It was the first time I’ve visited YourTotalSite.com and my first visit already became memorable one. Not only does it have articles I wish I could write, its articles help us help develop a better web.
One of the articles I’d like to bring to you is Capturing Design Inspiration. You know how we as designers need inspiration to trigger our creativity at times. Not counting the illumination process we have when we’re sitting on our humble thrones.
Well, Garret was sharing in his entry on how he keeps his inspiration library. Unlike most designers, his method is by only screencapping or capturing a small amount of the entire inspiration.
Don’t get it?
Imagine it this way. You’ve visited a nice website and it looks great. However, out of all that sweetness there’s a specific part in there that continues stealing your heart away. Like an excellent Flash animation, you pinpoint your desire being the shadow that mimics a page corner turning.
So what Garret does is he captures just that small amount so it’ll trigger his same inspirational sensation the next time he opens up his inspiration library. If you still can’t visualize it, just have a read of his Capturing Design Inspiration.
My method of capturing inspiration is normally screencapping the whole interface but maybe I should give his method a try. One of the better outcomes I feel that a designer earned from this is the ability to locate out of all the beauty, the only miniscule object that turns you on.
Garret’s way of looking at this practice..
We’re all inspired by the work we see, and sometimes that inspiration shows through a little, and sometimes too much.
In conclusion, this method helps a designer focus and define. :)