been here in Louisville two years and finally did it. My wife got hers the other day. Well, if you need a couple of people to be the poster kids for procrastination, just give us a call. Speaking of procrastination, this blog is so off track with our discussion on the creative process, I apologize.

O.K., so let’s identify our project. The MRC I spoke of is a service and provider entity. You’ll need to understand two things in order to create and effective design for your project. First, you have to understand the entity and second, you need to understand their market. With MRC I drew on Biblical symbolism for provision since their main market (at this point) is drawing ministry minded people together. If this were a plumbers union I would have certainly gone with another concept.

The hands holding the corn was a beautiful and natural element to focus in on. Tomorrow I’ll show you how I brought the image to life.

-Armando

Questions, comments, concerns? Please feel free to E-mail me!

Creative Stuck In The Mud…

Talk about getting stuck creatively, we’re moving into a new house and are halfway between here and there. What a pain. Anyway, we moved a bunch of stuff and left a bunch of stuff and got the church van stuck behind the church. I’m on a deadline to finish a website before tomorrow night and have to draw up a contract for a new client for tomorrow, but you know what the best thing is? Last night, right in the middle of all of this hectic rush, I was asked to speak at a funeral for a good friend of mine’s cousin.

I had never met them or the family. God gave me this beautiful message a while back for another friend of mine. It was called The Staying of James, you can read it here, it’s a message about the fact that a funeral is about the staying of the loved ones more than it is about the passing of the individual.

The family went out to eat afterwards and it turns out that the man’s father is an amateur photographer. Wow, it’s amazing how God opens avenues to allow our small creative efforts to make a difference in some one’s life.

Well, we’ll get back on track tomorrow. Be blessed.

-Armando

Questions, comments, concerns? Please feel free to E-mail me!

Creative Process: Work or Play?

Identify. What is the goal of your creative effort? Sometimes creativity is a means to an end, sometimes the creativity is an end in itself. Whenever I get a chance, or when I get stuck creatively, I will do a free form design just to open the creative avenue. Here’s an example:

This design is an end in itself. The whole point of this creative effort is the creative effort. The same can be true whether in writing, painting, music, etc. If you look at the great masters of creativity you will see them sketching on the back of napkins, or maybe writing lyrics and verse on scraps of paper. I saw in a book a piece of gift wrapping paper that Phil Collins had written the notes to the score of the Disney animated movie, Tarzan. He was playing a song at a party and there it was. That’s how it works. Sometimes your play becomes the spark that can lead to your best work.

When you become a creative, the distinction between work and play becomes almost invisible to others. It’s hard to separate sometimes, that’s the beauty of being able to do what you love. Maybe their right when they say I’m not really working, hmmm.

Tomorrow we’ll go the next step in the process, understanding your project.

What are your thoughts, how do you get your creative avenue open? Post your comments below.

-Armando

Questions or concerns? Please feel free to E-mail me!

The Creative Process

Let’s talk about the creative process. The focus of my life and work is being a creative, that’s what I do. Some people wouldn’t call it work. I guess to them it’s more like playing with fancy tools. I disagree, sometimes when I end out a day of creative work I am exhausted. Creativity is like muscle, the more you work it the stronger it becomes. A great songwriter didn’t start out as a great songwriter. He or she may be gifted in that direction, but as in everything, there has to be a place where theory comes to application.

In order for you to excel as a creative, whether in speaking, writing, drawing or design, there has to be a regimen of exercising the creative, and because creativity is not just mental, just thinking about it doesn’t make you better at it. You and I have dozens of ideas everyday, some are profound, some are average and some we wouldn’t admit to. As long as the idea is trapped in my head, though, two things cannot happen:

1. I cannot be considered a creative.
2. The idea cannot make an impact.

Let’s consider what it means to be a creative. You’ve probably noticed that I am using creative as a noun and not as an adjective here. To be a creative you must create. Deep, huh? There are a lot of profound thinkers, but only a few creatives. The thought is important, like a seed, but they have to both be planted if they are going to create fruit.

This week we’ll focus on the process I used in creating a logo identity for a new ministry called Ministry Resource Center. I met these two gentlemen last week and am excited to be involved in something that I feel will be effective nationally and globally. They are at the ground level of creating an incredible avenue to provide the Body of Christ the resources it needs to be efficient and effective.

Here’s my interpretation of one their goals:

The American church’s idea of evangelists is really askew. We have confused it with bringing in a guest speaker for a couple of extra services. The problem is three layers deep, layer one is ignorance, layer two is lack of finance on the churches part and layer three is lack of finance on the evangelist’s part.

Layer one, ignorance: an evangelist’s job is not just to preach a couple of services. It is to “carry the gospel to places where it was previously unknown.” Source When the evangelist comes into an area, he or she has one job: to carry the gospel to that area by any and all means necessary and afforded to them. Preaching is a very small part of that, at least it should be.

The second layer problem is the fact that the local church typically doesn’t have the financial ability to sustain a long-term evangelist and his or her family, so they are forced to try to make a hummer impact on a vw bug commitment. This is why a “revival” (the use of this term is also erroneous, we really mean a harvest of new souls not a reviving of the church – wouldn’t that be more of a prophet’s job, comments please) is typically two or three days of extra services with a guest speaker.

The third layer problem is the fact that most evangelists do not have the financial ability to sustain themselves at a location for an extended period of time. Consequently they’re prayers are more focused on asking God to lead them to the next church down the interstate that can afford to have them instead of to the next soul around the corner that could be the catalyst for an ingathering.

This isn’t a negative on the evangelist or on the church, it’s just reality. The MRC could be one of the answers to this dilemma. By becoming a channel to educate the church and enable ministry through the financial support of evangelists the MRC will change the focus of the church by alleviating the pressure of completely supporting the evangelist and his or her family. The evangelists can then focus on completing their task in a city or region without having to feel like traveling salesmen trying to market themselves so they can stay on the road.

O.K., this is a tremendous concept, (and only a very small part of their vision) but the thought itself means nothing until it becomes a real entity that is making this happen. That’s where a creative becomes an integral part of the vision. We are what make the vision visible so it can become viable.

Tomorrow we’ll look at the first part of the creative process. If you have any comments or questions along the way this week please feel free to post them below. Don’t let the salt turn into a rock inside the shaker.

-Armando

P.S. You can contact Scott Richardson or Andrew Garrison directly in reference to the MRC. Maybe God has gifted you in the area of finance. You can play a major role in creating an effective ministry to the body of Christ.