Creativity

Creativity is an open topic and can mean many things to people. It allows us to express ourselves individually. I see creativity as producing something new from ideas thought out from experiences and in the mind. When someone has innovative ideas, but does nothing about them, this is not being creative, it is just imagination.

Games manifest creativity through most characteristics. The graphics show what the creative minds of the artists and animators were thinking about how to portray the scenes in the game. Creativity is also revealed from the gameplay, for example, Nintendo Wii’s gameplay is original and it adds to the realistic effect of the player being immersed in the game.

I don’t think creativity has a common face as it lies within the individual to identify what they think is creative. If an idea for a game was original, I would class that as being creative as the concept is fresh as it shows the world something new.

As for who ‘does’ creativity, most roles include some sort of creative side. In gaming, the art director, artists and writers work very closely. The writers’ creativity is input into the storyline of the game or character specifications and profiles. Their writing may be influenced from life experiences or a dream of which they used to produce creative writing. The artists create the concepts, which may be an idea from a selection of experimental images and the art director uses their creative spark to manage what we, the gamers, eventually see and make the final product look appealing to gamers.

The idea that only special, talented people are creative and are born that way, shrink others’ confidence in their creative abilities. There is no such thing as being born with ‘talent’ or natural creativity; it’s a psychological matter. If someone says they want to be an artist, all it takes to be one are opportunities, training, being motivated, encouragement and practise, not ‘talent.’ The same applies to creativity. Mozart trained for 16 years before he produced master work that was acknowledged. The key was practise, do this and anyone can be creative with improvement over time and effort.
There may be, however, a dark side to creativity. By encouraging it, people are steered to detach from society's existing norms and values. Some people are so caught up in today’s norms and values that extreme expression of someone’s creativity could create controversy.

In my opinion, an immense amount of creativity was portrayed by the Mexican artist Frida Kahlo (1907-1954). She was one of the most influential painters of the middle twentieth century. She studied medicine and never thought about being an artist until encountering an accident that left her bedridden more months at a time. To pass the time, Kahlo painted her thoughts, experiences, sexuality and pain (physical and psychological) onto canvases and became an artist.

I tend to express my creativity from my interests and experiences I have encountered in this world. Creativity doesn’t just happen; you have to explore and embrace the world around you to become influenced and inspired to create something exceptional.