Rediscovering Authentic Creativity

[Music] hi you guys thank you so much for coming I'm Peter and I guess before we begin I supposed to remind you to please turn off your phones and no videotaping because I definitely don't want to be on YouTube and I just have to say doesn't this look like a like grandpa's pair of pants like I it looks like I'm wearing like huge it's like yeah let's see here I want to thank GDC and Colleen Mickey and my good friend Lee petty who is one smart and creative guy for inviting me here today I'm going to be walking back and forth because that's just how I have to do it

I'm not a podium guy so I just wanted to start off by saying I started my gaming experience back in the early 90s working for LucasArts and I worked on you know monkey - Dave tentacle full-throttle Grim Fandango that's where I started and then I left my dream job three years later and moved my family to San Juan Island up in the Puget Sound and the beautiful Pacific Northwest and I've been freelancing there for over 18 years now still making games designing games but primarily moved into the movie side so for example I designed Rio and Rio - that's coming out and monsters University is my recent one so I see I still draw on paper I'm really low-tech I draw on paper I know like three things

on Photoshop and I'm happy to say that just last year I put together my first website I know unheard of right go freelance thank you thank you would go freelance what 18 years ago and not make a website or a blog or something and I held out but then I was forced to do it because of the other Peter Chan's that surfaced because it turns out my name is very common it's like John Smith and so thanks to the other Peter Chan's it forced me to put together this website so people don't get us mixed up more and more and so if you're here to listen to the other Peter Chan's I'm sorry to disappoint you sorry and I happen to teach concept design at this awesome animation college in Denmark and the students there always

ask me variations of the same questions write questions like what feed your creativity I how do you produce art how do you come up with original ideas and thoughts when you've got busy brain or you're running on empty right and one of the toughest questions I've been asked was what's the one thing that keeps you from doing your best work and I couldn't answer that right away and I told him look let me think about it on my way home and when I land I'll answer that so I realized the answer too but what's the one thing that holds me back from doing my best work are my fears and so I started exploring these questions and the word authentic kept surfacing right and so I decided to force myself to answer what does it mean to me to have authentic creativity and so I by

exploring I decided I'll turn that into my topic for today and so before I dive into that let me just share with you and this was Lee's idea share with you what it's like to be in my studio for the week okay so I'm a pre-production guy I come in super early usually the scripts not finished maybe it's just an idea from the product project leader or art director and and and the he usually gives me this big assignment and like create the world and but make it believable make it functional oh and make it different make it original as much as you can yeah hard assignment right so mondays are usually reserved for research I hit the library yes the library I collect my books I surround myself with reference

material I start reading because reading gives me pictures in my head that's not in front of me and then I supplement by going through my morgue file that I've collected over the years and I used the internet to supplement the rest of my research and I surround myself with this then Tuesday and Wednesdays are the days of problem solving I've got to accomplish my assignment and then at the same time I've got to listen to this part right here I've got to listen to my gut my intuition okay and sometimes my intuition and the assignment are in line and those are like the sweetest weeks to work and then there are times where my intuition and my assignment clash but I trust this part in me because it knows me best so I will try to shove this you know square peg into a round hole thing and there's a little bit of compromise but eventually I shove it in there all

right Thursday comes around I have to psych myself to draw because I can think forever but they're not paying me to do that they're paying me for this piece of paper so I've got to make myself draw this out take this half-baked idea right make it readable and hopefully you know with all my reference and everything it makes sense and then Friday morning I've got to put the final touches on it and if it's a bad idea I highly recommend just making the presentation look sweet but if you can but if and then I send it off an hour before the conference call I sent it off and then my drawings get blown up in a dark room somewhere in some studio and usually in that room is the director the producer and five other incredibly talented designers and I'm on an island so I can't see their faces I can't see their body language right so I

don't know if my ideas are any good as I'm pitching it so I have to just trust that my ideas are worthy and basically I'm just on my back belly up totally open and it's scary but I have to go for it okay so that's like my week so I asked so as I reflect I reflect on the creative process I asked myself you know what are the things that I value and three things come to mind all right here they are number one I practice being vulnerable folks like Pema Chodron pick not Han brené Brown Seth Godin even Steve Jobs Neil Gaiman and a great designer like Stefan Sagmeister these guys say in their own words of course innovation creativity personal

transformation connection and great learning all begin with being vulnerable okay number two I practice what I call being good with discomfort because when I'm brave and I reach outside my comfort zone and I work through my fears there's opportunity for growth okay and number three I practice what I call making space in my head for creativity making space because how can I connect with my intuition and listen to my passions if I'm always overwhelmed or overworked and exhausted right and running on fumes so now I'll talk more about that later but here's the thing I don't want you looking up here like I've got this all figured out I am NOT an expert in anything I'm like you I

wake up every morning I do my best and if I fall on my face thank God the Sun rises the next day and I can try all over again so let's start with number one practicing vulnerability so we have this emotion of this prim primal emotion it's called shame okay and shame is all around us and unfortunately it is big part of wrote our culture and for some of us it's also part of our upbringing and shame is all about having fears and our fears come from this place this like smear of a brain that sits at the stem of our spine and that's our lizard brain and that's where our fight and flight mechanism comes from right and the lizard brains jobs that keep you fearful

it wants to keep you feeling safe and secure right and you know those fears those fears of feet feeling not good enough the fear of not smart enough not clever enough not fast enough right the fear of being wrong the fear of failure not fitting in and my biggest hang-up that I finally let go last year was the fear of being found out as a fraud the fear of being found out as a fraud and I wish I had more time to talk about that that would be like another key note like 12 years from now but for me being a product of my environment I ended up being prone to shame so some people not all some people who are a shame based go down the perfectionist

path right and we all know there's no such thing as perfectionist right but I didn't know I was young I was inexperienced and when you're a perfectionist you're like being a really awesome magician and the one act that you're really good at is the sleight of hand right it's like look over here you guys look at my perfect drawing right look at my perfect life look at my perfect job look at my perfect kids look at all my accolades right but don't look over here don't look at my other hand don't look at my fears don't look at my weaknesses don't look at my addictions don't look at my shame right and when you stuff your fears down there you put up protective armor right in front of you and that protective armor will see that protective armor

that veneer that ego facade those masks that are in front of you that's to keep people at a safe distance right because that's the the shield that you want people to look at and to believe not this stuff down here that you're hiding right so the problem is that armor prevents any kind of connection that's what it's all about isn't it connection we do art so we can connect with the audience on the other side with the people we want to connect with right I mean that's our what we desire as humans right this connection that's why Facebook is so popular so to be vulnerable is is to soften in your visual people just imagine being softer being kind being honest being compassionate to yourself first right

because the more vulnerable you are the more courageous and brave you will become I know it sounds counter intuitive but it's true you got to trust me so to be true to yourself my suggestion is to be more vulnerable by shedding those protective armors one layer at a time or at least pound them down so then there it's like paper-thin okay so can you imagine not having to worry about those protective layers can you imagine that how liberating and free that would feel how light you would feel you don't have to switch them out when you go to a like a family reunion or or when you have to present your your artwork in front of all your peers or when you're on Facebook and Twitter you don't have to switch out your masks right you can actually be you you can actually be authentic that'd be pretty

sweet so by shedding means reaching in means reaching into that dark corner pulling out that fear and exposing it and let the Sun Shine on it and while it's out you want to label it you want to name it and say it out loud right you don't have to say it in your head if that's not good enough you even if you're alone in your room you got to say it out loud because by saying it out loud you're taking the power out of it right and guess who hates that the lizard brain hates that because the lizard brain wants to keep you secure right so the lizard brain hates it when you say it out loud because it's no longer hiding anymore it's no longer controlling you anymore so a long time ago when my kids were really little and don't forget I was a perfectionist and I was setting

really high expectations and my kids were just being kids they would do something and it would trigger something inside me and I would get angry get mad and years and years would go by and then one day my kids being kids did something and it triggered something deep inside me and I saw read write and fire came out of my mouth and I heard my dad's voice for the first time and if I freaked out and I knew right then in there I had to go and do something about it and because hey I want to be a responsible parent I don't want to pass my crap down to my kids it's got to stop with me right so you're probably thinking what does that have to do with creating art well for me parenting and creating art aren't that different you have an idea you bring it to life you help it develop not knowing how it's going to end all right so the point I'm

trying to make is if I kept my protective armor up and I stuffed my anger issues down would that be fair to my kids no way so let me ask you if you kept your protective armor up and you stuffed your fears down with that be fair to your creative self so you see you the authentic you deserve to be truly seen you are worthy of it you guys good so let's go with practice number two practicing being good with discomfort so it's entirely natural for us to be fearful with the unknowns that's because the lizard brain is part of who we are right so it wants us to play things safe

because safe equals no pain and I'm not talking like life-threatening pain I'm talking about the pain or the feeling that you get when you are outside your comfort zone right so when you when you're not feeling any pain that means you're not doing anything new you're not learning anything so the advantage to moving past our fears and taking more risks is seeing it out as a opportunity for growth so being good with discomfort means to stretch your comfort zone to a new more creative normal the goal is to eventually with practice become more comfortable with change it's not so scary anymore sure there's always a chance for failure

when you take risks but there's also a really good chance of succeeding too you have to just go for it like Neil Gaiman says to make glorious mistakes and that's because making mistakes means you're doing something it's all good so I have many examples of you know being good with discomfort but I think the best example is just me standing here in front of you right now because for one I'm vulnerable I'm sharing some personal stuff with you but also I am my friends know that I'm an introvert so for me to be up here is kind of a big deal it's really difficult for me but I know deep down that what's important is this connection that I'm making with you right now and also that I know at the end of the day I'm gonna learn something about myself something good will happen but being good with

discomfort all the time is not sustainable every once in a while you're going to have to stop take a break have some solitude to reflect right and give yourself a quiet break and let your inner critic focus on the present moment you know have some nurturing time for yourself ask yourself how you're feeling you know slow down have a cup of tea sit by the window and ask how you're feeling and if you did really well that week go out and get yourself a scoop of ice cream because you deserve it and if you're wounded because you had a really rough critique or you had a rough week still go out and get yourself a scoop of ice cream do you still do serve it right and then you can recharge

your batteries get back on the horse and get ready for the next round because if you're serious about your art you will always be seeking out that discomfort which segues nicely to number three practicing making space in our heads we live in a world that is I mean you guys know we live in a world that is overwhelming over stimulating full of distractions full of worry and stress full of clutter visual clutter material clutter mental clutter right so how in the world can we come up with original thought and even listen to our intuition all right sometimes our brains are like an episode of Hoarders right it's it's just so full and we're really lucky if

there's like a clear path that runs through our mental house so to make space let's look at our mental house imagine there's a spare bedroom in the back of your head and you clean it out nothing on the wall nothing on the floor it's all white it sounds good right get open a few windows with the breeze go through and then there's an air shaft that runs from that bedroom down to your heart or your gut so now you've got these two rooms there's a clear path between and for clear communication all right guess who's going to find out about this plan your lizard brain and he's going to throw in distractions and he's going to sabotage this idea and I know you know what I'm talking about because how many times have you decided to do something and then at the last second you pull out

and you stop that's lizard brain making you safe keeping you fearful doesn't want you to have any experiences or learn anything new right that's like artists who draw the same style all the time or people who always just draw the same subject matter all the time right it's cozy in their familiar they get a lot of kudos but what happens if someone locks on his door and says hey I want you to design this game for me but it's this style and it's maybe this kind of subject matter pretty scary is it worth taking so here's my suggestion in making space it's what Leo Bovada called media fasting and some others

call it taking a digital Sabbath so this is called media fasting media are all the things that you love right watching movies surfing social networking playing video games right and then fasting because are those diets those detox diets that cleanses your body of toxins right some of you have probably tried it with some success so much so what I'm proposing is cutting back on your media intake cutting back on your media intake for short periods of time to set healthy limits and do things in moderation right I didn't say cut it out completely I love technology but you you're adults you're I want you to figure out how to set those limits how long you should be doing this you know set some boundaries

around them because as you know when you over indulge in something they're usually a consequence that follows so moderation is good notice that I did not mention reading books Neil Gaiman says reading books especially fiction is a great way to exercise your imagination muscle that's why you always hear people say oh I prefer the book over the movie it's because your imagination is a powerful thing can you imagine tapping into that I know this works because I practice this most of my life and I also challenge my students and the serious students always come back to me the following year and tell me basically the same feedback I always get I feel like my days are longer I feel rested and I feel more creative and these guys are like 20 year olds

right and if they've already figured out how to set healthy boundaries boundaries around their media intake then they're off to a really good start so let's say you guys are brilliant you guys decided I'm going to give this a try your mental house you've got that clean bedroom in the back of your head and you've kept it pretty clean for a long time now it's time to fill it and you want to fill it with cool experiences because what's nice about experiences they don't take up any room and I believe if you want to be original and different you'll need to add something to the mix you're gonna have to add something to your art and that's where your personal experiences come from because the way each of us sees the world is very distinctive by

doing this you've just automatically made your art yours you automatically major art unique because only you have had that experience yep we have it sorry about that that was for traumatic for sorry um but only you have had that experience you see because I know that this is true because when you are tired and I'm guilty of it too because I'm human when we're tired we go into automatic mode we grab a couple things off of Google search we do a mash-up and we call it good right no pain we're just rehashing ideas right so I mean who do you think I mean why do we think so many movies and games always look alike right who's in charge is elizabeta in charge or are you in charge and I believe that that's where

our personal experiences come in to kind of like to set us apart so having experiences can be travelling the world and I know that's expensive sometimes but it could also mean just walking around a block to have an experience look we have the Golden Gate Bridge here right people travel all over the world to come here and walk across the bridge and we live here or you live here and you see the bridge but you've never walked across it and it's free or you go grocery shopping you go to Safeway and rather than taking a right turn to Safeway you take a left turn you'll still get the Safeway you just happen to see something else along the way and that experience you might see something that you can take and put it into your artwork you see I'm saying just shake things up a little bit and having experiences also means picking up new skills take a cooking class right

take a sewing class figure out how to do your own electrical your own plumbing and if you you know mess it up horribly that's when you can call the professional but at least you gave it a try right and in that process you've learned something because fresh ideas come from that you just need to start doing a wild while back I went to visit my friend tim schafer I don't know if you've heard of him he makes games and I visited Tim and he took me out to dinner and we had a really nice dinner and after that I thought we were just going to go home and he instead he took me to a bar and he bought me a drink and and I said Tim you you don't have to do this you don't have to entertain me we can just go home watch Letterman and go to bed and he

goes no Peter he goes when I come to your Island you give me an island experience and when you're in the city I'm going to give you a city experience and he's right after the bar and I totally enjoyed myself we had another long visit and I soaked it all in and then he took me to another place that played live music and it was already midnight and next thing you know I'm head banging with the rest of them and then eventually I find myself passed out on his sofa but I'm so grateful for that because he gave me he pushed me he gave me this opportunity to do something that normally I wouldn't do but now if I ever had to design something that needed that vibe I can now go back in and pull that experience out right the essence of that experience out and use it so it's time

to share my some work with you and I'm going to be vulnerable again because some of these drawings aren't all that impressive but it kind of gives a good example of what we're talking about so this first one is uh when I was helping Double Fine with this game broken age and this is what I consider a freebie I call it a freebie it's or you can call it a treat Seth Godin calls it a gift where you have an idea and you give it away without reciprocity it's one way the reason why I do this drawing is for the sake of connection right because

really it it's not really part of the in the environment it's not really part of the game it was just an idea that I had and obviously this idea is really wacky and strange right it was it was when I took a knitting class with my kids you know to knit scarves for Christmas and I remember looking around the room and seeing these the people knitting stars and reindeers and it was like it was mesmerizing and I thought wouldn't it be cool that maybe you can knit an environment so I just sucked that idea away hoping that one day I can pull it out and use it and and so I thought I'm just going to go for it even though it's like so lame and so weird and unusual I'm still going to just draw it up and give it to them okay so it's a it's a

freebie for the sake of connection and this next one is from monsters University and so if you can imagine how scary that is this is again a great opportunity Pixar gives me a call and says we're going to give you a shot and I want you to figure out what the university is going to look like and so I came in super early right we don't really didn't have a script or anything the characters weren't even designed yet so my job was to figure it out and fortunately the year before I visited Princeton the only experience I got from walking through an Ivy League college because obviously I did not go to an Ivy League college and so I remember walking around and looking at the ivy growing on the buildings not knowing that monsters University was

coming up right so I do this thing because I don't take a lot of photographs I do what's called mental noting it's a form of meditation where you can memorize things okay and so I remember seeing the IV growing on the walls and and I I remember the silhouettes the beautiful silhouettes and shapes that came from that and then that's when I realized I'm gonna use that IV as a second level motif right because there's the architectural monsters motif and then I thought I'll use the IV as the second layer to enhance hopefully enhance the the monster look and and this drawing means a lot to me because as you can see it says zero zero one so there was a lot of anxiety on this drawing because this is going to be the first drawing that I'm going to pitch to them and try to

sell them my look and my ideas okay the next one is again your job is to design or my job was to design the dorm room now if I just did a plain dorm room that would be boring usually boring and playing things safe never leads to connection so I always add a little extra something to my drawings for the sake of connection so I put in the characters so you can relate to them a little bit now again I don't know anything about the story not that much the only thing they told me was that Sulley at the time was studying to be a dentist and Mike was he's only in college to party but his skill was he knew a lot about scaring and that's all they gave me so again it's going into

your memory banks and your experiences of visiting like for me visiting my friends and dorm rooms and seeing how they decorated you know I've got my Bruce Lee poster on the top I've got my beanbag and Rubik's cubes I got my vinyls out because those things are nostalgic those things mean something to me and and it did connect because I get the feedback was this made us laugh you know because Mike why would he have a turban he has no hair and why is he wearing a towel around his waist we have snow privates right and so then I knew that these things my drawings were connecting with Pixar okay so I'm just reaching out to the art department right now you see the free hat you get at Chevys see it's at the top the next one is so this one

here this is what this one is called a freebie as well this was a freebie to Pixar obviously the background there's not really much about the architecture right it was just an idea that I had this that I wanted to give them this treat this gift and the idea of history at this college I thought it would be really cool to have the students rub the the feet of the sculpture or the statue for good luck and and before games big games right because they you rub it before exams and I got that idea from I don't know if you guys been to Seattle but there's Pike Place Market and out in front of Pikes Place Market there's a where they throw the fish to the fish market there there's a bronze pig out in front and everyone rubs the nose on that bronze pig that's where I got that idea

from that experience and what's cool about this for me is that Here I am I've got this idea i doodle it up I throw it one way to Pixar not expecting anything back and all I'm trying to do is reach to the art department and then I find out later I get a call from the production designer and he goes guess what Pete docter who happens to be he was the director on this at the time he directed monster the first monsters and he said I like these so much have have have that all blown up have all Peters drawings blown up and put down the hall between the art department in the story Department so then when the story guys go through it'll get them inspired so here I was with this simple

doodle I'm now reaching the art department and now I'm reaching connecting with the story department and then I find out that it ends up in the movie so now I'm reaching beyond that from just having this idea and listening to my intuition and going for it so that's that one do we have time yeah we're on good schedule here so um do you guys want to see a little more okay now this is a little different but I still have you guys in mind all right

now you guys thought I was going to show you more of my artwork right but I know that if I shared my artwork that wouldn't really get you motivated to go

out and do stuff I wanted to show you real people doing stuff having real experiences and because I know that if you went out and had these experiences you can draw from them too right literally now that slideshow was put together from the help of good friends and family some of it was mine too but what's what's what I found out when I was putting it together that these people in my life inspire me right and they remind me to get off my butt and do something and and I realized when I was putting it together that I wasn't really doing it for you I was doing it for me too I need to be reminded to do that

so in conclusion Rene Brown says allowing ourselves to be truly seen as a powerful source of innovation creativity personal transformation and connection it starts with being more vulnerable and while the rest of the world is busy hiding out in their cozy comfort zone I believe the best art are done by people who listen to their intuition who have an idea give it a try not knowing how it's going to end so choose courage over comfort and lastly there's value in doing things in moderation right cutting back on things that don't matter simplify making space so you can rediscover and reconnect with your authentic self first and then your authentic creativity will follow

so as we know the games industry is evolving right it's it's ever-changing so I I ask you do something different when you have an opportunity to make a game or design a game make it unique don't fall into the land of compliance and mediocrity listen to your intuition trust your gut okay trust this part and don't let this part talk you out of it okay so thank you guys thank you very much [Applause] no thanks we have time yeah yeah yeah I'll be open to take some questions and if I don't know the answer to them you know forgive me and I'll take it I'll

write it down and I'll get back to you I just don't want to be s anybody I want to be thoughtful hi when you get the idea for something like a Monsters Inc version of the thinker do you then go and reference the actual thinker or is that just as you remember the thing that's a great question I do get reference but when I tap into my personal experiences it's usually just the essence of it right right and so if that's like the thinker is more like a memory of what the thinker is because obviously it's a monsters version of it so it doesn't have to look like the real thinker like I shouldn't really I shouldn't have used the thinker because I it should have been more like a founding father of the college right if I had more time to to do the well think about it it's hard because you guys if you think about like right now

I'm working for Paramount Pictures I'm working with for this really awesome production designer he designs for most of Tim Burton's films like Frank and wienie a nightmare right and so I he has me pitching twice a week Tuesdays and Fridays so if you can imagine I have to like move along fairly quickly so I don't always have time to get reference I just have to go with my gut and just go for it and sometimes you know you can see some of the drawings are okay it's the idea and that's the thing if you guys have good people skills and and you're a problem solver you'll be all right anyone else don't be shy hello um I do have one question about we apply what what do you say to art and then do you feel like is you can apply that to anything else that's right

that's why I said art it's whatever you want it to be I mean you can it could also move into your life if you wanted to so that's actually leading to another question so if someone else he or she was asking a question about this type of creativity but what you realize actually she or he doesn't do anything what we mean about go out into happy experience well you just encouraged them to do that yeah okay that's my question okay yeah it's nice here's the thing it's balance basically I'm just telling you to have a life - okay I mean I believe you guys all work really really hard but at the same time you need to take care of yourself - you

need to have balance and I know you work like 10 hours at work and then you go home and you play some more or you work some more but we only have this one life it's not a trial run so you might as well fill it right with experiences so all I'm saying is just have balance yeah from personal while ago we weren't in a class and we were supposed to come up with our idea of a game and and I came up with this what I thought was a creative idea and the class liked it and everything but at the end I couldn't sell and then they went with this typical pirate idea and they taught it like your ideas so we're we cannot connect whatever we don't know if people like it and I couldn't say like and I think to this day I still think that it would have been it would have been an

original thing but they decided to go with something safe and how do you have you win people with your ideas that's a great question well they don't know what they're doing because they're listening to the lizard brain and they're just you know they think by keeping it safe they're they're not gonna make any money right so let go of them don't listen to them I still say keep that in your back pocket keep that great idea because it's important you're passionate about it and one day it you'll find the right people that will listen to you that's why won't you see these games that are so innovative there's a reason why it's so innovative they're taking a chance not knowing how it's going to end right so try to find

companies that support that that they're open to that if you can I know I have and I find myself I don't work for those kind of people then that's and I mean I'm fortunate enough now that I can you know find who I want to work for but I know when you first start out yeah sometimes you have to compromise but that's but that's where I was telling you about you know you listen to this part and then you have your assignment and sometimes you have to compromise a little bit that I still shove that my idea into it and I still accomplish the assignment and at the same time I still feel a little bit good about what I did because I I got to sneak in my my personal experience into it or my idea into it yes it was very encouraging to

hear all of the different techniques you used one of them that you mentioned was mental noting I was wondering like where you got that farmer did you know Sylvia beer stein I believe is her name she is a Buddhist and she taught me through the her book I went on a silent retreat every once a year I try to go on a silent retreat so you which means I go and camp by myself I don't talk to anybody I don't say anything and it is an opportunity to go inside and so what happens is it's really cool when you don't hear your voice you get to slow down you actually listen to your body like you don't look at the clock you leave all the technical stuff all the gadgets at home you listen to your body you listen to when you're hungry that's

when you eat right and if you feel sleepy go to sleep so you'll get in tune you kind of reset okay and when you do that and when you go walking for example it's like the mental noting means for example if I'm walking through and hiking I I pay attention to everything I'm here I I note in my head if I hear a bird if I hear the waves and then I am also sensitive to what I'm feeling I feel the wind on my cheek I feel the warmth of the Sun I feel the coolness of the shade and then I also listen to the crunch of my feet the leaves the gravel the the feeling I get from the bottom of my soul you know sharp stones or I'm walking on grass I just call it out in my head now

what's cool about being in the moment when you do that 15 minutes goes by and you haven't thought of one thing you just meditated while walking right and by doing that by being in the moment you actually memorize your environment so when I'm in a in a situation like my wife and my kids know that if I'm walking around and all of a sudden dad's gone and it's because I'm standing at and I'm looking at something and I'm just taking it all in I'm memorizing it and then it's sucked away because I don't take pictures you know and so when that time comes when I'm sitting at my desk that's when I can pull that you know that Harry Potter thing where you take the wand then you see them take the memory out that's what I've it's like that you can just take

out that one idea for that that essence of that experience and then you can use it so mental noting is just a form of being in the present Thanks anyone else yes hey I was just like when you were talking about those struggling and have you embraceable your fears and like the specific being afraid of the people will find out that you are a fraud like oh we do have time okay so that's okay thank you for bringing that up all right so being found out as a fraud that's a big big one for me because I I didn't have formal training right I kept it a secret until I got to college and then if I forced you know I was forced to start drawing in public and then I went to an art school that didn't have any film classes back in those days back in the day of illustration doing

editorials you know that kind of stuff spot illustrations there were no film classes back when I was in school so I was a traditional illustrator right and so I had this opportunity to do games and at the same time while I was at games I was a fraud because I didn't play games I wasn't really in into games but here I was making games designing games so I felt like a fraud there and then when I finally had the opportunity to do film work right like my first job was a storyboard episode one like I think no design ants I design ants from the island and I've never designed film before so I was a fraud and then storyboarding right I've never story before I never took a class on storyboarding and then episode 1 comes around and says hey you want a storyboard some shots it was like I had

a fake it I was always pretending I was always faking it so for the longest time people would come up to me and say you know hey I really like your work you know you did a great job I wasn't able to really receive it back then I wasn't able to like take it in and look them in the eye and say thank you it was always like because I felt like a fraud I was always like look away and say oh it's alright you know and so finally I was I worked on this one film last year for blue sky studios and they're making it right now they totally gave me freedom to figure out this entire world and it was the hardest project because I was problem-solving throughout the whole thing how one this part connected to this part connected to this partnering I thought of every little bit of it and they're making it now and after that

experience I thought what am I afraid of I can they they hired me to figure this out even though I didn't have proper training is like I helped them do this and that was when I finally dawned on me I remember I was on a walk and then I I was like I'm gonna let that go you know that's what I was saying you know pull out that fear and label it and it's like I finally did that and I let that one go so now I don't you know now I I don't think about it anymore it's like if if people come up to me and say hey would you like to give this a try now I'm cool with it you know thank you thank you uh-huh hi I know with with a lot of creative work there's a certain like nebula sness when

you're like in the thick of it and you're in this like state of uncertainty where you have no idea whether it's good or not and I know at my stage like I have yet to receive like validation for a lot of the work I'm doing and I feel like you you have received that validation over and over again and I'm wondering if that has changed the way you do your creative work or if you use or if you still have that uncertainty throughout the process and you use that to your advantage that's a great question and if my wife was here she would say that even at this stage where I'm at I eat a lot of ice cream for because I'm wounded some day because some days I walk home from what my studio is across from the house my lawn

is my commute and I there are days where I just drag my feet home because I feel like I didn't come up with a good idea and and she feels it you know the whole family feels it and then I find out later that oh they like the idea and then it's like I'm better again but hey I go through the motions you know and yes to answer your question yeah I do have moments almost every week where I feel like this is not a good idea but I have to listen to my gut because if I don't listen to my gut then I'm just rehashing ideas and it's just going to be like everyone else's so I have to try it's rewiring you have to rewire yourself and and just go for it thank you we're gonna have a couple minutes left but I have to ask a whole generation

loves your work in film but a lot of us fell in love with you through the games that you made so can you talk a little bit about this stuff that you're doing currently for double fine I won't tell Tim no I can't really talk about what I'm doing for Tim and I I'm done doing stuff for Tim he's he's no I meant I meant he doesn't have any more work for me to do he's got all these wonderful projects going on and I have to say I mean I'm not supposed to hype any companies or anything but you know the only if it wasn't double fine if it wasn't Tim if I found a company that is innovative or these guys actually listened to their gut and and go for it that's that's the company I'm looking for yeah they're the people that will

receive my silly goofy ideas of knitting robots or whatever right so that's who I seek out and those are the people I want to surround myself with right it's like picking your friends you want to surround yourself with supportive people in your lives right yes yes when you were talking about mental noting and you said you know your family kind of knows when daddy's away yes how did you kind of transition your family into that and like when you have smaller children haha I don't really Oh understand no I I got them gone on it when they were really little they're adults now my kids are 21 and 18 I got my son Zack he's uh he's he's doing silent retreats now so um my daughter's

different get one of each so but but when they were little I did I did get them you know how you get them going is I have them like we've go to the beach because I live on an island you go to a beach and I have them close their eyes and I have them just listen to the ocean or listen to their surroundings and then I have them and I ask them what are you hear you know it's a game to them they don't know what they're doing but you know it's a game to them and and that's how you can bring them into it and and another way to get them having little kids it's so important to like build up their curiosity right their imagination so I used to to get them into like classical music for example I would play certain soundtrack songs and I would have them listen to it it may be you know not long one like a two-minute song

and then I have them close their eyes and they listen to that one particular soundtrack song and then I ask them what did you see because when you listen you actually can you see animated things happening or you see you know you have feelings and and that's exercising their imagination and for any of you guys and that's a really good thing and I teach this in my class I play you know various songs and and I have them listen to and each of the students hearing one song everyone has different stories to tell and so if you're ever blocked creatively lot I highly recommend not listening to your rock and roll or anything like that just to find a song and listen to it and you know imagine what that short film is happening in

your head and that will help you get out of that creative block so I highly recommend you know giving that a try especially with young kids yeah thank you hi I'm a game design game designer by trade and I find that my best work comes from collaborating with others you talked a lot about trusting your gut how do we balance trusting other people's God as well that's a good one well yeah you have to trust them that's for sure it's hard because that's a great great question that's a good question that again it's been a long time like if I'm if I'm working with a company that I'm familiar with of course I trust the people in my life in the production designers or the project leads I trust them they know what they want

I'm my job as a designer though is to make them happy I'm not making the game it's not my money right it's it's them it's for them so but to be true to myself that's where the experience part comes in right that's where I add my piece of the puzzle into the mix right and that's where the compromise comes in because it's for them ultimately I got to make them happy if you want to do something all by yourself and independent then you got to go for it you got to use your own money but if you're going to work with somebody else then you know hopefully they'll respect you too and that they'll listen to your ideas right so you again it's compromise and seeking out the right people the right companies you want to work for that support your creative drive anyone else know well you

guys are my gaming community so I you know I support you guys good luck with yeah you know good luck with everything do good work be well see you guys [Applause] [Music] [Applause]