The Death of Innovation

[The Evil Mika-El Vance]

Is there no innovation left in Flash design?

Everytime the big boys (The WDDG, Lunarmedia, MONO*crafts, Balthaser and the like) come out with a cool effect - within two days the source files pop up on this site. I'm guilty of this two - but that is not the point.

It's just a sad state that we are all smart enough to pull off these effects - yet we do not innovate. The John Mark Sorum "splicing mask" effect is childsplay. However, how come we didn't come up with it first?

Is this the death of innovation? How many Flash sites have you seen this week that open up in a popup window? Have the same "Loading" screen, have a music on/off button, or have some text effects or draggable windows? Or stupid phrases from any Madonna album about life and death and creativity and design?

This frustrates me because we have become a community of copy cats and followers. There is very little innovation left on anyone's piece and I'm guilty too.

I left the Flashkits message boards a while ago because I was sick of seeing the same garbage day in and day out. There is very little new stuff or innovation left. Even the sound effects become used over and over.

I'm not knocking anyone - I'm knocking EVERYONE! We need to forge out on our own people. And stop looking liek a bunch of groupies. I've seen some incredible talent on this site from this community - but the same thing - little innovation on their part.

And stop this "Actionscript War" - Flash design is more than who can out-program the other guy. Sure - they are cool - but the best actionscripts cannot save the crappiest design. We shoudl enforce good design and innovation instead of open source "xeroxing" (copyright © XEROX Corporation).

I hope this opens some eyes - it's not an argument or a sermon - it's just the way I see things going nowadays. I dont any e-mails complaining about how I dissed somebody. I really don't care - I dissed myself and I'm searching for innovation myself.

I hope this gets the gears in motion - take care everybody and keep Flash design alive and fresh. Do not follow the leader. Innovate! Create! Think for yourself!

[mg33]

Mike,

That's an interesting read, I enjoyed it and pretty much agree with you. It seems so much these days is done because it has been done. And I do mean by people within our community. I don't really know how to address that, though, becuase it would cause too much of a fuss about who knows what. But in all actuality, that's what it's about:who knows certain things, who knows how to communicate a message, who knows about graphic design and how to do it well.
Not enough people are realizing that they are not going to get known simply by doing what everyone else has done. For the most part it has alot to do with their influences-they look at the sites they like, and have it in their mind that their site is going to look the same way.
Last night I was at a presentation for the Dallas Society of Visual Communication (I live in Dallas pretty much, Dallas, TX) and the principal designer from 52mm was there. It was just wonderful listening to someone speak so passionatly about their ideas and work-I found that I identify so much with that.
One of the things that she was speaking about was where we get our influences from, and how that fits into our ability to produce good graphic design. She more or less said, "All the people who go to the computer to get influence from other sites are never going to be unique. They need to stay away from working in that manner."
I totally agree. Maybe you have seen some of my posts about how I use influence, and where it comes from. The computer is probably last on my list of things I use to think of ideas in a form of taking ideas from other sites. The two main things that influence me are architecture and music. Music is the one thing in my life that is better than any other, it's something I live for-listening to it, writing it, playing it. I love it. So I've been able to see how moods and emotions in music play a huge role in something I am designing, music sets the mood for how the images will look, and the design ends up truly being about my personal thoughts and the exchange of thoughts in my mind.

Not everyone can see it that way, though. And that's unfortunate in one way, and good for me in another. Good for me because it's going to keep my ideas that much more unique when I'm presenting them to people who don't think that way. It's unfortunate for others-becuase I truly believe that seeing the world as I do is something that everyone could benefit from. And I'm not saying "think as I do, do as I do," I'm just saying that the themes and ways of thinking are available to people if they take the time to find themselves.

Another thing-you mentioned Actionscript. I have issues with this, and I'm not all that good at it with Flash 5 yet.
But the thing is, Flash is so open to so many different styles of use, the beta version of my site uses basic actionscript in Flash 4, but it does what I want it to do. In a situation like that I imagine that some people may see it and say, "Where's the cool actionscript stuff?" Well, there's not any, because that's not what the site is about.
I find that Flash lets me bring life to the static images I create, and it provides such an incredible way of total freedom of design.
There are so many sites of people doing complex actionscript experiments, I am very impressed by them, and my hat is off to those who figure all those things out-I never see myself doing that becuase my skills are not headed in that direction.
My only concern about the complex experiments, the gravity simulations, the bouncing stuff, etc. is this: What purpose do they have?
There are very few sites that get created for a client that use all the crazy actionscript stuff. I think it's great that people come up with that stuff, FlashGuru never ceases to amaze me with what he's doing. But what is the end result of creating something so complex? Does it get used anywhere? Or does it remain as a cataloged item in an online portfolio?
I just never seem to see sites that incorporate all the things that are going on with complex actionscript. In the end, (and this is an approach I take due to Advertising) I look at it and wonder if there will ever be a place for some of that stuff on sites that are business or service related, even many artistic sites would not benefit from some motion things.
Like I said, though, I'm always impressed by the things that people are creating, and I doubt I'll ever put that much effort into creating things of that nature.

Maybe give me your thoughts on this. I could write so much more but my fingers are getting tired.

Take Care,

mg33

[The Evil Mika-El Vance]

I agree with you 110% - crazy actionscripting is nice - but if is not functional or can't make you money - it's pointless. I can discuss this for hours myself - e-mail me if you wanna continue - maybe we can write a book!

[Virtuoso]

Interesting comments guys.
I think ('I' & 'think' being the operative words here) that we probably see so much "copy cat" material for a number of reasons.
1 is that it is a way to learn what is possible and how certain things can be done. However some ppl seem to take the easy road and don't learn (what a waste) and see it as a short cut.
Another is that most of what I see from this site is self promotion sites. Design for designers and really the only people who see these sites are other designers and the people you directly send to see your site.
The interesting thing about the feature fla you mentioned is that it is for a photographer who has specific requirements, I quite liked the site and the tranfers were cool. What is important is Information by communication.
It's important to have the knowledge of what can be achieved on the web, what works and what doesn't but at the end of the day our main purpose is to innovate NOT immitate.
It all comes back to customer focus, listen to your clients get a handle on their business and DEVELOP a way of providing their information to their target audience, communication by design.
This brings me to Inspiration, and as mg33 said if your inspiration comes from other web sites alone then the end product will be an immitation. Designers and their egos like to believe that they 'think outside the square' but to many are influenced by what the top guns are doing.
So while many great artists learn the techniques from copying the masters (this is a common practice by artists - Le Louvre in Paris has half it's open days dedicated to allowing copyists to learn from the masters by coming in and copying the styles of our most famous, they learn the technique but must go on and produce their own masterpiece if they are to call themselves an artist)
So maybe we should stop to smell the roses more often but be aware of the thorns, there is inspiration all around us in the texture of a single petal to the straight and continuous line of the blacktop highway. find the poet in your heart and release your imagination.
At the end of the day remember your purpose.
As a footnote to this, I haven't really got a functional web site for myself, I approach my clients face to face and sell my ideas, I use a cd rom to display my skills and then listen to what they want and then work out what they need.
I now work from referals and rarely get asked about my own site, this is the real world for me.

[The Evil Mika-El Vance]

WOW...you should write a book. Well said. Inspiration is one thing - innovation is another. Yeah I got the scrolling ideas from MONO*crafts - but I innovated on a techno-design and deep space theme. I could have copied them menu entirely - but I love space and the future.

[phooka]

Originally posted by The Evil Mika-El Vance
I agree with you 110% - crazy actionscripting is nice - but if is not functional or can't make you money - it's pointless. I can discuss this for hours myself - e-mail me if you wanna continue - maybe we can write a book!

I do normally aggree with you most of the time. You do come from a background where designing is understood as something that has to be "functional" or make you earn money.

What about flash directed to art? I personally do not care if there is pointless (from your pointless conceptual point of view) AS in my flas, since I am not planning on getting money from them... (lucky me, I would be hungry all day long!!!)...

[The Evil Mika-El Vance]

yeah.

[phooka]

Originally posted by The Evil Mika-El Vance
yeah.

Ein? Yeah what?

[The Evil Mika-El Vance]

Exactly

[cmhinshaw]

Ok, and I have stepped into a thread where it looks as if the point has been made abundantly clear. However, since I am very new to this community, and I haven't spent enough time to experience the particular copycat-isms that the original post so eloquently denounced, I would like to make a comment on innovation in general.

Imitation is an important part of the learning process. While the learning process should never truly end, the imitation phase shouldn’t last. I refuse to believe that this community lacks individuals who have passed this phase – Individuals who are capable of being on the cutting edge of what is a cutting edge technology.

I am sure that everybody has heard the expression “Think outside the box”... When I started my business, I cannot even begin to tell you how many times I saw the expression used in books designed to inspire creativity. When it comes down to it, thinking outside the box just isn’t enough... you have to realize that there is no box (creative Zen).

Ok, well the point of this entire message:
Most of us have the creativity.
Most of us have the talent.
Most of us (myself included) haven’t done a thing that can really be described as innovative.

If we have the creativity and talent to innovate, maybe we should. I don’t think that this community realizes the amount of potential that it has.