I was speaking to the esteemed Creative Director of an esteemed agency yesterday (hello, Paul!) and we got talking about vanity projects - all those little creative sidelines that people have that inspire and inform their work. Whether it's a blog, or a band, or making t-shirts or anything, it's important to keep all that going, even though it's often hard to maintain the energy required to do them justice.
When I look back over the hard-drive of my PC, it's terrifying to see the number of half-baked, unfinished projects I've undertaken. Look:
This is the profile picture I made for a blog I was gonna write - a satire of a fundamentalist, jihad-preaching Imam. Somewhere, there'll be a Word document with the name I made-up for him on it as well as some sketches for posts. And that's just one idea out of 100's on the computer, not to mention the drawers full of notebooks and screwed-up bits of paper. You know how some women have cupboards full of shoes they'll probably never wear? Well, I have notebooks full of ideas I'll probably never use. Shocking.*
And on that note, I'll leave you with the most famous vanity project of all: the 1983 Bullseye Christmas tape.
(sorry can't embed this so you'll have to use the link)
http://uk.youtube.com/watch?v=Lg_x6aIQ9uQ
*Hasn't this post gone all wanky and "plannery"? I'll make sure there's more swearing in the next post, and stop sounding like a fucking adult-learning lecturer or something.
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