freelance paradigm

Part 1 Part 3 Part 4

In the first part of this series I discussed the noise that is created by the media outlets which clutters and occupies our minds so that we simply cannot think creatively. But there are other problems too. The next in line is:

The Lack of Imagination
Imagination is the core engine of creativity and many people simply lack that. Imagination simply means seeing with your mind's eye what has not been materialized yet. At least not that you know of it. There are IMHO two basic reasons why people don't develop/carry this ability in adult age:

1- they lack proper genes for their brain to be powerful enough (I don't believe this could be true for such a large amount of people),
2- they had it too easy in life.

Since the first reason is completely arbitrary and hard to prove (then again, I am not a geneticist), I shall not discuss it.

But what about the second? Again, I might be speaking from my gut, but I came to believe that imagination develops when there is a certain delay between a wish and its fulfillment. If that time is too long then frustrations and its suppression can occur, but that is an other subject.

Remember your childhood; you want a new toy so badly it almost hurts. But your parents don't buy it right away, so you'll have to wait till Christmas or your birthday. During that time you start imagining how sweet would it be to get that thing and everything you could do with it. You can see yourself playing with it, sharing it with friends, and so on... This is how your imagination was born! If you have parents that fulfilled your wishes instantly, it is very likely you will not develop imaginative powers of the brain. Again, this is from the gut, but in my experience as a mentor, spoiled kids tend to have more difficulty understanding fairytales, poems or even visual art. They also produce less (and lesser quality) of their own works. It is not that they are stupid or unknowledgable, they simply lack imagination. And patience! How could anything be created without patience!? (another product of non-fulfilled wish)

Then you go to school and school fails even harder than some parents at developing children's imagination. Almost every education system in the world is what Lawrence Lessig would call a Read-Only (RO) system. That is a centralized system at which one person broadcasts his knowledge or skills, while a myriad of other are in a role of completely passive receivers, who have to repeat whatever was told or demonstrated. This system has no respect for individual intellect or personal creativity. Most classes are organized in a way that knowledge is brought to you readily on a tray. You don't have to work for it. It is just there for you to consume it. It often feels like the system thinks I am so stupid, that I can't find that knowledge myself. Only the most inspired teachers have the power to overcome this built-in flaw and make their classes a Read-Write (RW) class, at which students equally participate in creation of the lesson, and where their individual contributions (ideas) are crucial for the class. But those are rare exceptions.

Imagine now, if you will, a different kind of class. It is a class at which knowledge is acquired by hands-on experimenting and (field) research. A class where you have to work to get your answers. The knowledge doesn't come right away, you have to wait and search for it, and while you're at it, you imagination is already working out the possible solutions for your problem. It might take a little more time, but the understanding you get is far deeper and the knowledge more real. It is not just words you memorize from a book, it is The Knowledge. This kind of teaching respects learner's intellect. It is as if it's been sublimely said: "I know you are a smart person. I believe you can find answers yourself and you don't need me to bring them to you." It is a lot easier to be motivated after such compliment. And imagine a class at which testing is done in a way that is not humiliating. Questions are completely different. One can get a question like;

"From where does a tree get all the stuff it needs to grow?"

If you want to answer that, you have to know really a lot about trees, but not just that; you must also connect together different domains of knowledge, like biology, chemistry, geology, meteorology, math... Everything has to fall into place for you to answer that the tree is made mostly of carbon and that carbon doesn't come from the ground (like the majority would answer), but from the air with a process called photosynthesis. You didn't see that one coming, did you! Photosynthesis is how a tree makes wood! If it really came from the ground there would be a large hole under every tree. A tree wants to grow up to reach even more sunlight and dominate the space (evolutionary explainable). Oxygen is just a side product. But you didn't learn that in school, because you were too occupied with memorizing the exact word order of the proper definition of photosynthesis, which goes as followed:

"Photosynthesis (from the Greek φώτο- [photo-], "light," and σύνθεσις [synthesis], "putting together", "composition") is a process that converts carbon dioxide into organic compounds, especially sugars, using the energy from sunlight.Photosynthesis occurs in plants, algae, and many species of bacteria, but not in archaea ..." (source)

It is a scientifically correct definition, but it completely blurs the point. It is a wood making process! Of course, memorizing and repeating that dull definition will rob you of the joy that is thinking. I assume you had a great time pondering the question "From where does a tree get all the stuff it needs to grow?" but not such a great time when you had to memorize in school. People simply love to think, they love to use their imagination, but the schools will just not give you enough opportunities to use your brain in a way that it was built for and we are lucky to have that many creative people who retain this capacity into their adult life. For the most people, by the time they finish school, they are just a machine to store and reproduce a few facts and some basic skills (language and some math). If people are creative, they are creative despite of-, not because of the schools.

The schools are tiring and stressful, but that shouldn't be confused with intellectually hard. The schools are far to easy. Thinking is fun, but there is almost no thinking and imagining done in schools.¹ This kind of teaching is actually an insult for one's intelligence. No wonder kids rebel! Again: there is no delay between a wish and its fulfillment that is needed to spur imagination. Hence, for the most of the people, schools are boring and no fun at all! The unnatural way of learning and testing is a cause of a lot of anxiety. There is something very wrong with that. The majority of people doesn't see it that way (they assume this is the nature of things, that it cannot be done any other way...), but I simply find it problematic. Give me one good reason why should the school be stressful! Why in the world should 10-year-olds have cramps in their stomach every morning? Why do we torture our kids like that? Schools could be so much fun, full of adventure and exploration, just like Naional Geographic, but in real life! We just have to shift our logic from RO to RW and develop respect for their young but huge intellects.

In both cases (parenting and teaching) the reasons for not giving a child enough time to develop imagination could be completely benevolent and even noble. Parents want their children to have things they couldn't have had. And many people go into teaching because they want to share knowledge and spare misconceptions they had themselves. They want to give kids the right answers straight away so that they wouldn't waste time on intellectual dead ends. That is a noble cause indeed, but by doing it too much they rob young people of the joy that is exploration (and imagination).

After school, your passive intellectual life, where information is only consumed (not even repeated anymore) continues in front of the TV set and other classic media.² We covered that already. 20th century is perhaps the only century in human history, where the predominant culture was of the RO kind. A big, centralized industry of music, movies, television, radio and publishing was feeding hungry consumers. Why wouldn't they consume; professionals in Hollywood are much better than the local theater. But there is a good news; with the dawn of the internet our creative potential is back at work. Just look at the Vimeo, YouTube, Flickr, blogs and everything that is created. We are back to Read-Write. We all participate in making the cultural landscape. And that fuels my imagination!


Basic references:
Hawkins, J., (2004), On Intelligence, New York, Holt Paperbacks
Robinson, K. et all, (1982), The Arts in Schools, London, Calouste Gulbenkian Foundation
Robinson, K., (2001), Out of Our Minds - Learning to be creative, London, Capstone
Robinson, K., (2009), The Element - How finding your passion changes everything, New York, Viking Penguin
Lessig, L., (2004), Free culture - How big media uses technology and the law to lock down culture and control creativity, New York, Penguin (Free PDF)
Lessig, L. (2007): TED Talk
Robinson, K. (2006): TED talk 1
Robinson, K. (2010): TED talk 2
Drori, J., (2007): TED talk

And if you want to so see how a good RW kind of class looks like, see this.

Footnotes:
¹ - We should also note, that the school curriculum is far to narrow to cover all of the interests and talents that children might have. Not just that; it is completely unbalanced. Languages and math are dominant subjects everywhere you go while arts and certain sciences suffer from the lack of attention. As Ken Robinson puts it, a lot of people go trough their lives thinking they don't have any talent at all. They don't enjoy what they do in life, they just do their jobs and wait for the weekend. We are not all born just for math, languages and encyclopedic learning. We are much more than that! I spilled a lot of ink on that subject, I am aware of the problem, but it is an education-specific subject, so I decided not to write about it in this context.

²- One more thing. When you talk about schools and media in this tone, you can quickly pass the line and end up on the side of conspiracy 'theories'. It is a very thin line indeed! The point at which conspiracy simply fails is that it assumes that this system is put up and maintained by intelligent design of the elite. Now this is a kind of a compliment, don't you think? I simply don't believe they are that smart. Nobody is. There is simply too much data and too many arbitrary factors for anyone to manipulate with. Stephen Wolfram's A New Kind of Science will show you that even with the simplest of rules a great randomness can occur. Even supercomputers can't predict weather for more than 3 days ahead, not to mention the whole society. I would also strongly suggest reading some game theory on this subject. It will show how even if every involved member of the society is trying for the best, the whole system can go totally down. Richard Dawkins' The Selfish Gene will force you to make the same conclusion.

Every once in a while you can spot twenty- or thirtysomethings argue on forums, blogs or facebooks whether or not the cartoons were far better "back when we were kids". Perhaps they turned the TV on by accident, out of curiosity, by or because they have kids of their own now, but they seem largely to agree that cartoons are now far worse than they were. Present day cartoons ought to lack important qualities of storytelling, graphics and benevolence, while violence, shallowness and simplistic graphics took over.

The opposition might make an argument that most of what we experienced as kids didn't come trough the tubes but rather happened in our heads. Children have a tremendous power of imagination and most of the cartoon happens there. No matter what we would have watched, we would be equally romantic about it today.

But still; the change is visible no matter how you value it. I for one don't even try to join either of camps but rather embrace both arguments and find a personal balance between them. It is also true that creators have to make shortcuts while budgets go down, production time becomes shorter and demands even greater. What we see might be actually a result of the tragedy of the commons. I am sure many networks would gladly have well written stories, superb animations and music done by world class composers merged into their cartoons, but frankly they cannot afford it for their daily program.

So I was so much more surprised when I came across this little series by Nickelodeon called Avatar: The Last Airbender. This series has everything a goood cartoon needs; a good story, a very complex set of characters which are by no means shallow or simple, nice graphics, humor and most of all, what I call the right set of values just underneath the surface. There are no absolutely good or bad characters; they all make their decisions, sometimes good, sometimes bad, but they always face the consequences of their actions and pay the price or collect the awards. Even the good old benevolent cartoons like The Smurfs or Tom and Jerry (which are often praised as examples of the good old times) fail at that. Gargamel is simply evil and that's just that.

It made me think which are the lessons that a good program should promote. I am sure you have your own set (which I would be more than happy to discuss below), but "Work hard for the things/people you love," or "People do stuff for a reason, those who appear mean are most likely hurt and fragile," or even "If you made a mistake, face the consequences" might be among them. Of course; good graphics and overall quality serve well to develop a refined taste of every individual.

I am happy to admit that Avatar-Airbender series embodies all these qualities and many others. Even though it was intended for a younger population, it will get you hooked no matter how old or young you are. I cannot recommend it more. You have three seasons of fun, each better than the last, and everything ends in an epic series finale. The story is concluded in the best possible way (I think writers did better "finale job" here than with Battlestar Galactica, although BSG had its story more complex).

During the time in whch I neglected this blog, I did quite a lot of reading and educational watching. I watched the entire series of Justice class from Harvard, and I really liked this episode where they discuss the price that can be put on a human life.

I also read this book that Chase Jarvis recommended.

But enough about my academic pursuits.

What I realized more vividly than ever is that even intangible things must sometimes be tagged with a price in Euros. Which often sucks.

As a photographer I must attach a price tag to my photographs or my work in general. More often than not, I make critical errors in judgment, but not in my favor. I usually charge far too less. I tend to forget what I invested in my self and I also forget what I bring to the table. And I think I am not alone in this. It is a general thing among artists, not just photographers, but also painters, illustrators, writers, movie makers, musicians... etc.

It would be too easy to blame it on society, even though it plays its part too. The value that creative work has is often intangible and hard to defend financially, so people tend to diminish it in negotiations with the artist. They often do it on the basis of time ("You did it in one day..." "I don't earn so much in 3 hours..." etc) or material costs ("You only used this much of color"). You hear it everyday...




Yesterday a society of photographers in Slovenia called Enoooki (one-eyed) distrubuted an edition of our biggest daily newspaper Delo - but without photographs. It becomes very clear what the value of a photograph is, once you miss one.

Think of your wedding/graduation/family/whateveryoulike photograph(s). How much would you pay to get them back if someone stole it from you? That's the price!

Recently I had to defend my portfolio (most of it can be seen here) and a member of the jury asked me to separate digital photos from those taken on film. I did so, and then I explained the difference in paradigms of shooting on each medium. Not that film was expensive, the mistakes were! I would gladly spend three rolls of Velvia or Portra VC if I knew I had The Photo, but the price of failing was a bit to high to act this way. I had to think a lot more so I killed many ideas in the start. As a result certain subjects or approaches were considered unworthy of photographing. Not anymore on digital and that explains the explosion of diversity seen on Flickr and elswhere.

"But don't you think that rapid and thought-less shooting [common on digital] leaves you with photographs of lesser quality?" the jury asked.

"Perhaps," I answered. "Perhaps that is what happened to me in the first weeks after I made the switch from analogue to digital. But then one has to find a balance between the paradigms of film-like planing or contemplation and high-speed-intuitive action (believed to be common on digital)."

That is not a bad answer, however, it is not an accurate one. What I should answer is the following:
Rapid shooting is just a technique. It has been popular in sports photography for decades (even on film) because it is the only way to ensure a good photograph. It doesn't mean sports photographers are careless, they need this technique. Often they do a lot of thinking and planing in advance (before the competition). They examine the light, camera angles, athletes' motion (etc) and set up their work flow hours before the actual exposure. Then they shoot their thing. This video might be a good example.

Rapid shooting is essential to get a good photograph.

In landscape or fine art photography rapid shooting is often no advantage. No matter what medium (digital or film), photos have to be well composed and properly lit. And there the "film paradigm" is still well practiced on digital.

A technique/medium should not be confused with the attitude! If one has a careless attitude towards the art and photography, one remains ignorant on film as well as on digital. But if one seeks for perfection, the medium doesn't matter.

I renamed my compact flash cards after great thinkers of our history. With time (and new cards) other names will follow; Dante, Leonardo, Euler, van Gogh...

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I could show you my last slideshow of photos from gymnastics world cup in Maribor (actually I'm doing it right now), but istead I'd much rather share with you my last talk from the conference in Olimje a week ago. The purpose was to present UMMI summer camps and our methods of working there, but in doing so also shine some light on the issues connected with giftedness and creativity, especially with children and youth.

Unfortunatelly for some of you, the talk is in Slovenian. If anyone is willing to make subtitles or translations I can provide source video file and the transcript in Slovenian. I lack time to do it myself. Those of you who understand it, thank you for watching and I'll be glad to recive some comments.

More lulz...

PS: why did my.opera change photo displaying settings from 640 pix wide to even smaller resolution of 620 pix on the blog page?

Some time ago I wrote about what resolution in media might be. Only later I remembered a xkcd comic in which the charachter contemplates how wide our options are and how we yet choose to live only a few of "day-types" over and over again. Imagine how it would be like if you could live every day anew, with different tasks and different people.

Something like that is happening to me last 10-14 days and it will go on for an other 5. I have no steady routine, each day is really something special. That is not to say it is spontaneous and improvised, on contrary, my activities are well planed, but still days are very different in comparison to eachother. And they are packed with work work work... From 7AM to 10PM. I could say that right this moment I live a very high-resolution life A lot of data in short amount of time.

One might think this is cool, and it is. But it is also very fatiguing. I learned that repetition is what keeps us fresh for the new stuff (to some extent). It quite hard to live like this for a longer period of time. I can't wait to slip back into a warm old daily routine. At least for a while, to get some mental rest.

So, what was I up to? I can give you a few things, there is lot's more, but I don't want to bore you

One of the things was a new creativity conference, organized by UMMI. It was really really cool. I opened the conference with a Keynote lecture of my own (video will follow), and then I was blown away by lectures of dr. Zadel, dr. Juriševič, Korado Korlevič and many others. This is me during the lecture (photo by Mojca Kukanja Gabrijelčič):


G33Ks might notice a familiar face on my t-shirt Moar photos.

This year I also went on Kras marathon for which I designed the main poster and some postcards. The postcards were designed with photos from Flickr via Creative Commons licence. It is soo cool to have that kind of colaboration across the world. This is a postcart for 4 events that will happen this year. Photos are contributed by Cobalt_sun, ((brian)), Randy Son Of Robert and Samo Onič, who is not on Flickr.

The poster:
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That is me with my design. Again - sharp geeky eyes might recognize bent corners on my number tag. This weekend Battlestar Galactica hit its final run and such an important event must be celebrated with every possible detail. I dedicated my 8.4 km run to this series finale.
Moar photos!

So, as mentioned - Battlestar Galactica Series Finale happens only once in a lifetime, therefore it deserves a special party, full of geeks, pizzas (we even ordered one with BSG caption on it), computers and elaborated debates about things that exist only in our imagination(s). But it was great. I'm not giving you any spoilers though...

Tonight I work! I will make a presentational video for my masters work at Faculty of architecture. I figured it could be really easy to animate 3d stills of my project into a fancy flashy video. So I set up a small video studio in my room. Here's what I have for the night:

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- one TV monitor for previews
- one PC monitor for work (borrowed)
- one video PC (borrowed)
- one condensor mic for possible audio effects
- one iMac for graphics and cool stuff
- 750 GB of extra storage (that will not be used)
- studio headphones
- 0.5 L of fresh coffee (that will be very needed)
- 0.5 L of fresh watter
- a good chair
- a lot of patience (not visible on the picture)

Wish me luck! If this goes well... I'll be happy!

Here it is. It was about time, don't you think? Let me know your impressions

PS: this wouldn't be possible without Violetisha from whom I borrowed the css code.