Here at the Uglydoll office, Sun-Min and I must get close to 100 emails a week from soon-to-graduate art students and aspiring authors/toy designers/creators all asking pretty much the same two questions…What is your creative process and do you have any advice to help me get from point A to point Z?
That’s easy stuff…
A. Lock yourselves indoors.
B. Stay there.
C. Make the stuff other people go out and do.
D. Then still stay there.
Presto! See?
When we create characters, we stay away from “designing” them.
We don’t really think of ourselves as toy designers….or designers at all really.
We tell stories though books and toys.
No story? … No toy.
So we start by writing characters…come up with who they are, why they’re here, what they love, what they don’t love so much…
This usually happens when we run into funny people (or animals, bugs, situations) out in the real world…then we run home and begin to write these funny people or things or situations out on paper to start…
Things take off from there and by the time we’re done we have an all new soul to then draw out on paper and sew into a doll or form into a toy.
So while we are inspired by true events, none of our characters are based on actual people…
they just serve as the starting point.
As for creative advice, that’s easy stuff…
Be willing to work nonstop and fail for decades,
Stop all TV, movies, or other non-work related actions unless it’s genuine research,
And, most of all, don’t do anything “too.”
Never ever do anything “too”.
Bring about the idea everyone else wishes they thought of and do the thing everyone wants to do too. And do it first.
See? Man, that’s a piece of cake!
No but for real, it’s simple.
If a psychic time traveler from the future told you your life long dream will 100% absolutely fail and you go for it anyway, you will succeed.
