It's all about ideas

One of the most rewarding and encouraging experiences I've had thus far during my COLABORATORY experience have been the times when I get to sit in on brainstorming session.

At both Ascentium and Grady Britton I have seen that in the world of ad/marketing no man is left behind. Brainstorm sessions revolve around every member of the team -- designers, project managers, media buyers, copy writers and interns alike. These sort of free flowing, all-out dump fests are so fantastic. The whole shebang is really show to be seen. It all begins with one good idea. I get excited and start scribbling things in my journal, throwing out random stories. Then someone references a seemingly unrelated event which triggers another idea for 5 other people. We all laugh. Someone reads a Tweet aloud. We laugh again. Then there's an awkward moment of deep-thought silence. Then the whole beast gets roaring again and 58 new ideas flush out on to the table, every single one of which can be traced back to the original good idea that the client had that we as an agency are trying to make BIG. Meetings like this rarely happened in the graphic design world--being on the content side of this creative process is great. Gosh. I'm really starting to like this whole creative strategy thing. I really am.

A sharpie rendition of what a brainstorm session looks like at GB.

journals of sorts

In my purse, next to my bed, underneath my coffee cup and in the back pocket of my pack you will find a journal.

I have journals of all sorts. I typically use the classic small Moleskines. I vary amongst the lined/plain/and graph paper options. The tipping point of like ---> love for me with these journals is when their kraft outsides become soft and fuzzy from rubbing in your pocket so much. It's really a beautiful thing. When I go on a big adventure, like a trip to India, I opt for the classier version of the Moleskine, bound in black and perfectly suited for heavier sketches and scuff marks from adventures. I've also acquired many miscellaneous journals in recent months. One of my favorite new items is my "FIELD NOTES" journal from Draplin Design Co. (thanks to Portland marketing collective, MilkMilk, for the goody).

I use journals for just about everything. I make sketches for my homework for classes.

I take note of important things while I'm traveling. Volunteer ID card from Mother Theresa's House, daily schedule notes and ideas:

Given the prompt to draw a monkey and a lion playing together, I sketched this in one of my journals:

All of my journals have the same last page: Current Feeling. It's a habit I picked up while traveling. I tell myself, at the least, I can simply jot down my current emotion in my journals. Long entries are infrequent for me, however the cumulative sentiment of a whole page of my feelings tracked over a period of time is surprisingly representative.

This one time, I had an idea for a blog and I wrote it down.

My journals are like a community. I feel supported, nagged at, reminded and inspired by all those darn little pages.