I am constantly inspired by new things, but the thigs that mostly by the shapes and behaviour of nature and the natural world, I also like to inspire myself with artists and cultures that also integrate its design with nature. I am very inspired by the oriental and more exotic cultures compared to what I am used to seeing in the European culture. I try to be metaphorical with my ideas, I like how we can transmit a message or a concept by showing something completely different visually. I tend to first look up underlying meanings of what I am trying to convey. With that I try to create mind maps with keywords I would like to further explore and try to find connections between what I have found and then simplify the message I am trying to promote. Depending I find at first, sometimes I can immediately find connections and ideas that I am interested in and therefore expand it to then funnel it down to simpler ideas. Other times I start off with something, continue to develop an idea, and if eventually I am unsure I either start over, or try to take a different direction with what I have already researched. After I have gathered enough ideas, I immediately try to sketch and represent the keywords and ideas visually, some come out more as rough sketches, and the ones I am more interested in I like to try to make them more elaborated and tend to repeat them more. I like to get as much feedback from my colleagues and friends during this phase without explaining much the idea, by just asking them what they think, I can understand if the idea is clear and understandable. If they don’t understand at first, I then explain my design thinking behind it, and see how they react knowing the context. The more I have to explain the less clear my idea is.
I tend to be more creative at night and in the morning, I prefer to work with either music or with little noise around me. People talking tends to distract me. But generally, if I am in the right mindset and interested in my project, where and when I do my work doesn’t tend to affect my process that much.
I am always very interested in trying out new media and tools to develop my ideas, I like to explore different techniques by myself, and a lot of the times I also like to inspire myself with existing tutorials on the internet, see the first steps, and find the rest out by myself, unless I am stuck.
I tend to be sometimes quite inpatient when doing my projects, I am not very perfectionist. I am not great at simplifying and tend to try to add a lot of ideas into one project, which can cause me to overcomplicate simpler problems. In motion design, one of the harder parts for me is the sound editing with the video, even though I have always been very interested, I have not really explored it and or tried to properly learn it. So in my past work I have never been satisfied, and tend to rush sound editing. But I am eager to give it more interest and devotion. I am also very interested in 3D modelling and I want to learn more about 3D animation, I have tried it various times before, it is a lengthy and hard process, but I am aware of its capabilities and results, and I am very absorbed to get to know more about it.
I am not very good at organizing and planning my creative time, but I have gotten better in my most recent projects, I am starting to understand the importance of not letting most of the work till the last days, even though I feel I work more efficiently and creatively when I have the pressure of the deadline imminent. I get more easily distracted and less motivated when knowing I still have “a lot“ of time in my hands.
Since I was young, I loved drawing and painting, creating my own worlds and fantasies using paper and pen. I loved watching cartoons and animations all my life, but I always thought that it was a lengthy and arduous process. but Since my first project with animation with AE, I learned that this was true, but I truly enjoyed and understood it, being able to see the images and drawing come to life with movement, really fascinated me, and in a cheesy way, it was always my childhood dream to be able to this, so therefore, knowing I could choose Motion design as my major, In New Zealand, which was also another childhood dream.
Samuel WorkWeek blog - Research 