Myths & Misconceptions About Finding (or using) "Your Style" as a Designer - Part 2

Brandi & Amber continue their conversation about finding your style and the misconceptions  about how to do it. 

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Myths & Misconceptions About Finding (or using) "Your Style" as a Designer - Part 2

00:00:06 - 00:05:13

Welcome to design speaks. The podcast that e mpowers you to stay i nspired, be creative on demand, and find your visual voice. I'm your host Brandi Sea and this week is part two Two of my conversation with amber anderson all about finding your style and the myth and lies we are told so stay tuned for that coming up later in the show we go all right so. Let's talk some uncommon inspiration my uncommon inspiration this week is the zack snyder. Cut of the justice league before our black and white version called. Justice is gray. You probably know by now. If you've been listening to me talk for any amount of time that. I am very very drawn to things in black and white for a number of reasons not just personal preference. But i think that there's a lot of elements and contrast and shadows and composition values that you can see in black and white that you may not otherwise see in color being distracted by color so when i found out that zack snyder actually always at. It's in black and white. It was a really intriguing idea to me to see his his vision of this movie. Not only i'm cut and exactly the way he wanted it but also in black and white. So i wanted to check it out and see how it was and honestly i prefer the black and white version. We watched both versions color and black and white and i think that there are just things and elements and emotions and sort of intent that you can catch when washington in black and white that i didn't quite see in the color version. The color version seemed a little bit. More no let us genuine. I guess is is what. I felt but that is my uncommon inspiration. It was just really interesting to see something like that. It's sort of like the the movie version of making sure. Your logo works in black and white before you put color in so that is always really close to my heart. And zack snyder. Great job doda rose x. Jalek son plays me with my mind. Xiros drew five ever keeping on the theme of uncommon inspiration. Asong that i've been listening to quite a bit probably since even before summer. Is the song called golden brown by a band called. The stranglers came out the year. I was born nineteen eighty-one so obviously it's going to be good right. But honestly i'd never heard this song until i was watching the show on netflix. The umbrella academy which. I think i've talked about before is really unique really interesting. And so are their music choices especially where they choose to put them in the show which is a whole other side sorta inspiration thing but this song in particular. I really love. It has definitely that vintage vibe. Which i didn't know it was from so long ago. Forty years to be exact. When i put it onto my what. I'm loving lately playlist. I just really liked that vintage vibe. The sound of it it's quirky. I can't really say the lyrics are great. I don't particularly resonated with any of the lyrics in any specific way. But i really lake the feel and the vibe and it's sort of like a bouncy quasi happy quirky song which you know me. I always liked quirky things interesting and different things so check it out. You can always find these songs on our playlist. Music from design speaks. Podcast over on spotify part of where i i do talk to designers about things that are sort of related to this. And don't call it style or voice. When i am referring to it because in my mind it's more preferences are the things that i think are not great for designers to default to and that's why i pushed so hard on especially for color choices because you know those are so subjective and that is like one of the major areas where designers really fall into thinking.


00:05:13 - 00:10:04

They know when they don't have a clue what they are doing with their choices in color. so all. just talk about that one. But this applies to any choices whether it's type or imagery or Lay out anything like that. So if you are creating a design and you often design with. And i'm just going to call it out because this is just who. I am so many designers right now. Just doing like all of these earth tones and it's like light browns and light pinks and there's like frigging hundreds of them and then they're all trying to tell other people how to design and i'm like you're just telling them how to design like you because you like earth tones or tones are right earth. Tones are trendy. I mean that's fine. If if you always want to just be designing with the trends. Okay i. I don't think that that's going. That's not long lasting and that is not a voice it might look on the surface like voice. It's more like a style like you said it's like they are following after the the current swiss design. It is it is what's trendy it is. What's now and can you merge those two absolutely but if you only if you only know the style and how to recreate that you're gonna do great for awhile and you're gonna get lots of work and people are going to be like. Oh i really like that super thin not great for just about anything typeface and blush. Pink is everything and sage green. And you know it doesn't matter that it's doesn't match this brand at all. I'm gonna choose that because it's my style. I don't think you know what style is sweetie like i don't and so sorry. I'm getting feisty. I'm gonna back my backed off minute. Taking he's gets me I'm not saying they're not good designers because they are because if you can emulate that with ease then you have skills but you don't have your voice like where are you if i looked at ten instagram accounts or fifty websites of these people. That design like this. And i'm someone who wants to hire them. I can just pick a name out of a hat like it doesn't matter to me. They all look the same. And that's great. If that's what i'm looking for like if i want that and then i'll just be like okay. I'm gonna choose. I choose you pichu because you are there. And you're easy and i don't really care so here client. Here's the thing. But if i want something that is going to be bespoke made for me with something that has right. Genetic qual- lake that. I don't know what that that thing that's special spark of something. I want to know what i'm getting. That is why people hire james victoria. Who basically his process is so amazing and wacky and his style is completely unique. All sorts of different brands hire him because they want his style to represent their brand. They don't want a designer to change their style to represent their brand and they want his voice to speak for their brand. They don't want their brand to speak for him. And that is. I think that's like one of the biggest differences and that is where i get really hung up. It's like okay so going back to the whole thing of choosing colors. And this is where your preferences tend to morph into the ugliness of thinking. That's your style is like i just really. I really love rank stripes and bright colors. So i'm just going to design everything like that because that's just what i like. And it's not a way of designing as opposed to the concept of the fact that i like designing contradictory things which is similar right stripes and polka dots stripes and flowers or bright colors and wacky socks.


00:10:05 - 00:15:39

Like these things are more as a concept as an idea can still be translated into style. My part of my voice is contradiction. And i have only discovered that by understanding what inspires me. And that's kind of where we're coming full circle to what you were talking about it being a journey and in kind of evolving. But it's always it's actually they're finding. It is the journey but looking back at the things that i'm inspired by now and being able to identify that it's contradictory things and it's sketchy type things. I love things that look hand done. Although my style doesn't out might design style does noise show that my design style is very often straight vector looking not a lot of texture until like the since i worked with james victory it was like hughes your handwriting. Like use. Your hands to make things in my ipad is obviously made that a lot easier than like scanning and vector izing and like all that nonsense takes way too much time but looking back at things over the years. I have always been drawn to this stuff and when i'm out and looking for inspiration i am drawn to things that you are not going to be drawn to and that's where you start to find your voice in your inspiration and it all comes back together. Does that help at all. Or did i come more. Yeah but with what you're saying. I so having an overarching concept for your style or your voice. I think that that that's so. Let you grow as person in grow as a creative but if you are someone who just is always doing a specific style like what you're talking about with the colors in something that's trending. I feel like you have this huge inner pressure like oh i can't break out of this. I can't really grow too much because all of my work casts looked like this. That's how i get the money or whatever and then with what you're saying With james victoria. I think like if you have a voice like that you attract clients that are like minded you guys have similar values and you mesh well together whereas if you're just being attracted by oh they do this style. And that's what i want. You're saying get clients that just want that they don't care about what you had to say they just want you to do. The style rather have like-minded client set. Eventually become friends because right click so well. Yeah and it doesn't mean that you always have to do like having a style and having your own visual voice and using those like in tandem with each other doesn't mean that you're always going like your works always going to look the same. I have basically uncovered this part of my brand personality. My voice my style. All those things together only in the past couple of years and you can still look at all of the design. Work that i've done in the past couple of years none of it looks identical and it all still and this is where the contradiction comes for me. Some of my stuff is very straight vector. Clean some of it is very hand done mixed with very clean. Some of it is black and white with color. Which is something that i do when i feel it's appropriate like i'm working with this. I'm working with lauren. Who is a singer. Songwriter musician and i'm working on a whole bunch of her singles. That will eventually become a full album. Which is something. I've also doing with kelly brantford bare. Their brands are completely different and for her. Her brand concept ended up being lovely contradiction. Which just fit well into my my whole thing so i was able to use a black and white photo and use my ipad to draw over top of it and use my handwriting and do all of those things with these really bright colors. That are brand. That doesn't work for kelly brown's foods but i can. You can still see my style in his stuff. So i think the other the other sort of misconception around this is that people think backwards about it right. They think that. Oh if i'm doing. If i'm doing what's trendy i'll be able to constantly change and like grow and do things as the trends change but you don't because you get stuck designing something that's trendy and then when it's not trendy and you're not getting work and then you go into like a crisis of like why doesn't anybody want my design work anymore as opposed to trying to grow what you actually have and letting that continue to mature overtime because the seed is already there so i think you are sort of right that there is a lot of pressure early to sort of do that but i think that the pressure should more be to be willing to be more introspective and try and i think i think part of it comes with the thing that i try to teach.


00:15:39 - 00:20:04

People is finding your own inspiration. Yeah finding what inspires you and being okay with that because if you're only ever looking at other people that's all you're ever going to be able to do. Yeah i i actually. It was just thinking that like if we pushed more for you know younger designers or just even if it's a new concept for you whenever you've been in the field for awhile of finding your own uncommon inspiration iron not shot push that then the whole like develop your own style. Yeah and the style and eventually comes but your voice is really like what matters and you can put your voice into anything you can implement it anywhere and if you understand how to find your own voice especially as designers and brand builders like we're going to be better at helping brands and companies and clients do the same. And that's where like you will be more respectable if you can figure that out because all of that is strategy then not artistic. Woo like they just think that we do right just like we just do the magic and we press the magic design button. We're just borne or just born creative like you know like corollas born evil were just we just have it and all you millions. Just don't know what we know and it's it's stupid. It's it's really ridiculous so funny thing. I just literally before we recorded this morning finished an audio book called the night circus and it's really good. That's on my to watch. Yeah it's not too why it's a really good. It's really good but part of it is like this idea of being born with an innate talent to do magic or can you be taught without like it's not in your blood. Can you be taught. And i think that more often than not people think that creativity slash being a designer specifically is just like something that nobody understands. He will tell me that all the time. Oh you to design. I could never do that. I'm like you could actually like it. Doesn't diminish what i do. I am amazing. What i do but it's it's not because i just woke up one day and was like illustrator extraordinaire. Like gimme that photoshop. I know how to use everything like it's just someone had to teach me. And do i have a different way of thinking about the world and of looking at things and approaching how i designed that is ultimately different than anyone i know. Yeah maybe but also literally. I'm here on this podcast right now because. I think i can teach people how to do this. You learn the process. It is not it is magic but it's not magic. It's like i can teach you how to use this this magic formula and so i think that changing people's minds is important in general but changing designers minds on the fact that like you can look over at your friends drawing and drawing one. Oh one and be. Like i will never draw. Hand that beautiful and then it doesn't matter like could you if you really wanted to. You could do that but you have to want to so. I don't even know where i was going with that. Finding your voice horri- The only other thing i wanted to say is well first of all. I'm i'm gonna take a breath so you can talk drink quarter and then you know. Move on yeah so go ahead. Well gosh you. Into the whole like innate. I know and i because we're not gonna go into it today but it'll be a little. I don't know if i'm allowed to talk about that But voice voice stein cab. And i i agree with what you're saying though on all of that and i have nothing to okay so the only other thing that that really likes solidified this for me. is i was listening or not listening.


00:20:04 - 00:25:07

I was watching. I have the masterclass app. And because as you know and longtime followers of me will know. I am extremely inspired and influenced by literary things literary themes literary people Authors and books and things and so because i love to write and i'm trying to write my own book books now as of chicago. My husband and i came up with a new book idea on a napkin. That's never happened. It will vary movie. Like i'm like taking me drive me right now. I'm putting this idea on a napkin. This might be history some day. He just left but he didn't any make us. He's cute of humors me So i decided to take. I'm still not finished with it. But i decided to take the master class with margaret atwood. Who is the author of handmaid's tale and a ton of other lake. She's got dozens and dozens of books but she is a brilliant writer and something that she started to kind of hint on is something. I also found in another article that i wanted to just kind of read verbatim because it. It's about writing but it very much applies to like how style invoice play out in design. Because i do think that they are really interconnected. How one goes about dating for a story is very similar to how you would idea for a design story which is why i like to call it that. So i'm just gonna read this real quick and then we can about it. So says voice is your own. It's a developed way of writing that sets you apart from other writers. Hopefully it's your personality coming through on the page by your language. Use and word choice. When you read a dave barry column you know. It's his why he's developed a distinct writing voice style is much broader than voice. Some writers have a writing style. That's very ornate. Long complex and beautiful sentences packed with metaphors and imagery think frank mccord and john irving others have a more straightforward style sparse prose simple sentences etc. So it's very much what were trying say here. Like voice is yours. Style is what that looks like and how you say it so twilight to call it a visual voice. Because if i am talk you and i are saying the exact same phrase. We read the exact same poem how we deliver. It is the style. What what we say. Maybe the same but how we say it is the style but our voice like the thing that it actually comes out of is only hours now. I feel like it's easier. I don't know why. I feel like it's easier to like hen point that with literature and reading in like what she's saying and is a lot more convoluted in design. I don't know why it's because it seems even with even for us. It's a little blue right like now because it's creativity we feel like oh. We can't put a definition on that because it's creativity. I think it's like it's a visual component. Yeah where writ written text is is written voice. I don't like it's word you come visual. Yeah yeah you can in your mind. I was just talking actually to my creative director yesterday about how it's interesting couch. She formulates formal emails. Compared to me in our voice in style is very different It's a saying you know with design to but it's harder to put into words because you don't have a i don't know voice voice and that's why that is why i have just wrapped around so tightly this idea of visual voice in the last year. Because it's not just your voice. It's your voice made visual as opposed to reading it and it being visualized in your mind. Whatever they're trying to put whatever pictures are putting in your head. You're going backwards doing the opposite of that thing you're taking the the words that are in your head and you're making it appear visually using words graphics colors type all of those things so it's like the opposite process but it's the same. Yeah and i think that's why like if your process in the word map though were mathis special because it is kind of like what that article was saying like specific words that you know in our yeast two but then i also love the sources because the source is helped me break out.


00:25:07 - 00:29:39

I thought words and and breaks my concept out to little bit further. Them light display amber would have created background. That's the only way. I am not scared of if someone can put a chip into my brain that gave me like an automatic thesaurus and i just like if i look right. Twice like activates the source and that's a little otherwise. Ai freaks me out guys. that's all i want. That is freaking me out. It's cool but that would say okay. Maybe not a chip but like something. Something can access that. I don't have to pull out my handy power thesaurus. Which i love. I love you power. Thesaurus you should sponsor me anyways So yeah i think. I think that you are right. I think that i think that the push to do it quickly is not necessary. I think when you are in school up to a certain level like depending on like where you're in school. I think just mimicking other people's styles is what you should be doing. Copy the style. Copy copy everybody and then you will eventually find what you're drawn to that you can go out and search for your own and then you can learn from amber her school or learn from me how to use us all of this to actually find find yourself and it is like a miraculous feeling when you go. Oh that's that's what. I am all this time. I didn't know you person in the. It's so nice. I'm still waiting for that moment for with fiery branding while i'm gonna tell you right now. It didn't happen when i did my rebranding. It didn't happen. There was hints there and that i see crisis but yeah you're having a brand identity crisis brandon's i think i'm gonna write that down because that's a really that's like a thing a brand crisis that's like something i could. I could like so. Are you having a brand identity crisis. And i'll just i'll just say it like it's one of those Those prescription commercials. Yeah if you are suffering from brand identity crisis oh real do it. I don't know now. That's a lot of pressure will. It was fun while it wasn't a solid idea. Now that i'm expected to do it. I don't want to do all right. Well thank you so much. Amer for joining me. We're going to have another episode in the future. And i think it's either going to be on what we started talking about which is on being innately creative or comparison and confidence. So we'll see both of those tie in really well to this one so that one will be in a couple of weeks i'm gonna do. I'm basically doing me by myself with someone. The next one knee by myself someone on the next one I think it's going to balance it out a little bit. But any last words any last encouragements any last words. The free die. That's how that sounded any last words. What you say that came across to me at all until you said that like any last. I don't i think i've been watching too many spy movies. I've been watching lately. Oh okay in you last amber. My now i need hammered brand identity crisis nine. There's episodes twice as long as it was supposed to be so need to go so thanks for having literally all i have to say is it was fun. Let's do it again. Let's do it again for sure so with that. That is our episode. Thank you lovely people for being here. Be sure to leave us a review on itunes and you can always send us a note over on instagram at these podcast. You can find all current and past episodes at zion speaks podcast. Dot com design speaks is produced by kenneth nathan and dakota cook. Shout out to colin from best routine for our theme. Music design speaks as a project of brandy design co and is recorded in the shadow of the watermelon. King sandymount mountains near albuquerque. New mexico as always. I'm brandy see reminding you that you can take control of your creativity. Thanks for listening.