Many Ways To Inspire Yourself
Thomas Edison once said that genius is 1% inspiration, and 99% perspiration, but where exactly (and how) should one find it?
Thomas Edison invented the lightbulb amongst other influential inventions, for those of us that are academically challenged such as myself 
Here are some tips to find inspiration
1. Your eyes need food to send to your brain, so feed them with images. Visit;
- Design blogs; graphic design, logo design, interior design, general art blogs
(David Airey has a list of the top 50 design blogs)
- Go shopping, retail land is a riot of creativity. Take your camera.
- Photo/image stock libraries
- Illustrators agents websites
- Put search terms into Google images
2. Play music
Play it loud, play it soft, vary the styles….dance, rnb, rocknroll, easy listening, swing, classical, rock, indie ….you get the drift.
3. Hit the streets and photograph interesting architecture, there are many shapes and patterns to be found in architecture.
Even better visit a National Trust property and get snapping away at the wallpaper, tapestries, paintings, and carvings to be found within. I did that recently but lost the blinkin image files! Grrr…
Likewise you can visit your local museum.
4. Look to the past:
- Visit retro shopping websites.
- Google for retro advertisement images (and visit this great Flickr page)
- Ask your Gran if you can riffle through her old jewellery/clothes of yesteryear 
4. Review Other Designers:
Have a look at what other designers are doing, good links to visit for this include;
Urban Collective
40+ Great Design Books
24 Great Design Portfolios
What to do with it all?:
Finally all that you collect from your various inspirational sources - shove them all together on your creative project Mood Board.
Good luck!
December 1st, 2008 at 11:23 pm
I’ve recently started an A3 scrapbook full of different things I find interesting, because I tend to save any nice design work its the perfect place to keep it all. I like the illustratation at the top of your post, did you do it?
December 2nd, 2008 at 11:01 am
I’ve thought about keeping a paper scrapbook, but then I just decided to instead photograph everything I like, even stuff that I see in paper format and then this blog is my scrapbook to be honest!
I did the illustration at the top of the page yes - watch this space because actually today I’m just in the process writing another blog with more images about that particular project.
December 2nd, 2008 at 1:47 pm
Great set of inspirational tips…
I always find music inspires me
December 2nd, 2008 at 8:24 pm
I find music just as exciting as design, I’m always looking for fresh new music to listen to.
April 24th, 2009 at 10:52 am
These are some really good inspirational tips. When designing I like to listen to music as it helps me concentrate and I also check out what other designers are doing at the moment to help get inspiration.
April 24th, 2009 at 11:46 am
Thanks, glad you found it useful
Are you a graphic designer or web designer?
May 5th, 2009 at 1:42 pm
I find inspiration hard at times, and then when I have an idea I like, I sometimes find it hard to get it onto paper. So I agree when Edison says 99% perspiration…lol
May 6th, 2009 at 12:16 pm
Yup Edison was right about that!
When people say to me “Oh I love your illustrations, is there a tutorial or book you can point me to so I can learn to illustrate better.”
I always have to explain that these things won’t really help that much, you essentially need to just sit down and put in the required (apparently) 10,000 hours of practice required to become ‘good’ at something.
Amanda