No Heroes Anymore
Whilst in bed with the flu, I’ve had the time to go through my old photos and this brought back loads of memories of sun filled days in the 70s doing crazy things like jumping over 6 of my friends on my Raleigh Burner BMX or recreating the opening scene from Raiders of the Lost Ark with a huge boulder we found in the sand dunes (Gran wasn’t too happy when we rolled if off the sand dune in her direction!). Not forgetting my personal favourite, building the tunnel from the Great Escape across my neighbours back garden.
Now, you’re probably wondering what the hell does this have to do with digital?
Well it doesn’t in the first instance. But it does illustrate that when we were kids, we all enjoyed doing crazy things and most of these happened outside.
Our imaginations took us to places we had never seen, or never been too. When I was jumping over 6 of my friends, in my mind, I was Evil Knievel and I was actually jumping over the grand canyon, on a rocket powered motorbike (I don’t think Mark Nash has ever forgiven me… he was the last of the 6 and I miscalculated the landing).
When I was a kid, we didn’t have DVDs, we didn’t have videos, we didn’t have mobile phones, computers, the internet, CDs, PlayStations, Twitter, Facebook, cars (actually I just threw that one in there to see if you were still reading). We had to make our own fun and to do this, we used our imaginations.
If I were in charge of a Creative Degree at a University, I would ban the use of computers. I would not teach people how to use Photoshop or Flash. I would want them to work on using their imaginations. I’m not bothered if someone can use Photoshop. That can be taught. People need to get their imagination working again. They need to wake it up from the long PlayStation-induced coma it has been in.
I suppose what I am trying to say is that I’m worried about the future of creativity. Everything is too accessible these days. Yes, it’s great that I have the world at my fingertips but is this instant accessibly killing our imagination and making people not have to think about things? I think it’s the job of todays creatives to inspire the next generation.
It’s important for us to come up with ideas that are different from everything else and we need to create things that are bursting with imagination. I can look at 100 sites today, that look great but I would happily take 1 Mr Strings website over 100 “fluff” websites any day. This is the kind of stuff that will feed into kids brains and get their imaginations pumping. Just like Star Wars did for me.
This blog post has the danger of making me seem like an old fart. But for anyone who is over 30, we are part of a privileged club. We are the last generation, to have grown up having to use our imaginations to have fun. So I’ll end this post with a rallying cry to other members of this club:
“Why Don’t You Just Switch Off Your Television Set and Go and Do Something Less Boring Instead?”
~Ross
I’m obviously exactly the same age as you – I remember being Evil Kneivel (although I had a Grifter when everyone else had a bmx – always a bit slow in the fashion stakes). But I have to disagree about technology and digital kit killing imagination.
I didn’t go to art college. But the new kit allows me to create and to fuel my imagination. I didn’t read many books, the internet gives me more information than I could possibly need.
Even the dreaded games consoles have given me some great ideas for our creative work. Sure, they numb my brain, but they open up new media possiblities and new ways of infiltrating people’s heads.
You constantly refer to TV in yoru blog. that was our xbox. And it wasn’t even interactive. Talk about soporific!I want my nipper to be out on his bike, playing football in the snow and rolling marbles in the back yard, but I also want him to understand technology and have access to things I still don’t understand. Not at the expence of his creativity, but to enhance it.
c
Thanks Craig for your comment. I agree with a lot of what you are saying. The point i am making is that with all that is accessible now (internet, xbox, dvds etc) it is easy to just do what other people are doing, and to take the easy route. Before we had all this, we had to use our imaginations more, and rely on this to create worlds and ideas. I think its great that todays generation have all these tools to fuel their imaginations, and i cant wait to see what avenues all these will open up for our children, i just don’t want them to rely on this, as their only source of inspiration.
Two other things, i did go to art school (but i didn’t finish), and i also had a grifter.
hi,
getting into my late 30′s, i sometimes have a harking back to the ideals of my youth and wish there were still 4 channels on Tv, Donkey Kong consoles with only 1 game and hair metal…..ahem!
(i also had a Raleigh Super Burner BMX – the one with the gold plastic covering the frame, which i worked through picking off, which in course made it completely rust!)
However, when i was in my youth, i had a ZX spectrum which i played on at length, even tried progamming on it. It took up hours of my time, but i saw it as a device and not a route to all things in my life.
Just as in my youth, i can hear mi’ dad bellowing, ‘stop watching that goggle box and go get some fresh air!’ if i was stuck in front of the tv too long. The advice was common sense. Get outside, even if its just digging a hole in the ground with a stick…….it may inspire me to maybe put a plant in the hole, then look after the plant, then draw the plant, plant other things around it to complement the other plants or maybe the hole is just fine on its own.
But, with so many channels of media, on and offline, a mind can easily be occupied 24/7 in front of a screen. If i don’t realise this myself, i need someone to highlight it for me, otherwise i’ll end up experiencing the world only through a screen. No one wants that, unless that is your only means…
Some say, that a factor in kids spending too long in front of a computer is the lack of external facilities for kids – safe play areas, etc., rise in crime, etc., its safer in doors or just plain easier for a kid to be occupied by a screen for hours on end but, that is a whole other debate..
Creativity, i think is nurtured from all areas of life and as i see it, computers and all things connected to them are the TOOLS to get your creativity out.
An online tutorial on photoshop, showing me how to make a cool logo will show me the steps to make the logo in question, but the creativity comes from learning those new processes which i could use on other work, how i could expand on the learnt porcesses to make something better or only use parts of the process for other projects.
The worry really is staring at a screen all day, every day and hoping a piece of software will spit out the creativity.
A creative will produce something fine, if its on a computer or on toilet roll. The computer is there to aid in getting the job done quicker, more efficiently and a source of knowledge and a source of inspiration.
Therefore, i think its down to a healthy mixture of computers, a variety of experiences, skills and activities that is key.
Go get some plasticine and see how many different shapes or animals you can make with it! Do it now!