How Creative Is Multitasking?

Mixing multitasking with creativity and “you and your true love – your smartphone. Think about it. Are you lost without it? Inconsolable if the two of you are separated? Willing to walk into a lamppost rather than look up while texting? Is it the object of your desire? Isn’t it?”

–Ira Flatow, Talk of the Nation host at NPR

And if it turns out that constantly buzzing from one tweet to the next website to the next text to the next blog post to the next email to the next link to the next song to the next YouTube is killing your creativity, can you give it up? Can you even recognize that it may be killing your creativity?

That’s the compelling case being made by more than a few researchers, including Clifford Nass, a psychology professor at Stanford University. Nass told NPR that “the research is almost unanimous, which is very rare in social science, and it says that people who chronically multitask show an enormous range of deficits. They’re basically terrible at all sorts of cognitive tasks, including multitasking.”

So the laugh’s on the multitaskers, who are so terrible at multitasking that they don’t realize they’re terrible at it. In the meantime, their creativity suffers, since they cannot filter out irrelevancy, Nass maintains.

Sue Shellenbarger reports in The Juggle blog for WSJ online that multitasking blocks your best ideas. In her terrific piece Tactics to Spark Creativity, she suggests that “even people who lack ideas can set the scene for inspiration; just walk away.”

There’s more creativity to be found on a hike in Big Bend than at my Mac.

Creativity doesn’t seem to find me when I’m searching for it in the midst of millions of other distractions. It comes to me randomly when I’m on a hike at Big Bend, or sautéing some kale, or driving along a Hill Country road (without the radio) or when I’m just relaxing on my deck. There’s no room for creativity to drop in unexpectedly when I’m in the midst of a million things. Multitasking, that is.

I’d like to hear from other creatives on when they’re feeling most creative—at the computer? With iPhone in hand? Or elsewhere?

And now it’s time for me to just . . . walk away. To preserve my creativity for another day.

Who makes archival prints the old-fashioned way in these online days?

I got into the business of fine art printing (and later, out) to satisfy a need: mine. As a fine art photographer who’s gained some local reknown by photographing an ongoing series I call Vanishing Austin (since 2004), I was frustrated by the print results I got when I’d leave a DVD or upload an image file with a local or online vendor. There was no one to discuss my file prep with, no one to consult on the best kind of print paper for the look I was after, no one to review my file with me to be sure the deeps I wanted would print deep, or that the highlights I strived for wouldn’t blow out in the printing process.

I opened a gallery and art services business in 2010, with an Epson Stylus Pro 9900 (a professional imaging system that prints up to 44″ wide in 10 Epson Ultrachrome pigment color inks plus two blacks) and set about to print with the skills and knowledge to tweak the best results from an image file. The goal was to astound and satisfy customers who were as demanding about the art of printing as I was, with one-on-one custom service.

The Fine Art of Printing

I kept our pricing in line with the services in Central Texas and the online printing sites (that only provided the more typical file-upload-and-batch-process workflow). I stocked two high-quality Epson papers, two higher-end Moab art and photo papers, added Red River Pearl Metallic and lots of samples, so customers could have some options to see how their work looked on differing substrates. I set up a soft-proofing on-the-spot system in-house on our iMac 27″ and encouraged customers to be a part of the process and watch their prints roll off the Epson Pro 9900.

I eagerly shared knowledge about making high-quality images for print, and answered questions about file prep, color profiles, file formats and more so customers felt like collaborators in making their prints shine. Once clients gained trust in our quality and service, I set up a file-upload system using Dropbox, encouraging phone conversations about the uploaded files, even custom proofing or strip tests by delivery, for customers who couldn’t get to my downtown Austin studio for one-on-one service.

These are times of less and less personal service, with so much available online. But I’ve found I’m not alone in desiring the craft of what I create to be of critical importance to my process. It’s ultimately about the end result, the finished product, the stunning print, that I am committed to, as much as it is about the thrill of creation behind the lens.

What’s your idea of a finished product? Are you content to have it viewed online, or are you old-school in wanting that gorgeous print that’s been lovingly made on a richly-textured art paper or pearly-finished photo paper?

Get Your Tech Affairs in Order for 2012

Mail thinks this is junk. Mail is right.

Welcome to 2012. The day that experts’ columns appear  with abandon, advising us on New Year preparations and goals. Generally the best recourse is to read these columns, save them in a location where you’ll never find them, and then procrastinate until it’s too late to act on the advice. For the procrastinators among us, here are some timely tech things to do to start 2012 off with a clean slate (or a clean iPad). Most are guaranteed hangover cures—since you’d probably rather have a hangover than do any of these tasks:

1. Take the trouble to actually “unsubscribe” to every junk email you’ve marked as spam and allowed to accumulate by the thousands in your Mail  junk folder.

2. Update every person in your Address Book with current phone numbers, emails and addresses, and delete the duplicates.

3. Go to every website where you’ve entered a password that you’ve forgotten, and change them all to passwords you can actually remember.

4. Delete all of the duplicate songs in your iTunes library, delete all of the stupid playlists you  made when you were younger, and create new playlists for your current favorite songs.

5. Load every CD you’ve never copied into your iTunes library into your computer to copy over the songs. Then put the CDs on some dusty shelf somewhere.

6. Visit the websites of all of your credit cards, loans and cell phone carriers to examine their privacy policies and opt out, since you’ve already been automatically opted in.

7. Organize all of the apps on your iPhone into meaningful folders and delete all the free apps you downloaded while drinking with friends.

8. Ditto all of the apps on your iPad.

9. Investigate the latest software for erasing your online identity in the (unfortunate) event of your untimely death. Then pick your software poison for making all of your stupid Facebook entries (yes, they were stupid) and your self-aggrandizing tweets (yes, be honest, you were trying to make yourself look good to total strangers) leave the universe with you.

10. Or just clip this list to a safe but obscure location where you’ll never find it again, and pour yourself another Bloody Mary.

The Fine Art of Schlepping

Being an artist involves a lot of schlepping, which is not something you are trained for in art school.

(Come to think of it, are you trained for anything in art school? But we digress.)

Schlepping is pretty much thought of as hauling, carrying, lugging, dragging a burdensome load (with some interesting deviations from google.com) . . . and artists have many, many opportunities to practice schlepping in their art practice. Schlepping canvases, paints, brushes, solvents, easels, and more, back and forth from supplier to studio. Then there’s the schlepping of framing, glass, framed pieces, finished artworks, etc. back and forth to coffee shops that agree to exhibit the work, to art festivals where artists withstand the elements to get known, and to art galleries that agree to show their work. Then back to the studio with the art that doesn’t sell. Commitment to your art involves commitment to schlepping, too.

There's a whole lotta schleppin' goin' on when you choose art for a career

Was there a Professor of Schlepology in the fancy art school you graduated from? Not likely. Wouldn’t artists become discouraged in undergraduate school if they learned that their career success owed a heavy debt to the art of schlepping?

Photographers schlep as well, on a near-daily basis, and all the more so if they are location photographers. And no matter how small memory cards get, cameras and lenses and lights and battery packs and laptops and handy gear never seem to get smaller. Even when they do get smaller, there are still more small nifty accessories to add to the camera bag.

Photographers, at least, are able to solve the schlepping problem by hiring lowly young assistants-in-training. Assistants work for the more established professionals in order to learn from them, and then end up learning how to schlep, too.

Artists are a bit more on their own to become creative when it comes to schlepping. You can go through friends who are willing to schlep pretty quickly in this career.

There are some successful artists who have solved the schlepping problem rather neatly by choosing their partners wisely. I was quite envious upon meeting the husband of a noted Austin-area artist who rather cheerfully introduced himself to her studio visitors as “the artist’s slave.” While the artist’s statement lists many accomplishments in abstract and expressionistic painting, she does not list “schlepping” among them. Apparently she owes all the schlepping her success entails to her husband, the self-described “artist’s slave.”

Artists whose spouses would never describe themselves as “artist’s slaves” nonetheless understand the important role they play in (literally) supporting their creative mates. “See, I just schlep what she tells me to,” one artist’s husband explained to me. They schlep the artwork around, from the art studio to openings and art fairs and back again. Thus their appearances at openings and festivals are understood to be mandatory–especially since they’ve schlepped all of the art in and out.

How much time have you spent schlepping v. creating in your art career? What are your strategies to minimize the schlepping, and maximize the making, of art?

Your Image Is Your Brand

(And Your Brand Is Your Image.)

If you’re a visual artist or photographer, your image is your brand. Literally.

You’re known for what you present, and when you present a focused body of work with a theme, or a recurring topic, or a continuing concept, or an identifiable style that’s unique to you, you’re more likely to get known. In a world of endless creativity, with everyone a smartphone artist, there’s a clearer need than ever to present your image in a polished, professional context.

Branding 101: If you're known for something (like I am for Vanishing Austin), use its image over and over again, relentlessly. It's your brand.

Your resources and energy for presenting your image are limited too, even as the options seem to multiply daily. That’s because you probably want to focus your creativity energy on the art or photography you make, and not so much on your brand. So you’ll need to make informed choices about the avenues you pursue to present your image.

You can default to the ease of sharing your portfolio pieces to your friends on Facebook, where you’ll receive praise and encouragement. You can upload hundreds of photos to Flickr to be lost in the Flickrsphere. But have you evaluated how those choices further your art career, or make photography sales, or get you commissions and assignments, or even give you a reasonable ROI?

ROI is, of course, a business term, used most commonly to refer to the financial return on an investment. But since you are making your own investment of your time and your energy, is there an obvious return in store  for you with Facebook or Flickr? If yes, and if it’s lucrative in a measurable way for your career or your sales, then keep it up. If not, consider that:

1. Your image is your brand: what you present is what you become known for (and you must guard your image, nurture it and tend to it).

2. Presentation is everything. What you show the world is what you’ll get known for.

3. Your art portfolio doesn’t need to ever physically leave your studio, but the act of creating it will focus you and your work.

4. Your web portfolio is a must-have, in the way a business card once was—it’s your calling card for the world, and the way you’ll be introduced over and over again.

5. Your business card is still a necessity. You’ll probably print more than you’ll ever need, but  your card must be polished and offer all of your contact options—then you can just hand them out like candy.

6. You’ll need some promotional cards. One for each subject or theme you pursue will offer a quick visual reminder to your various audiences about what you do and what your focus is.

7. You work can get a boost in attention when you present it on your iPad. (But not on your iPhone—see Dumb Things Artists Do if this is not self-explanatory.) You can make a short presentation for each body of work, using Keynote on your iPad, and ride the coattails of the iPad‘s popularity by offering it to a client you’re wooing.

8. Your art and photography will be shared again and again when you create a slide show (or Keynote or PowerPoint) and upload it to sites like Slideshare or LinkedIn.

9. Everyone else has a video. You need one too. Or several. The better to see you with, my dear.

10. Have a one-page PDF handy to email anyone, anywhere containing your professional highlights and contact info at a glance, and include an image, too, of course. The one that promotes your brand.

Related articles

• 38 New Digital Media Resources You May Have Missed (mashable.com)
• Branding Is For Everyone (washingtonpost.com)