Your Creative Push

Troy Plota has been an award-winning Professional Photographer for over 30 years. His work has appeared in top magazines including Vanity Fair, GQ, Rolling Stone and many more. His advertising work has also appeared on dozens of billboards in New York's Times Square, as well as on the Vegas strip. He has photographed dozens of celebrities like Heidi Klum, Usher, Mariah Carey, Hillary Clinton, Donald Trump, and many more.

Troy has always been on the forefront of technology and gave the Ted Talk titled "The Future of Photography." Troy's latest creation is the digital sharing platform Plotaverse, which also features his award winning app, Plotagraph. It was the only App featured on the Apple Store for the release of the iPhone X.

Full shownotes: http://yourcreativepush.com/troyplota

-How he tries to constantly push the limits of technology.

-The importance of having the perspective of an artist while creating software.

-How challenges and contests have grown and matured the Plotaverse community.

-How he helps photographers and visual artists with monetization.

-The significance of motion art.

-How he was able to get 4 million downloads.

-Reaching out to his competition and realizing that they all have very similar stories.

-Why traditional artists might want to consider adding motion to their art.

-Some of the difficulties that he is seeing other photographers having as technology continues to change.

"I don't think there's anything more important than helping artists monetize their work."

"To monetize your passion is freedom."

Plotaverse

Alatar on Your Creative Push Episode 232

Website / Facebook / Instagram / Twitter

Alatar : Newgrounds / Tumblr

Aliza Einhorn is a writer, an astrologer and a tarot reader.

Her first book, The Little Book of Saturn, is a smart, friendly introduction to the astrological Saturn. It is a book for curious readers who know there is more to astrology than their sun signs.

Full shownotes: http://yourcreativepush.com/alizaeinhorn

-How her first book ended up not being a poetry book even though she thought it would.

-Why she stopped writing poems while in her thirties.

-Identity and whether or not we can define ourselves by something we no longer do (or haven't done for a while).

-A crash course of Tarot and how it can help people with their creative blocks.

-Having a dual-identity, where one-half of you is focused on a day job and making money while the other half is focused on your creative passion and doing what you truly love.

-How astrology is a tool for self-awareness and self-discovery.

-The validation that creative people can get when they are (finally) told that they might be meant to do the thing that they've always known that they are supposed to do.

-Why Saturn is so important.

-Working with Tom Hart and the Sequential Artists Workshop.

-How creating art and finding your audience is like internet dating.

-The experience of writing and publishing her first book.

"I remember thinking 'I'm not going to write anything anymore unless it is directly related to my income, which I want now to be astrology.'"

"It's not one-size-fits-all. You can create your work and create your life. You just have to do it. You can't wait for someone else to do it for you."

"People are afraid. They're afraid of others seeing their insides."

"If you don't expose yourself, people aren't going to care."

Youngman Brown's astrology reading

The Little Book of Saturn: Astrological Gifts, Challenges, and Returns by Aliza Einhorn

Sequential Artists Workshop

Tom Hart on Your Creative Push

Astrology and Tarot Readings by Aliza

Website / Facebook / Patreon / Twitter

Danny Gregory is an artist, author, teacher and co-founder of Sketchbook Skool. He taught himself to draw in his mid-thirties after a tragic accident changed his life, bringing with it a new peace and perspective. One that informs his creative habit everyday.

Danny has written nearly a dozen internationally best-selling books on art and creativity including Art Before Breakfast, Everyday Matters, The Creative License, Shut Your Monkey, An Illustrated Life and many more.

Before starting Sketchbook Skool, he spent three decades as one of New York's leading advertising creative directors and has created award-winning, global campaigns for such clients as Chase, JPMorgan, American Express, IBM, Burger King, Ford and Chevron amongst others.

Danny resides in New York City.

Full shownotes: http://yourcreativepush.com/293

-The importance of your partner understanding your creative needs.

-Creative postpartum depression that often occurs when we are finished with a project.

-Why he left the advertising industry.

-Meeting Koosje Koene and how Sketchbook Skool started.

-The value in seeing how many different artists make art as well as seeing where they make it.

-The role that community plays in developing as an artist.

-The difference in motivation when you are paying for something as opposed to getting it for free.

-Going to clown school.

-Giving yourself constraints or challenges.

-What it means to clear space in order to start new things (or finish old things).

-How he got past imposter syndrome (and his advice for Youngman in getting past his).

"I think that having a partner that understands you and your creative needs is essential to be able to focus on your work."

"If you want to start something new, you need to clear some space for it to happen."

"Thinking you know yourself too well can be limiting. Sometimes you've got to just jump off the cliff and see what happens."

"I think it's really important to have skin in the game. If it's too easy to walk away from, you will."

"I always find that if I have that glimmer of an idea, if I have that grain of sand to put in the oyster, I'm on the way. I'm going to get to the end just by having a beginning."

"There are people out there waiting for your art. Give it to them."

"Every time you have the impulse to distract yourself, instead try to focus that energy into making something new."

Sketchbook Skool (Use offer code SBSPUSH to get 10% off!)

Danny Gregory on Your Creative Push Ep. 50

Website / Facebook / Instagram / Twitter / Blog

David Talley is an internationally recognized photographer, director, and producer operating out of Portland, OR. His works exhibit the darkest moment before an explosion of light, a story broken, but changed for the better, and the ability to transform the present problem in to a prospering future. David is the founder and creative director of the world's largest photographic collaboration event, Concept Collaboration.

Full shownotes: http://yourcreativepush.com/davidtalleyreplay

-How his personality doesn't lend well with a normal job where he is told what to do.

-How many people are afraid of making money with their creative talents because they love it so much and don't want that love to disappear.

-His "single sentence" and how it applies to his creativity as well as his life in general.

-How if you want bad things to turn around, you have to seek out your "explosion of light."

-How his creativity was nurtured from a very young age.

-An important first experience photographing a sunrise in Hawaii.

-How many potentially creative people are idealistic so they never go out and create that first thing to get the ball rolling.

-How lack of structure as well as lack of deadlines holds many people (including David) back from actually creating work.

-How beginning a 365-day challenge gave him the structure and framework to actually take photographs and strive to get better, which actually began his career.

-How it is impossible not to grow when you do something every single day.

-The moment when he realized that he didn't have an answer for why he takes photographs and the way he found an answer, which ultimately led to his single sentence.

-One of his worst moments, when all of his camera gear was stolen, and how he was able to look at the situation from above to realize that in six months, everything would be much better.

-The power that comes from being able to step outside of situations and attempting to determine exactly what is going on and how your single sentence fits into it.

-How sharing your single sentence with people that you care about allows them to hold you accountable for the things that you believe in.

-How more than art, he wants to be able to help people.

-How he balances his time, working hard and then playing hard, along with the concept of sabbath.

-The importance of having some "zest" to your life.

-The Pareto principle and how it applies to him and other artists.

-His greatest inspirations: God, J.J. Abrams and Gregory Crewdson.

-The origins of Concept Collaboration and how it helped many artists and photographers to work together and share resources.

-His ebook "The Single Sentence" and how it breaks down the process of developing your own single sentence and helped many people find vision and focus in their own creativity.

"I don't know if it's like this for other creative artists, but I have a problem with authority and I don't want to be told what to do."

"I was afraid of making money with my creative talents for a really long time."

"At the end of the day, if you're not failing in your art and learning, you're not growing."

"The sentence itself is the guidepost for everything I do and everything I create in terms of art and in terms of life."

"I'm just snapping photos and framing these images and I'm just dying inside. Like this is the best thing ever. I love this so much."

"I think the biggest thing that holds creative people back is a lack of structure and lack of a deadline."

"The first part was take a photo every single day for a year and the second part was try to get better every single day. With that, I found my calling as a photographer."

"As creatives, we love the idea of things, and we hate the idea of hard work. We need to combine the two into one so that we can get stuff done."

"If you want to be something and if you want to say that you're something, then go do something."

"The art that I create is a direct extension of the strongest parts of who I am."

"Who I am at my core is what feeds into my creativity, what feeds into my art, and what ultimately becomes what I produce and what people see of me."

"Go start today. Don't wait until tomorrow because you won't do it. Start today."

"If you want to take the next step in being who you want to be as an artist or a creative person, go take the first step today. Right now."

"Do your art every day for the next 30 days and it will destroy you in the best way. It will completely awaken who you are going to be."

"'Someday' is a very dangerous word."

"The Single Sentence" by David Talley (David's ebook!)

Gregory Crewdson (Wikipedia)

"The Gap" by Ira Glass

Website / Facebook / Instagram

Danny Gregory : Website / Sketchbook Skool

Carson Ellis is the author and illustrator of the bestselling picture books Home and Du Iz Tak? (a Caldecott Honor book and the recipient of an E.B. White Read Aloud Award). She has illustrated a number of books for kids including bestsellers The Mysterious Benedict Society by Trenton Lee Stewart, The Composer Is Dead by Lemony Snicket, and The Wildwood Chronicles by Colin Meloy (who happens to be her husband).

Full shownotes: http://yourcreativepush.com/carsonellis

-Going to school for painting, even though she had a desire to become an illustrator.

-Doing album art for The Decemberists.

-Working in bars while doing her art on the side and why she finally needed to leave.

-Her stance on working for free or working for "exposure."

-Working with her husband, Colin Meloy.

-What it is like to live on a farm and being surrounded by animals.

-The importance of having your own creative space.

-Battling procrastination.

-How to know when to take a break from a creative project that is giving you problems (and how to know when to come back).

-Creating a new language for her book Du Iz Tak? and some of the other challenges that that book presented to her.

-How she enjoys the laborious process of drawing by hand.

-Getting to her childhood dream in a roundabout way.

-How artists should always be pushing themselves and taking on projects that make them feel uncomfortable.

"It was important for me to do all that art for free because it made me work. It gave me stuff to do and made me feel like I was part of the art scene."

"I got into this sort of spiral of not knowing how to solve certain problems in the book so I just didn't think about it for a month and then came back and had a better sense of how to do it."

"I think that part of the practice is getting through the parts that aren't inspiring you."

"In every project I feel like there's a really inspired part where I'm in a mystical art-making place, and then there's a boring part where I have to paint blades of grass all day."

"If you love to do something creatively, make it your practice."

Du Iz Tak? by Carson Ellis

The Decemberists

Website / Facebook / Instagram / Twitter / Tumblr

Shayne Taylor is an illustrator, designer and maker originally from Detroit, but now making her home in Chicago, Illinois.

She attended The College for Creative Studies in Detroit and worked a variety of jobs in illustration, design and restoration before becoming a full-time freelance illustrator and designer.

Full shownotes: http://yourcreativepush.com/shaynetaylor

-The game-changing realization that she could actually make a living from her creativity.

-How things changed when she took Illustration at The College for Creative Studies in Detroit.

-Her decision to move to Chicago and her early experiences there.

-Doing craft shows and DIY trunk shows and how they can help you to make not just sales but connections.

-Why we struggle to call ourselves artists and instead define ourselves by what we do to make money.

-How to handle our parents not understanding what we do creatively.

-Restoring vintage circus posters.

-Unpredictability and how it plays a role in her art as well as the projects that she takes on.

-How she handles self-doubt and expectations of others.

-Finding ways to make yourself uncomfortable, because that is where the growth comes from (and you always feel better after).

-How she started using wood as a canvas.

-A quote from Ed Catmull that inspired her to quit and go full-time freelance: "Always take a chance on better, even if it seems frightening."

"The idea of drawing and telling my story without having to talk was the best thing in the world."

"When you put yourself into a new atmosphere, you become different."

"If someone doesn't like it, it's not the end of the world. It's just one person and you're never going to please everybody."

"It's interesting to try to explain what you to do people who have absolutely no clue what you do. It feels like you're making something up."

"The unpredictability is a huge part of being creative."

"You learn so much when you make yourself do things that you don't necessarily like doing."

Creativity Inc.: Overcoming the Unseen Forces That Stand in the Way of True Inspiration by Ed Catmull

Youngman on The Kick in the Creatives Podcast

Website / Etsy / Facebook / Instagram / Twitter

Carson Ellis : Website / Instagram / Facebook

Jan Urschel is a freelance concept designer and illustrator working in the entertainment industry, designing for feature films and video games. Clients include: Paramount Pictures, Warner Bros, Lucasfilm, Marvel, EA, Sony, Ubisoft, LucasArts, Cloud Imperium Games, Psyop etc.

Full shownotes: http://yourcreativepush.com/janurschel

-His decision to go to school for Japanese studies and what that did for his art.

-Living and working in Singapore as a graphic designer.

-His inspiration to become a concept designer and the thought process behind making the switch.

-How he started and stopped his art many times over many years.

-How he got his first job at LucasArts and what it was like to work there.

-The struggle of either not being allowed to show the work that he did on a project, or not wanting to show it because it has been so long.

-The importance of doing personal work as a freelancer and how he attempts to find the balance of personal work and client work.

-How he is in his most productive and effective state when he is employing painful self-discipline.

-His "Project T" and the importance of pursuing your own personal projects for the simple purpose of self-pleasure.

"As a freelancer, you need some material to show off what you can do."

"In order to put yourself out there in a way that is true to yourself, you really need to put out personal work. And a lot of it."

"You have to follow your own path and listen to your creative ideas."

"Live your life and have a bit of fun. People are too focused on making money or becoming a superstar."

"Experience as much as you can and live a full life. That will help you to become a better creative in the end."

Website / Instagram / Twitter / Behance

Shayne Taylor : Website / Instagram

Amber Rae is an author, artist, and speaker whose work invites you to live your truth, befriend your emotions, and express your gifts.

Her writing blends raw, personal storytelling with actionable aha! moments and has reached more than 5 million people in 195 countries. Her public art has spread to more than 20 countries, and she's spoken to and collaborated with brands like Kate Spade, Apple, Amazon, and Unilever.

Her book, Choose Wonder Over Worry: Move Beyond Fear and Doubt to Unlock Your Full Potential is your official invitation to face your fears, wake up to your truth, and get to the source of what's holding you back.

Full shownotes: http://yourcreativepush.com/amberrae

-Her journey of self-discovery.

-Always pushing herself to be honest and vulnerable in her book instead of being "safe."

-Choosing to focus on the people who love your work rather than the people who might not understand it.

-Being told from a mentor that her story "didn't matter" and how it affected her mindset and her output.

-The difference between "toxic" worry and "useful" worry.

-Using journaling to talk to your worries and other resistances.

-How and when perfectionism can actually be a good thing.

-How we stop ourselves from progressing or self-sabotage with upper limiting.

-How we are often afraid to lose our suffering because we are afraid to lose our excuses.

-Her suitcase analogy for people who say that they don't have enough time.

-How she felt while writing the book and how she feels now that the book is finished.

"Am I going to write the safe book or am I going to write the true book?"

"In order to be raw and vulnerable, that requires deep and profound honesty with yourself."

"You can think of worry as both an inner child throwing a tantrum as well as a parent trying to protect us at the same time."

"What are the excuses that you're telling yourself and how do you face them?"

"There is something inside of you dying to be born and you know it. You feel it."

"What is that thing that is dying to come through you and how will you spend five minutes with it today?"

Gay Hendricks: The Big Leap: Conquer Your Hidden Fear and Take Life to the Next Level

Overcome Your Upper Limits (Article by Gay Hendricks)

The Artist's Way by Julia Cameron

Website / Book / Facebook / Instagram / Twitter

Jan Urschel : Website / Instagram

Iris Compiet is an artist and Illustrator living and working in the Netherlands. She worked as a graphic designer for 16 years before making the decision to become a full-time freelance artist and illustrator.

She draws inspiration from European folklore, mythology, fairytales, ghost stories and anything from tombstones, Victorian photography to popular movies and music. She explores the depths of darkness to find the light.

Iris used Kickstarter to successfully fund her book, Fairies of the Faultlines, a collection of drawings that she started in May and June of 2016 when she participated in the #mermay and #junefae challenges on Instagram.

Full shownotes: http://yourcreativepush.com/iris

-Her experience of going to school in the Netherlands and working as a graphic designer for 16 years.

-How the Kickstarter for her book, Faeries of the Faultlines torpedoed her to become a full-time artist and illustrator.

-How and why she decided to go full-time as an illustrator.

-Dealing with imposter syndrome and the fact that we all have it and should talk about it more.

-Defining "fame."

-How she wanted her faerie art to have more grit.

-How she handled her battle with Carpal Tunnel Syndrome.

-Doing the #mermay and #junefae challenges.

-How she grew her Instagram followers from 1,000 to 50,000.

-Treating her sketchbook like a playground and always saving her old ones so that she can look back and get new ideas.

-Sharing your rough drafts, sketches and mistakes.

-Finding time throughout your day that you are normally wasting in order to create your art.

-Continuing to sculpt and how it has helped her see things in a new way.

-The triumph of her Kickstarter for Faeries of the Faultlines and some of the pitfalls that she encountered along the way.

"People always think that you need to be successful before a certain age, and I think that is a load of BS."

"It's very important to talk about imposter syndrome and acknowledge that it is there. It's not a problem that it's there. Just know how to deal with it. We all have it."

"It sucks that you second guess everything you do. But that's just your mind telling you things that aren't true."

"All of these influences and inspirations I had as a child are finally finding their way into this world. I'm painting faeries now!"

"My Instagram exploded, just by daily posting."

"I don't believe there are failures. I believe that there are tries. Your 'failure' might be a trial for a new piece or the first version of something else."

"I took away the expectations that I thought people were having, and I just had fun."

"I call my sketchbook my playground. I can do anything I want. There's no restrictions, there's no laws. It's just me, the paper, my pencil and an eraser. I just have fun."

"Art is life. It's like breathing and eating. I need it."

Faeries of the Faultlines Kickstarter

Website / Facebook / Instagram / Twitter / Tumlbr

Amber Rae : Website / Instagram

In this episode, Youngman explains why he decided not to do the #Cramuary challenge. Yes, the very challenge that he created.

Was it fear? Self-sabotage? Laziness? Burnout? Bitcoin, even?

He's not sure, and he's been too ashamed to talk about it, but by the end of the episode he gets a much better understanding of why, even after two years of constantly thinking and talking about it, Resistance can still hit you with fists of fury.

And that's nothing to be ashamed of.

Full shownotes: http://yourcreativepush.com/287

"I was thinking about doing all of that work and putting in all that time, and I was just dreading it."

"It's not a big deal if you push off your big project. You shouldn't feel shame about realizing that it's not the right time or you're not in the right mindset or place in your life to be able to do something that you care very deeply about. You can always do it later, you can always do it better. As long as you do it."

"I don't know why I felt for so long that I should be invulnerable to creative blocks and burnout."

"I promise to you that I will open up my heart and soul to you and share all of the creative blocks that I am going through myself."

"It's okay to do other projects. It's okay to take breaks. And it's okay to say 'no' to something that you said 'yes' to earlier."

Youngman Brown on The Blue Magic Podcast

Casey Neistat (Video about starting 368)