Fundamentals of visual communication unit v
- 2. Ideation Ideation is the creative process of generating, developing, and communicating new ideas, where an idea is understood as a basic element of thought that can be either visual, concrete, or abstract. Ideation comprises all stages of a thought cycle, from innovation, to development, to actualization.
- 3. Ideation is a process for bringing ideas to life. Ideation means to conceive or generate an idea and implement it. Ideas are the result of mental activity that can be based on past or present knowledge, thoughts, opinions, convictions or principles. Ideation includes the creation of original ideas, basically focus on concept to gain insights, understand, estimate possibility and give deeper potential of experiences. In other word, ideation can be considered as ‘building to think’.
- 4. Ideation Process There are four basic process of ideation are; Gathering Customer Insights: Reviewing customer research reports, analyzing competitors, social trends, lifestyle patterns and shopping habits are the process of gathering customer insights.
- 5. Finding Opportunity Areas: Look for customer pain points, problems, inefficient or abnormal behavior. Give these areas names since these themes will serve as vehicles for exploring and developing new ideas. Brainstorm Ideas: Create actionable design statements around the opportunity areas like ‘How might improve the product delivery times’ or ‘what will improve the online user’s experience’ provides motivation and guidelines for brainstorming.
- 6. Prior Ideas: Developing some criteria like ‘Does this idea improve customer’s lives’ or ‘Is the idea different from what customers are using today’ to help evaluate, rank and select the best ideas Creativity: Creativity is the act of converting new and innovating ideas into reality. Creativity is characterized by the ability to observe the world in new ways, to make connections between actually unrelated phenomena and to generate solutions. Creativity involves two processes: thinking and then producing. If the ideas are generated and not acted then the imagination is not creativity.
- 7. Characteristics of Creativity: Characteristics of the creativity are; 1. Creative individuals have a great deal of energy. 2. Creative individuals tend to be smart. 3. Creative individuals have a combination of playfulness and discipline, or responsibility and irresponsibility. 4. Creative individuals alternate between imagination and fantasy at one end and fixed sense of reality at the other. 5. Creative people seem to anchorage opposite leaning on the range between extroversion and introversion. 6. Creative individuals are also remarkable humble and proud.
- 8. 7. Creative individuals to a certain extent escape rigid gender role stereotyping and have a tendency toward androgyny. 8. Generally, creative people are thought to be rebellious and independent. 9. Most creative persons are very passionate about their work, yet they can be extremely objective about it as well. 10. The openness and sensitivity of creative individuals often exposes them to suffering pain yet also a great deal of enjoyment.
- 9. Process of Creativity: Creativity is not a ‘talent’; it’s a cognitive skill that can be learned and cultivated to empower individuals to express them within their community. The process of creativity involves different stages, they are; Inception: The first stage of the creative process starts by establishing the brief or the scope of the task. By defining the task, it helps to identify the problem that need to be solved. Once the task is identified, all the relevant information must be analyze and absorb, which closely understand the individual components that related to the task.
- 10. Incubation: Once the problem has been defined, research completed and basic ideation is initiated then the task involves immediate attention. At this stage, the task must understand the relationship between the conscious and unconscious modes of thinking. Consciousness is thought with attention; whereas unconsciousness works with intuition (sixth sense). Conscious attention allows the unconscious to efficiently process a mass of data.
- 11. Illumination: When discussing creativity with artists and designers, most agree that there is an urge to change their ‘mental state’ at the point of creativity. An experienced creative will a glimmer of an idea that emerge through a ‘feeling’ they have. Emotion is essential because it creates a chain of associations that lead probability. Such ‘feelings’ enable the use of past experiences to subjectively recognise the potential of certain directions.
- 12. Realization: Intuited concepts are short span thoughts; they have neither context nor structure. Therefore, intuited concepts need to be seized and brought into reality. Transform imagination into a solid form to put into action. What separates a great artist and designer from the ordinary is not the quality of the inspiration, but the ability to realise what others could not.
- 13. Verification: It is essential to test all ideas against the strategy of the brief and proposed outcomes. Ideas that created are highly personal due to the nature of the creation. Therefore it is important to be as impartial as possible when assessing the ideas. Invite critique from others. All ideas must report back to the reason that motivated the creation, if does not answer then again has to start from the first stage of the creative process. Creativity is a uniquely human ability that provides with amazing potential and allows achieving designs with glorious. That is, we create the world we live in.
- 14. Creativity Tools The basic creative tools are; Absence Thinking: Think about what is not there. Brainstorming: the classic creative method for groups. Brain-mapping: Combining brain writing and mindmapping. CATWOE: A checklist for thinking about problems and solutions. Forced Conflict: Using conflict to stimulate the subconscious. Head, Heart and Hands: Get all three systems of motivation engaged.
- 15. Lotus Blossom: Unfold the flower of extended ideas. Modeling: For the artist in everyone. NUF Test: Check idea is New, Useful and Feasible. PINC Filter: Evaluate pros and cons of ideas. Problem Statement: Getting a clear statement of what trying to achieve. Purposing: Finding the real purpose for what doing. Six Thinking Hats: Think comfortably in different ways about the problem. Storyboarding: Creating a visual story to explore or explain. Talk streaming: Just talk and talk and talk until unblock.
- 16. Unfolding: Gradually unfolding the real problem from the outside. Visioning: Creating a motivating view of the future. Wishing: State ideas as wishes to expand thinking. Write streaming: Write and write and write until unblock Approaches to Creativity: Basically there are two approaches followed in creativity, they are programmed thinking and lateral thinking.
- 17. Programmed Thinking: Programmed thinking depends on logical or structured ways of creating a new product or service. The programmed thinking approaches can be classified into Morphological Analysis and the Reframing Matrix. Morphological Analysis: The morphological analysis is a group of methods that share the same structure, which breaks down a system, product or process into its essential sub-concepts, where each concept represents a dimension in a multi-dimensional matrix. That is, every product is considered as a bundle of qualities. The morphological analysis may be summarized with five step process, they are;
- 18. o First Step: The problem to be solved must be very quickly formulated. o Second Step: All of the parameters related for the solution of the given problem must be localized and analyzed. o Third Step: The morphological box that contains all the potential solutions of the given problem is constructed. o Fourth Step: All the solutions contained in the morphological box are closely scrutinized and evaluated with the purpose that has to be achieved. o Fifth Step: The related suitable solutions are selected and practically applied.
- 19. Lateral Thinking: The other important creative approach is Lateral Thinking, which was developed and popularized by Edward de Bono. The lateral thinking can be classified into Brainstorming, Random Input and Provocation. Brainstorming: Brainstorming combines a relaxed, informal approach to problem-solving with lateral thinking. Here the idea can be crafted into original and creative solutions to the problem to be solved. This approach aims to get people unstuck, by ‘shaking’ them out of their normal ways of thinking. During brainstorming sessions, judgments and analysis may exploit the idea generation, so ideas should only be evaluated at the end of the brainstorming session, because this is the time to explore solutions through conventional approaches.
- 20. o Individual Brainstorming: While group brainstorming is often more effective at generating ideas, study has shown that individuals brainstorm come up with more better quality ideas than groups of people who brainstorm together. o Group Brainstorming: The group brainstorming has advantage of the obtaining full experience and creativity of all the team members. When one member gets stuck with an idea, another member's creativity and experience can take the idea to the next stage.
- 21. Random Input: While stuck with ideas during brainstorming or again and again going with the same ideas, it will be difficult to come out from the normal thinking. Random Input is a lateral thinking technique, which pullout the imagination from the fixed thinking pattern into developing creative and innovative ideas. Random Input is a technique for linking other thinking patterns into the process. Provocation: Provocation is a technique that is similar to Random input. Generally one use to think in recognized pattern and reacts according to it, which comes from the past experiences and logical extensions to those experiences. The Provocation technique often helps you to generate completely new concepts, which deliberately make stupid statements (provocations) of the situation that is not true. That is, the statements need to be stupid to shock the minds out of existing ways of thinking.
- 22. Innovation: The process of translating an idea or invention into a concept that creates value or for which customers will pay is known as innovation, which must be affordable at an economical cost and must satisfy a specific need. Concept of Innovation: People often use the words ‘creativity’ and ‘innovation’. Creativity is about ‘coming up with ideas’ and innovation is about ‘bringing ideas to life’. Innovation often results when ideas are applied to satisfy the needs and expectations of the customers. In a social context, innovation helps to create new methods of creation, joint venturing and creation of buyer’s purchasing power. Innovations can be divided into two broad categories, they are:
- 23. Evolutionary Innovation: Evolutionary innovations are brought by many incremental advances in technology or processes. Revolutionary Innovation: Revolutionary innovations, which is also called as alternating innovations are often disruptive and new. Lateral thinking: Lateral thinking takes the indirect approach to solve problems. Although the reasoning may not be immediately obvious and not obtainable by using only traditional step-by step logic, it does work in a more indirect way
- 24. A way of understanding lateral thinking is through its opposite, vertical thinking. Vertical Thinking: A vertical thinker is analytical, careful and precise, taking the data around a problem and analysing it with defined methodologies to find logical solutions. Lateral Thinking: A lateral thinker understands vertical thinking, but chooses to deliberately outside of this bounded thought process. Creativity is a word that covers a great deal. The Artists are said to be creative because they do not imitate but produce something new. Inventors are also said to be creative because, they come up with a new invention which works. Similarly, Scientists are said to be creative when they make a new discovery. So the common element of creativity is ‘producing something new’. For example, creativity is like a joke, it will not make sense until the punch-line at the end is understood.
- 25. Lateral thinking is specifically concerned with the generation of new perceptions and new ideas. That is, Lateral thinking involves changing perceptions and flexibility. Moreover, there is confusion between creativity and lateral thinking, because both are related with producing something new, but lateral thinking is a more specified definition for the process of changing perceptions or changing the way we look at things. The term ‘creativity’ is usually a value judgment of a result, whereas Lateral thinking is a process that can be practiced and used. With the right training, the lateral thinking can improve the ability to think laterally.
- 26. Lateral Thinking Vs Vertical Thinking:
- 27. Process of developing ideas to different medium. Most people know all about brainstorming: people sit in a room and come up with as many ideas as they can. They don’t censor themselves for idea quality or feasibility. Some simply put out ideas off the top of their head, while others use Google to come up with ideas. There are better ways than the standard brainstorming method, however, to take up problems and develop new ideas for them. The Storyboarding Method A storyboard is like a cartoon strip: you place pictures or written words to do with ideas, one after the other, on a sheet of paper. Then, you try to develop a story through them. When you storyboard ideas for an ideating session, you take ideas from everyone, write each down on a sticky note, paste it on a board, and then try to form a story around it. It’s a great way to see how these ideas interact and see if there is a connection that can be made among them.
- 28. The Mind Mapping Method Creating mind maps is common in many creative fields. To create a mind map, you write down the problem on a whiteboard and then surround it with words that indicate the things that you feel you may need in order to solve the problem. If the problem is growing website traffic, for instance, the solutions are the things that you need, like SEO or organic traffic. As a second mind map layer, you can take an individual need, like SEO, and add potential solutions, including hiring an SEO strategist, taking up a marketing course and so on. It’s possible to add third or fourth mind map layers, as well. It’s a proven creative technique that works.
- 29. Sketching As a Group Sketching helps visual thinking, something that is often more effective than discussions conducted through speech. In group sketching, a person begins the idea-making process by sketching something on the whiteboard. Another person then comes along and adds to the sketch with his own idea. As everyone contributes to the idea through sketches, they add up to something substantial. Creating Word Banks To create a word bank, you start with a word or a problem and then create a large set of words that you would associate with the word. It’s a word association activity, but it works with large groups of words. Creating word banks helps you break a problem down in your mind and form manageable parts. When a word banking session is ready, you start to form relationships among the words that you’ve thought of. When you do this, you come up with new ideas.
- 30. The Thinking Hats Technique Otherwise known as the Six Thinking Hats technique, this method was invented by Edward de Bono involves role-play. In a group of six people, each person takes up a different role and addresses the problem in that capacity. One participant uses logic to think about the problem, another one uses optimism, a third one plays devil’s advocate. The others take up roles for emotion, creativity, and management. As each person takes up a role, they get to think very clearly about the problem in that capacity. This method can bring up far more
- 31. Brainstorming in Reverse Knowing what not to do is just as important as knowing what to do. When you set up a reverse brainstorming session, your aim is to think up every mistake that it would be possible to make in a given situation. In a reverse brainstorming session for marketing knowledge, for example, participants would think of mistakes such as not using social media and social media ads, not paying attention to various metrics and so on. Bringing up problems is a useful way to know what mistakes to avoid. Brainstorming is a great technique. It’s important to understand, however, that sometimes, some techniques can work better.