From Drawing Your Own Path, by John F. Simon Jr. Art and Meditation Practices Make marks using pencil and paper. (30s-1min) Make marks, while consciously slowing yourself down. Focus your attention on listening to your breathing and watching your hand. (30s-1min) For 1 min, pay attention to everything and note the sensations (eg hearing, seeing, feeling). After 1 min, make marks based on sensations that come to you. (2min) Pick an object and draw it. (5min) Pick an object and draw a tiny portion of it. (5min) Pick an object. Draw to reveal the inner conditions of that...

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From Creative Workshop, by David Sherwin Creative Challenges Personal branding: Spend 10 min answering the questions: What are my 3 strengths as a designer? What are my weaknesses? What's my favourite colour? What designers do I love? What design work do I enjoy? What type of work do I want to do in future? Then design a logo for yourself based on your responses. (30 min) One line logo: Design a logo for the 2012 London Olympic Games formed from a single unbroken line. (30 min) 5 Fonts: Create a brochure promoting the Slow Food movement using 5...

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From Creative Workshop, by David Sherwin Designrandomizer Make the logo bigger Use purple as the anchor colour in your design Use circles in the background of your design Add twenty years to your target audience Tone it down. Make your design more conservative Spend only 20 min on your design Use illustration Cut the copy in half. Then cut it in half again. Use black and white only. Change the orientation of your design by 90 degrees ...

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From Creative Workshop, by David Sherwin Brainstorming methods Mindmapping Word listing Picture association Brute think (think of as many ideas as possible) Idea inversion Free form sketching Role playing Yes, and... (add on to the idea) Future thinking Blank bubbles (write dialogue in speech bubbles on how your audience/product may talk) ...

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In a good mood? Today, I felt really inspired to start tracking my mood.  I've observed trends like: Journals to record your daily mood Happiness/gratitude diaries Mindfulness/wellness/meditation apps But what I wanted was a simple way to just try to track my mood. A life experiment of sorts, to hopefully make myself feel happier.  I went on a Google-binge to track down the best mood-trackers on the App Store, and found a few that looked pretty good: Mr Mood Mr Mood is a really cheerful and colourful app. I was really psyched about downloading it, but then I...

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