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Watch Morgan Spurlock’s TED Talk, “Embrace Transparency” (aka “The greatest TED Talk ever sold”). No editorial needed… Enjoy!

Stephen McCranie is a cartoonist.

Befriend Failure (Credit: doodlealley.com)

My goal is to make good ideas easy to access, understand, and share. To this end, I create comics with heartfelt stories that are appropriate for all ages. I also try to facilitate the spread of useful ideas by drawing short comic essays about concepts and principles that have been beneficial to me. ~ Stephen McCranie

Delve into this always scary but always critical tenet for living a creative life:

The master has failed more times than the beginner has even tried.

This, McCranie believes, is the main difference between the beginner and the master.

It rings true for me, especially as I edge toward the exhilarating but risky launch of Wanderlust, the first in a series of short format memoirs. I’ve been writing and revising these chronicles for four years during which time they’ve evolved from a single-but-sprawling Year in Provence style narrative to a more intimate collection of extended essays exploring the notion (and artifacts) of “home”. Within months Wanderlust will tumble out of the nest and into the imaginations of readers. If I’m lucky.

It’s a scary/thrilling time. A time for confidence. And humility. A time to take a chance. To silence the critic within and risk failure. Come what may.

For the writer at least, and perhaps also for the reader, it is better to have tried and failed to achieve perfection than never to have tried at all. ~ Aldous Huxley (Preface – Collected Essays)

Befriend Failure (Credit: doodlealley.com)

This cartoon was sent to me recently by a close friend. The cartooning – the “doodling” – would appeal to me, not the message, not the befriend failure theme. This is what my friend said. And perhaps she meant it. Probably she meant it.

And I loved the cartooning. I’ve poured over many of McCranie’s clever, creative reflections on universal, often philosophical truths. But I’ve returned to this one cartoon, “Be Friends with Failure“, again and again. Shoot for success, but befriend failure.

Befriend failure? What sort of asinine advice is that?!?! How about gun for success, shoot for the moon, kick some @$$?

Yes, yes, yes. But befriend failure!

Hasta la vista, critic!

Related articles

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Be driven, but be realistic, and create a culture based on flow, process and collaboration, not work heroism. (Medium)

Sometimes life rhymes. And sometimes it’s difficult to explain exactly why. Why did I stumble across Stef Lewandowski‘s thoughtful reflection on the heavy costs of overworking, “What gets done is what gets done“, and why now?

Why did I just happen to dip into this while scanning the Medium Editor’s Picks? Right as I’ve been deep thinking this whole matter of triumphal solo workathons (and shortfalls, setbacks, etc.)? And why did it coincide with a couple of spontaneous social media exchanges with peers on the very same topic?

Fearless flow, process and collaboration…

Poetry. Sometimes life rhymes. The message may be as difficult interpret as a summer mirage, but for a glimmering instant we stumble upon mesmerizing clarity.

A little more than halfway through the year isn’t such a bad time to reevaluate priorities and goals. Maybe even to rotate the map slightly. Or turn it upside down to doodle a fresh map…

Stef Lewandowski (@stef) is cofounder of Makeshift (@makeshift), a cool “new type of company that makes digital products that ‘give a leg up to the little guy’“. Smart concept. Smart team. London-based. They built Bitsy to make it easy and affordable for you to sell your digital stuff, Help Me Write so you can tap your audience for guidance on what to write about, and Hire My Friend so can explore new work possibilities with help from your friends.

It’s all the more compelling to be reminded by a smart, hardworking overachiever who thrives in perennial start-up mode that we need to unplug. That we need to work smart. And that means that sprinting 24×7 because we have to (and because it often yields ace results, and because everyone has come to expect Energizer bunny tempo from us, and — let’s be 100% honest — because it’s a really addictive!) isn’t such a good idea. Not in the long term. Nor even the sort of middle term. It’s a fast track to burn out. It’s taken me most of my life to acknowledge this. To accept this. And to envision (and begin drafting) a new map.

The frustration and drive that you feel around what you’re working on is a good thing – it gives you motivation and direction, but it’s important to be grown up about it too. There is only so much that humans can achieve in a period of time, and by accepting this fact I’ve found that I’m able to create an environment where I feel more relaxed, creative and inspired than I’ve managed to be in before.

The result is that I, and my team are being smart about how we spend our time, rather than back-filling with a resource that we shouldn’t be using up—our personal time. (Medium)

Time. Timing. It’s one of the essential ingredients in poetry.

And life.

And work.

So are flow and process. Ideally. Though not always. Thanks, Stef, for the timely reminder. And thanks for building tools that help out with the collaboration part too.

Time for fearless flow, process and collaboration. Time to add bold lines and colors to my new map…

Related articles

• New London Startup Lab Makeshift Gives Birth To Its First MVP: HireMyFriend (techcrunch.com)
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Griffin doodle as vector image

I’ve become a little obsessed with vector images lately. Not necessarily the colorful, cartoony, commercial-feeling images so prevalent in marketing and entertainment, but smooth, crisp line drawings  rendered in black and white. In fact, I am as enthralled with vector images as I am incapable of explaining with any degree of precision or even accuracy exactly what vector images are, but the clarity and simplicity and minimalism possible when converting doodle from raster images to vector images is the Holy Grail I’ve been pursuing lately.

While my unrepentant doodle habit is no secret, I haven’t yet mentioned my experiments — extremely rudimentary experiments — with transforming my doodles into vector images. Soon soon I will share a collection of architectural doodles I’ve been working on, and perhaps at that point I will be better able to articulate what exactly fuels my newfound fascination with vector images. It has something to do with an aesthetic preference for ultra-simple, almost impressionist style line drawings, as if the absence of unnecessary lines allows the image to strive for a more universal, more archetypal…

But already I’m knee-deep and bogged down in “goofy talk”, so I’ll cut to the chase.

Did you know that you can  convert digital images into clean vector images online, easily for free? I’m not expert enough to critique how good/poor the free, online vectorizers are, but they certainly impress me. Although the following list isn’t inclusive or representative, I’ve used all four of these with good results. You’ll be asked to upload a bitmap image below, and the service will quickly render vector image.

Online Vector Image Converters

It’s March 1, 2014, and I’ve decided to update this post slightly after almost almost ten months of experimentation. The main difference is the order of online vector images converters I’m recommending. I still haven’t made the leap to Adobe Illustrator (it’s still floating near the middle of my “To Do List”), but I continue to use Online-Convert.com‘s free online image converter to convert my doodles into scalable vector graphics (SVG) format images. In fact, this free, reliable, online vector image converter has become my go-to each and every time, so I’m shuffling the list and moving it to the top. (FYI, Online-Convert.com offers a wide range of quick, free file conversion tools for image, audio, video, documents and even ebooks. It’s pretty amazing!)

• Online SVG Image Converter Online-Convert.com offers many free online converters including this vectorizer which lets you convert bitmatp images to vector images (SVG). Similar to the service above, you can either upload an image or provide a URL to an image, but Online-Convert.com offers greater control of the conversion and digital enhancement of your conversion.
• Vector Magic Vector Magic offers “precision bitmap to vector conversion” allowing you to automatically convert bitmap images (JPEGs, GIFs, PNGs) into scalable vector images (SVG, EPS, PDF). Note: only two free conversions, then you will need to purchase the service or software download.
• Autotracer.org Autotracer’s online image vectorizer also converts raster images to vector images, but it doesn’t limit your free conversions. “You don’t believe that a free online service will deliver usable results? Give it a try and save time and money.” In addition to uploading a bitmap image, you can enter a URL for an image. Autotracer also offers some control of the conversion/enhancement process.
• Free Online Raster to Vector Converter This stripped down convertor automatically converts PDF, SVG, DXF, AI and EPS images to vector images.

Let me know if there are other similar resources (especially if they are better) that are available online by commenting below. Thanks!

More Vector Software Resources

Special thanks to artist and graphic designer Terre Britton (@TerreBritton) who offered up some useful links. Here’s what she had to say:

As for vector software… I’m an Adobe gal so my first recommendation is always from the “Family,” in this case, Illustrator. There are a few pricing plans, including cloud-pricing, with tutorials on lynda.com.

I’ve never used these tools but have heard good things about both:

• Gimp: Video tutorials: http://ow.ly/jOwbq
• Inkscape: Video tutorials: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4dB6-S6zgb0

Both [Gimp and Inkscape] have the ability to apply filters and autotrace parameters. Both are open-source (and therefore free)

Thanks, Terre! Here are a few more resources to consult if you’d like to learn more about converting doodles to vectors or just about vector art in general. Good luck!

• Adobe Illustrator CS6 Classroom in a Book
• The Art of Vector Graphics, Design and Illustration in Illustrator
• Inkscape: Guide to a Vector Drawing Program (4th Edition)
• The Book of Inkscape: The Definitive Guide to the Free Graphics Editor
• Vector Basic Training: A Systematic Creative Process for Building Precision Vector Artwork
  

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• A Simple Guide on How SVGs Work (webdesignviews.com)
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“Until one is committed, there is hesitancy, the chance to draw back — Concerning all acts of initiative (and creation), there is one elementary truth that ignorance of which kills countless ideas and splendid plans: that the moment one definitely commits oneself, then Providence moves too. All sorts of things occur to help one that would never otherwise have occurred. A whole stream of events issues from the decision, raising in one’s favor all manner of unforeseen incidents and meetings and material assistance, which no man could have dreamed would have come his way. Whatever you can do, or dream you can do, begin it. Boldness has genius, power, and magic in it. Begin it now.”

~ W. H. Murray, The Scottish Himalaya Expedition, 1951

Murray’s passage has occasionally been maligned because he erroneously attributed the following couplet to Goethe.

Whatever you can do or dream you can, begin it.
Boldness has genius, power and magic in it!

It strikes me as a bit petty to toil in criticism in the face of useful motivation and beauty. Besides, boldness does pack plenty of power under the hood. And — whoever we credit with the seed that grew into this passage — the most important message is shoehorned into the last three words underpinning all commitment. Begin it now. What will you do?

Faust: Begin it Now

And, by the way, if you’re feeling persnickety (or just curious) here’s Goethe on the matter of dallying, boldness, commitment and action.

Enough words have been exchanged;
Now at last let me see some deeds!
While you turn compliments,
Something useful should transpire.
What use is it to speak of inspiration?
To the hesitant it never appears.
If you would be a poet,
Then take command of poetry.
You know what we require,
We want to down strong brew;
So get on with it!
What does not happen today, will not be done tomorrow,
And you should not let a day slip by,
Let resolution grasp what’s possible
and seize it boldly by the hair;
it will not get away
and it labors on, because it must.

~ Goethe, Faust I, Zeilen 214-230 (Goethe, Faust and Tricky Translations)

Now are you ready to begin? Begin it now!

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Creative Theft: I Stole Dali’s Dove, by Terre Britton

“Art is theft.” ~ Pablo Picasso

The day after Thanksgiving Florida-based artist and designer Terre Britton (@TerreBritton) stole Dali’s dove. While her act was brazen and her confession unremorseful, I suspect that Austin Kleon — author of Steal Like an Artist and Newspaper Blackout — would congratulate her creative theft and probably even encourage her to steal more!

“What a good artist understands is that nothing comes from nowhere. All creative work builds on what came before. Nothing is completely original.” ~ Austin Kleon (Steal Like an Artist)

Here’s Britton’s confession, published on her blog, TerreBritton.com:

I Stole Dali’s Dove is based on… [a] sketch I produced… nearly 30 years ago. I had planned to leave the right side of the canvas blank… But then, I happened upon The Ecumenical Council (1960), by Salvador Dali, at the Dali Museum in St. Petersburg, FL, and I was wooed by his dove. It’s in the top right of his magnificent canvas. Being that I was grappling with the concept of thievery, I wondered what it would be like to steal someone’s art… so I did! … I feel quite satisfied and, at times, justified at having that lovely little dove accompanying, inspiring, and protecting me. ~ Terre Britton

Britton, co-author of Energetics: The First Order and owner of Terrabyte Graphics, is no stranger to the increasingly strained relationship between creativity and copyright. Nor is she simply cribbing and cobbling for the sake of hitchhiking on the efforts of other artists. As the curator for Creative Flux Britton explores the creative process (which necessarily encompasses creative theft) through her own eyes as a writer and painter as well as the experiences of other creators. Here are a few recent excerpts.

I’m not officially Licensed to Write . . . but I do have a child’s irrepressible imagination.  ~ Ruth Long (Confessions of a Rogue Ink Slinger)

We must dive forward into the agony—sitting there with our face lying sideways on the desk—and discover within it every reason writing is an inanely bad idea… We will lie there and sob. Gnash our teeth… And when we are done, we will know something about life we didn’t know before. We will know how to survive… And then we’ll have something to write about. ~ Victoria Mixon (Going Beyond the Beyond)

I’m convinced that the creative process for fiction writers is a messy mixture of imagination, insecurity, and wee bit of insanity. Combine ingredients, shake well, then get the synapses to start firing, and wait for sheer genius to flow from every pore in your body. ~ Karl Sprague (Enjoy the Ride)

When you have the idea, you next have to figure out how to make it work in practice. It’s one thing to dream, but it’s completely another to engineer the final solution. ~ David Straker (Creativity’s The Easy Bit)

As if intentionally melding these four observations, Britton’s painting is simultaneously placid and wrenching, disturbing and beguiling. The color-play between the eyes and the shirt, the uncomfortable framing, and the bouquet of textures (hair, shirt, feathers) all contribute to the painting’s unnerving impact. Certainly Britton has not copied Dali’s Ecumenical Council!

Her creative theft is a visual footnote to Dali’s painting, not an imitation. Her painting is a mashup/remix of diverse elements — a black and white sketch she completed three decades ago, a nod to Dali’s dove, and unconventional cropping/coloring choices — which result in a totally original and highly creative image. Proof positive that creative theft provides valuable, if not essential, ingredients for artists. After all, as Kleon reminds us, “The artist is a collector”, selectively culling ingredients gathered along life’s adventure, and then weaving these ingredients into art. Bravo, Terre! Keep stealing! Creative theft serves you well.

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3D Art on Sidewalks (Photo: RedRoseRattus)

Have you witnessed 3D art on sidewalks? Chalk murals that create optical illusions so compelling they stop traffic?

I’ve mused about 3D sidewalk artwork before, wondering not only if it can blow minds but possibly also slow speeding vehicles. But I haven’t pondered its potential as a vehicle for storytelling. And yet it obviously is!

Telling a Story via 3D Art on Sidewalks

Literature and film have explored the idea of stepping into drawings for ages, using artwork as a gateway between reality and illusion. And yet 3D sidewalk and street artists are often dismissed with an amused shrug.

“Cool.”

“Weird.”

“It’s not graffiti exactly, but who’s going to clean it up?”

Julian Beever Creates 3D Art on Sidewalks (Photo: HMHung)

Is 3D Art on Sidewalks Just Chalk Graffiti?

3D art on sidewalks is cool and weird and graffiti, but cleaning it up is rarely a problem. In fact, it tends to vanish altogether too quickly. Rain. Pedestrians. Vehicle traffic. Perhaps its ephemeral nature is part of what makes 3D art on sidewalks and roadways so appealing. An invitation into another reality that will expire almost before you’ve decided whether or not to dive in.

Street artists like Julian Beever, Edgar Mueller, Eduardo Rolero, Manfred Stader and Kurt Wenner distort perspective with little more than chalk, unfettered imaginations and a near perfect ability to render anamorphic illusions. When their artwork is viewed from the correct angle, an ordinary street or sidewalk creates the illusion of three dimensions.

Coca-Cola Bottle (Photo: RedRoseRattus)

Their chalk art transcends mere graffiti and many other art forms in its capacity for interactive storytelling. 3D art on sidewalks introduces a narrative possibility that engages viewers. Pedestrians and drivers stop and look. Perhaps they reorient themselves to better appreciate the optical illusion. They pause and let their eyes wander over the mural, actively suspending disbelief in order to engage with the image. In many cases the audience/viewer even choose to step into the image, playing along with the illusion, often posing for friends with cameras to memorialize the encounter.

A bit like a real life video game…

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What have you invented lately?

Ever since I was a wee lad (no, I’m not thinking pre-potty training… just after that) I’ve invented solutions, products, worlds, stories. Mostly in my head! At least when it comes to products…

I suspect that most people have done the same thing, spontaneously, accidentally, invented the perfect widget for solving one problem or another. Or maybe you just dream up cool $#&@ because, well, it’s cool. Or beautiful. Or fun.

If this sounds familiar, you need to watch the Quirky Manifesto above, and then you probably need to start submitting your own inventions.

Social Product Development

The folks at Quirky describe what they do as social product development. Accurate. Boring. The video better captures the totally simple idea and the totally complex infrastructure they’ve developed to make this totally simple idea work. Frankly, it’s genius. And a couple of centuries overdue. I know, I know, first you needed telecommunications and then interwebs and then social… blah, blah, blah.

Better late than never. Quirky is smart. Just. Plain. Smart.

Basically, social product development combines the power of global collaboration with the scalable capital, manufacturing, marketing and distribution advantages. Result? Great products that would otherwise have withered on the vine are born, produced and consumed.

Here’s how they describe what they do:

For centuries, becoming an “inventor” has been a hard gig to crack. Complexities relating to financing, engineering, distribution, and legalities have stood in the way of brilliant people executing on their great ideas.

Since launching in 2009, Quirky has rapidly changed the way the world thinks about product development.

We bring two brand new consumer products to market each week, by enabling a fluid conversation between a global community and Quirky’s expert product design staff.

The world influences our business in real-time, and we share our revenue directly with the people who helped us make successful decisions. (About Quirky)

That’s what they do. What do you do? Time to invent!

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Sony WM-FX421 Walkman. (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

Technology creates our needs faster than it satisfies them. (Kevin Kelly)

My Monday morning muse for your ruminating pleasure is actually not mine at all. It’s a quotation from Kevin Kelly’s 1998  New Rules for the New Economy. No longer new, of course, but if you missed out before you’ll find that it’s still relevant and eerily prescient. And did I mention that the blog version lives on his website? And that it’s free?

According to Kelly, we’re hurtling forward, inventing technologies to satisfy our desires and — in the process —  discovering new desires.

Our wants are compounding exponentially… technology creates ever new opportunities for those desires to find outlets and form. (Kevin Kelly

Although the illustrative example, a $50 Sony Walkman (remember cassette tapes?), seems practically ancient, I can’t help but transpose an iPad or even a Kindle Fire.

When a merchant sells a consumer a new Sony Walkman for $50, he is in fact creating far more demand than he is satisfying–in this case a continuing and potentially unlimited need for tape cassettes and batteries. (Paul Pilzer)

Transposed for the digital age:

When a merchant sells a consumer an iPad, he is in fact creating far more demand than he is satisfying–in this case a continuing and potentially unlimited need for digital products (ebooks, videos, games, apps, etc.), physical accessories (from practical screen protectors and card readers to fashion carrying cases), non-physical accessories (warranty extensions, maintenance contracts, customer support, etc.), software updates/upgrades, and–let’s be totally honest–hardware upgrades because sexy new models with more memory, faster processors, longer lasting batteries and retina displays are the MSG that keeps consumers coming back for more!

With writers, publishers, editors, agents and booksellers wandering the Wild West known as the Post-Gutenberg Paradigm, it’s more evident than ever that technology creates more demand than it satisfies. Increasingly tech-centric publishing and storytelling is catalyzing an avalanche of new non-book formats to satisfy consumer demands. New options are invented daily, and yet we’re only beginning to glimpse the world of storytelling possibilities around the corner. Technology is simultaneously sating and creating new demand, seeding storytelling innovation and inventing new consumer desires… Suppose I’m bullish on storytelling in the digital age?!?!

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After three days back at home in the Adirondacks I’m ready to wrap up my Abiquiu series about my month apart in a remote New Mexico desert canyon. A month of writing, revising and listening. This post is a freestyle retrospective in images, sounds and words. A digital scrapbook of sorts. If you’re interested, here are the previous posts:

• Antigua, AWP and Abiquiu
• Productivity, Publishing & Apex Predators
• Rosslyn in the Desert

The video/slide show above was shot on my iPhone. Excuse the blurry images and the bumpy footage. The audio was not recorded among the Benedictines, though Gregorian chants were a part of my days at the abbey. All credit for this beautiful music goes to Medwyn Goodall, a musician and producer from Yorkshire, England.

Daily Scrape (listen to audio)

I’m shaving and all of the sudden a bearded fellow in black robes and hood is at my bathroom window. It’s Brother Hidalgo (name changed) from Monterey, Mexico. I’d met him on my second day at the abbey when he explained that he would pass by my hermitage a couple of times each week to pick up the garbage.

So I knock on the glass and wave. He recognizes me and waves back, then flushes crimson and turns away. He returns to the trash and recycling. I look into the mirror and continue shaving. I realize that – despite the towel around my waist – I must have looked naked to Brother Hidalgo. No wonder he was embarrassed.

Magpies (listen to audio)

When the weather is warm I sit outside and watch magpies, so many magpies gathering twigs and bits of fiber hanging in the sagebrush, gathering the ingredients for a cozy nest, I surmise, though I haven’t a clue if I’m right or wrong.

According to the 1961 edition of Roger Tory Peterson‘s A Field Guide to Western Birds, Magpies, Pica pica, are “the only large black and white land birds in N. America with long wedge-shaped tails. In flight, the iridescent greenish-black tail streams behind; large white patches flash in the wings.” Long iridescent tails that vibrate in the unfiltered sunlight that intoxicated Georgia O’Keefe once upon a time. The black billed magpies natural habitat includes this high desert canyon along the shores of the Chama River in Northern New Mexico, especially the foothills, Peterson says, and “ranches, sagebrush, river thickets,…”

Story Threads and Knots (listen to audio)

I’m in bed, almost asleep despite concerns on the first day when I arrived and saw the futon on a raised tatami mat floor.

That will be my bed for the month of March? Will my finicky back let me sleep on that? For almost four weeks?

But, like camping on an even thinner mat in the wilderness after a hike, I sleep restfully. Briefly, but restfully, though I usually awaken after four hours and think, How will I ever make it through the day with so little rest?

And then I do. Without yawning. Untangling then braiding my stories. Or twisting them into a rope. With knots. That I try to cut out when they become too tight to unknot. I discard the knots outside the hermitage door where they collect in a pile next to a cow patty the size of a Thanksgiving turkey which was still shiny, moist and brown-black on my first day but each day grows flatter, drier, paler and more wrinkled.

When I first arrived there were cattle wandering around the abbey grounds, especially between the Chama and the dirt road from the hermitage to the church. Sleepy eyed cows ruminating and nursing new calves among the sagebrush.

On the second or third day – when the winds were starting but before it snowed – a rancher on horseback passed through with a skinny black dog. I haven’t seen the cattle or the rancher since, but the dog comes back to visit every few days and I give him a piece of dried salmon jerky. He likes the jerky and he begs for more, but settles for a scratch behind the ears.

The pile of knots grows bigger each day. Twice buried in snow that melted within a few hours of sun-up, the knots that were too tight to unknot have been loosed by the wind, not all of them, not yet, but threads blow around the yard and hang in the sagebrush like desert tinsel. Sometimes I see one that I like, and I bring it back inside to braid or splice or just to wrap around my finger as a reminder.

Coyotes (listen to audio)

A lone coyote yips then wails then barks at the base of the canyon across the Chama, a river too lazy to reflect the moon which is full and high overhead. Soon others join in. The coyotes are all around the canyon, surrounding the hermitage, yipping and wailing outside my windows, perhaps hoping for salmon jerky handouts.

Coyote. Canis latrans mearnsi.

In Southwestern tribal legends the coyote is often portrayed as a clever trickster. According to a Native American twist on the Prometheus myth, coyote stole fire from the gods and gave it to humans, a welcome gift that made winters more tolerable and raw food more enjoyable. Perhaps the coyotes outside my window are singing about fire. Or outwitting the gods. Or salmon jerky. Perhaps they’re untangling and braiding stories. I hope they can find something salvageable in my pile of knots or among the threads fluttering in the sagebrush.

At this liminal frontier of waking and sleeping my own story – naked, iridescent and wrinkled – emerges among the moonlit thickets. At last!

Related articles

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• New Mexico Skies (natureofphotography.wordpress.com)
• Georgia O’keeffe & Maria Chabot | “Women Who Rode Way” (theselvedgeyard.wordpress.com)