The four key features that characterize Flow, or what 10000 hours of practice gets you

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The first is an intense and focused absorption that makes you lose all sense of time. The second is what is known as autotelicity, the sense that the activity you are engaged in is rewarding for its own sake. The third is finding the "sweet spot", a feeling that your skills are perfectly matched to the task at hand, leaving you neither frustrated nor bored. And finally, flow is characterised by automaticity, the sense that "the piano is playing itself", for example.
via Zap your brain into the zone: Fast track to pure focus by Sally Adee, newscientist.com

 

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Antonio Ortiz

Antonio Ortiz has always been an autodidact with an eclectic array of interests. Fascinated with technology, advertising and culture he has forged a career that combines them all. In 1991 Antonio developed one of the very first websites to market the arts. It was text based, only available to computer scientists, and increased attendance to the Rutgers Arts Center where he had truly begun his professional career. Since then Antonio has been an early adopter and innovator merging technology and marketing with his passion for art, culture and entertainment. For a more in-depth look at those passions, visit SmarterCreativity.com.

PBS Arts: Off Book, Exploring Cutting Edge Art - The Complete Series

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PBS Arts: Off Book is a web-based series that explores cutting edge art and the people that make it. The 13 episode series focuses on the process, motivation and meaning of a new generation of artists. For the pass several months we've been following the series. Here are the 13 episodes compiled in one location. Visit the links to the individual posts to find out more about each episode.

 

Episode 1: Light Painting

Subscribe to the new Off Book channel at http://www.youtube.com/pbsoffbook Light painting dates back to Man Ray, but contemporary photographers are taking the practice of "painting light" onto long-exposure photographs to a new level.

Subscribe to the new Off Book channel at http://www.youtube.com/pbsoffbook Type is everywhere. Every print publication, website, movie, advertisement and public message involves the creation or selection of a fitting typeface. Online, a rich and artistic typographical culture exists, where typefaces are created and graphic design seeps in to every image.

Subscribe to the new Off Book channel at http://www.youtube.com/pbsoffbook For decades now, people have joined together online to communicate and collaborate around interesting imagery. In recent years, the pace and intensity of this activity has reached a fever pitch.

Subscribe to the new Off Book channel at http://www.youtube.com/pbsoffbook Steampunk art evokes an alternate reality where steam is the primary source of power. Technology, though highly advanced, has taken on a very different look and feel, and fashion is heavily influenced by Victorian styles. In this episode, we explore the Steampunk aesthetic and art movement.

Subscribe to the new Off Book channel at http://www.youtube.com/pbsoffbook As we become more and more engaged with the internet in every aspect of our lives, powerful questions have arisen regarding the ownership of digital media and information, the relationship between corporations, governments, and individuals online, the power of pop culture influence, and the dissolving border between the digital and physical worlds.

Subscribe to the new Off Book channel at http://www.youtube.com/pbsoffbook The street is a space where art thrives, and a place where artists can shape the public aesthetic. Olek, a sculptor whose medium is crochet, and Swoon, a mixed media artist, disrupt daily life with work that creates wonder, emotion, and humor.

Subscribe to the new Off Book channel at http://www.youtube.com/pbsoffbook America has a long tradition of handmade arts and crafts. In the manufacturing age, however, much of this work was overshadowed by the homogenizing force of retail culture. But the passion for handmade arts didn't disappear, and persisted through the years in local craft fairs.

Subscribe to the new Off Book channel at http://www.youtube.com/pbsoffbook Video games are important. They are a storytelling medium, a place for self-expression, a sandbox for the human imagination, and an extension of an ages old tradition of gaming.

Subscribe to the new Off Book channel at http://www.youtube.com/pbsoffbook Although not every artist is as attentive to fashion as Kanye West, style does make its way into their lives. Sometimes driven by practical purpose, other times by personal expression or as part of performance, fashion plays a role in the aesthetic landscape of many artists.

Subscribe to the new Off Book channel at http://www.youtube.com/pbsoffbook An intriguing combination of programmers, artists, and philosophers, these creators embrace a process that delegates essential decisions to computers, data sets, or even random variables.

Subscribe to the new Off Book channel at http://www.youtube.com/pbsoffbook We swim in an ocean of products. Behind each one, there is someone (hopefully) thinking about the way we experience it. In this episode of Off Book, we explore three aspects of product design: build quality and engineering fundamentals, humanism and sustainability, and speculation on the future of the product experience.

Subscribe to the new Off Book channel at http://www.youtube.com/pbsoffbook Books are in a conflicted state. Should they still exist in a digital era? Will they all be replaced by Kindles and Nooks? These questions dominate the discussion of books in our time.

Subscribe to the new Off Book channel at http://www.youtube.com/pbsoffbook As the 90s came to a close, the business of music began to change profoundly. New technology allowed artists to record and produce their own music and music videos, and the internet became a free-for-all distribution platform for musicians to promote themselves to audiences across the world.

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Antonio Ortiz

Antonio Ortiz has always been an autodidact with an eclectic array of interests. Fascinated with technology, advertising and culture he has forged a career that combines them all. In 1991 Antonio developed one of the very first websites to market the arts. It was text based, only available to computer scientists, and increased attendance to the Rutgers Arts Center where he had truly begun his professional career. Since then Antonio has been an early adopter and innovator merging technology and marketing with his passion for art, culture and entertainment. For a more in-depth look at those passions, visit SmarterCreativity.com.

Scared Spitless in Zanesville: Esquire Creates Video Teaser For Animals An Article By Chris Jones

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I am sure this is the first time I've seen a video preview for an article in a publication. Read the whole story here. 

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Antonio Ortiz

Antonio Ortiz has always been an autodidact with an eclectic array of interests. Fascinated with technology, advertising and culture he has forged a career that combines them all. In 1991 Antonio developed one of the very first websites to market the arts. It was text based, only available to computer scientists, and increased attendance to the Rutgers Arts Center where he had truly begun his professional career. Since then Antonio has been an early adopter and innovator merging technology and marketing with his passion for art, culture and entertainment. For a more in-depth look at those passions, visit SmarterCreativity.com.

Creativity Top 5: Super Bowl XLVI Edition

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via creativity-online.com

Having the majority of the ads pre-released stole the element of surprise, the element of discovery. There were very few conversation stopping ads. It used to be that a good Super Bowl ad created a moment in pop culture. Now the ads merely remix and mashup the language of current pop culture as a shortcut to relevancy. 

 

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Antonio Ortiz

Antonio Ortiz has always been an autodidact with an eclectic array of interests. Fascinated with technology, advertising and culture he has forged a career that combines them all. In 1991 Antonio developed one of the very first websites to market the arts. It was text based, only available to computer scientists, and increased attendance to the Rutgers Arts Center where he had truly begun his professional career. Since then Antonio has been an early adopter and innovator merging technology and marketing with his passion for art, culture and entertainment. For a more in-depth look at those passions, visit SmarterCreativity.com.

Henry Miller's Productivity Commandments

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via kungfugrippe.com

Discovered via Merlin Mann of 43 Folders, productivity fame. Here they are in plain text so you can copy and paste and place somewhere for constant reminding:

1. Work on one thing at a time until finished.
2. Start no more new books, add no more new material to "Black Spring."
3. Don't be nervous. Work calmly, joyously, recklessly on whatever is in hand.
4. Work according to Program and not according to mood.
5. When you can't create you can work.
6. Cement a little every day, rather than add new fertilizers.
7. Keep human! See people, go places, drink if you feel like it.
8. Don't be a draught-horse! Work with pleasure only.
9. Discard the Program when you feel like it - but go back to it the next day. Concentrate. Narrow down. Exclude. 
10. Forget the books you want to write. Think only of the book you are writing.
11. Write first and always. Painting, music, friends, cinema, all these come afterwards.

The commandments apply to more than just writing. 

For more by Mann check out his podcast Back to Work, and two classic posts on his blog, Better and Cranking.

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Antonio Ortiz

Antonio Ortiz has always been an autodidact with an eclectic array of interests. Fascinated with technology, advertising and culture he has forged a career that combines them all. In 1991 Antonio developed one of the very first websites to market the arts. It was text based, only available to computer scientists, and increased attendance to the Rutgers Arts Center where he had truly begun his professional career. Since then Antonio has been an early adopter and innovator merging technology and marketing with his passion for art, culture and entertainment. For a more in-depth look at those passions, visit SmarterCreativity.com.