Inspiration – Where Do You Get Yours?
March 28, 2010 | Thoughts & Words By Paul Maloney | 9 Comments
Gaining inspiration at times can be an incredibly difficult and frustrating task, like writers, designers suffer a form of "writers block" which can be a major design hurdle before you even start. You will see posts around the web "9999 Of The Best CSS Galleries" which OK they can be handy and serve a purpose, but looking at other peoples designs doesn’t necessarily mean your will design something fantastic and unique, you’re more likely to borrow elements from other peoples designs.
One method I use is taking inspiration from other mediums for example: printed media, advertisements and even vintage posters and leaflets can provide something to get your creative juices flowing.
Here are a few resources which I have found and most likely will continue to find useful in the future for my own upcoming projects.
1. ADS OF THE WORLD
Ads Of The World has a huge collection of ads from around the world whether they are video, digital or printed media. They also have a section dedicated to logos.
2. BEHANCE NETWORK
Behance Network has a great selection of portfolios, projects and various collaborations, It has pages of designs and you can view anything from photography to doodles here.
3. MUSE
Muse is the brainchild of Drew Wilson and provides you with an inspiration hotspot, again the work on display is varied across the design disciplines, but all are of high quality.
4. COOLHUNTER
The Cool Hunter is a site I really enjoy, it’s not packed with the latest trends, it has an appreciation for anything that looks great and will provide inspiration and influence each visit.
5. FORM FIFTY FIVE
Form Fifty Five always strikes me as a pretty "arty" site as it has many examples of modern art. But it does cover much more than just art, I particularly like the fact is uses video clips to deliver inspiration.
"Awww.. Only five examples!" I may hear you say, the idea of this isn’t just to give you a list post to work from, it’s more to inspire you to look further afield for your inspiration, scour the web, search in book stores, charity shops or even your grandparents home. Where do you guys source your inspiration from?
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I know it’s an obvious one, but DeviantART is up there for my inspiration. So much good art on there, many of which goes by un-noticed.
Another site is Designers’ Couch which is very similar to DA but as the application process is much stricter, the quality of the work on there is better.
Muse is completely new to me. Anyways thank you for sharing
Gotta agree with DeviantART, so many times i’ve headed over there for inspiration.
I would imagine Dribbble to be inspirational too, alas I’m yet to be invited! lol
.-= Paul´s last blog ..Inspiration – Where Do You Get Yours? =-.
I didn’t know about Coolhunter, so thanks for that Paul!
I have suffered from creative block in the past and there is only one sure-fire way I have found to get the creative juices flowing again. Escape from my computer for at least 3-4 days in a row.
After disconnecting for this long, I find it much easier to come up with original ideas.
I think that we are currently overwhelmed with sources of online sources of inspiration.
.-= Duane´s last blog ..How Can We Improve the Design Community? =-.
Although I wanted to plug my own gallery website here, I would not.
But one more site I find really useful is http://www.graphic-exchange.com. This is some regularly updated and truly amazing collection of designs and art.
.-= tejas´s last blog ..Meca-graphics.co.uk =-.
I think my last post didn’t go through. Here I go again:
I love this post! So many useful sites to get inspiration from, especially when doing web or graphic design I would say.
It’s funny because I wrote an article myself in myblog, just a few days after you posted this. I talk about my own tips for getting inspiration in what I call it a “blank mind”.
You can read my article and see my recommendations there – Go to article.