On Creative Inspiration (Plus a Giveaway)

Over the years I've discovered that my creative energy often comes in waves. There are spans of time when I'm not exactly inspired, and therefore don't do much writing or graphic design. And then there are other spans of time when I just churn out creative projects, one after another. Even if I'm not actively designing something during those waves, let's say because I'm busy working my 9-to-5 job, I'll be jotting down some notes about a design that I can't wait to work on later.

 

Despite the extra screen time and the early-morning or late-night sessions (inspiration can come at inconvenient hours), it can be exhilarating. There have been plenty of times, for example, when I've worked on a look-alike custom card and laughed out loud when I really started to nail the resemblance of the character on the custom card to the athlete on the original. They're amazing times, and I've come to enjoy and cherish them.

Well, a few years ago, one of those creative waves helped me generate a set of baseball player designs based on a vintage 8-bit video game. Here's a sampling:

 

 

 

 

It took a while to get through every team in the league, but I had enough fun with the project that about a year later I found more time to modify the design for hockey. Another sampling:

 

 

I had even more fun with the hockey guys, and after spending a few sessions creating a standard uniform for every team, I added a handful of throwback and Olympic options.

 

After that, however, I was pretty wiped out. I couldn't even think about creating these characters for the other major sports. So I set the project aside for a while and started focusing my creative time and energy toward other things, like coming up with content for this blog and designing custom cards.

 

I did so much work in those areas that a good couple of years went by before I'd catch the 8-bit wave again. When I did, the first new sport I thought to try was soccer, as there's a wealth of teams and leagues to choose from. 

 

I started out with some Premier League teams.

 

 Then I thought National teams would be fun to try.

 

 

Fast-forward a few more weeks and I'd finished 20 Premier League designs and 22 National team designs. It was quite a time!

 

After a break for a few months, I was ready for another sport. Thinking that a football design would take much more doing (helmet, face mask, shoulder pads, and knicker-style pants), I decided to put that sport on the back burner and go for basketball instead.

 

 

After I finished all the teams, it was only a matter of weeks before I attempted the football design. Look here:

 

 

 

I felt pretty good about the way they turned out, and also did some throwbacks, like New England, Tampa Bay, and Seattle.

 

And with football done, all the major sports were finally checked. Here's where they live now:

 

 

 

 

It's an independent artist website called redbubble, where you can sell your artwork on all sorts of items, from t-shirts to mugs to pillows to fridge magnets to acrylic blocks (whatever those are).  

 

For the past couple of years, the baseball and hockey designs have been available there, so I decided to add the rest of the sports as well.

 

From sales thus far, it's clear that these little 8-bit guys are most popular as fridge magnets and stickers. The stickers are just about the perfect size to stick on the side of a binder or a storage box, like this:

 

I don't actually have binders and boxes full of Astros, Dodgers, Expos, Canadiens, Penguins, or North Stars cards. Those are just sample stickers I ordered to see what the finished product looked like. But I do still have some of those samples left.  

 

If any of you are interested in the teams shown below, let me know in the comment section and I'll send the sticker out as a small way of saying thank you for reading the blog. There's only one sticker available for each team, so the first commenter to claim a team will get it. (One sticker per person, please.) Even if none of the teams interest you, please feel free to claim one for a friend, coworker, or family member. 

 

 

Baseball: NYM, NYY, Houston

 

 

 

Hockey: Pittsburgh, NYR, Edmonton

 

 

 

 

Premier Soccer: Liverpool, Newcastle

 

 

 

National Team Soccer: USA, Brazil

 

 

 

Basketball: Boston, Portland

 

 

Football: San Francisco, Green Bay, NYG

 

 

If you do claim a sticker and haven't sent me your mailing address at some point during a previous giveaway, be sure to do so. (Check my blogger profile page for my email address.)

 

You can also message me on TCDB. Here's my TCDB profile page.

Back to the topic of creativity. Here's a question for you:

 

Whether you blog or do anything else in the creative realm, do you find that your creativity comes in streaks, or can you whip up content on demand?

 

Leave your experiences, along with a sticker claim, in the comment section.

 

Thanks for reading!