Who am I as a creative?
This is as much a piece of self-reflective writing, as it is a blog post.
I have a habit of getting over excited by big ideas. Even 18 year old me got carried away when I decided to make a bass guitar amp for my A-levels. It lasted 5 minutes before I melted the internals with the ridiculous Marshall driver. Then I had the great idea to be an architect, but thanks to Kevin Mcloud, I had a slightly warped idea of the real practice.
It’s taken me a decade to realise this, but I’m not a graphic designer. I’m not a photographer either.
I was sat in a client’s office a few months ago when their head of marketing was on a call to a creative agency, sat right next to me. I thought to myself, “well, that’s rude”. She then went as far to introduce me to them on the video call…
Naturally, we had a chat and it became clear that I wasn’t sat in the office to simply support their sales and marketing teams with Facebook adverts. They had much bigger plans for me.
Earlier this week I was trying to describe my job to a family member (it’s like Chandler from friends, no one in my family knows what I do). This is what I said. “I take a client’s disjointed, fragmented, and often slightly off the wall, idea and turn it into tangible visual assets”. I am the person that clients turn to when they have an vision, but don’t know how to make it real.
I am incredibly lucky to have had over ten years of fine-tuning different skills to become something quite unique. I listen, document, translate and progress speculative concepts into real life. I question and challenge my clients throughout that process with the aim of trimming all the fat and cutting out the noise. I constantly aim to deliver the most efficient visual communications I can.
There’s a lot of concern associated with spreading skills too thin. I know my limits, and that’s when I hand over to my network of other brilliant freelancers, but I am proud to be able to offer such a wide range of services. This week I have coded a HTML email template for legislative changes happening on the advertising of fatty and sugary foods. I was also been asked to create motion graphics for a campaign around London. Next, I produced an online pitch deck for a local council to install some compactor bins. Then I have been designing route cards for a community walking group, that I have been employed to lead twice a month!
I certainly wouldn’t have variety like that if I had pigeon-holed myself. Here’s to being different, don’t be a sheep.
