monday studio tip of the week

one of robert genn's recent posts was concerning the color blue and how it contributes to creativity. the following is an excerpt from the original post:

'Blue is the colour to choose when creativity is a priority," says Dr. Juliet Zhu, an assistant professor of marketing who led the study. About 600 undergraduate students took part. While red might boost the brain's attention to detail, blue is simply loaded with other benefits. On memory tasks, for example, those presented with a red background on their computer screens were able to accurately recall a list of items. Those using a blue background made many more mistakes. "People are less literal and more exploratory with blue," says Zhu.

One test in the Zhu study had pages of 20 potential toy parts illustrated in either red or blue. She asked participants to choose five parts to design a creative toy. A panel of judges found that those using red parts produced designs that were less creative. Those using blue parts came up with the more creative toys. The researchers felt the results were based on learned associations. Red, for example, is associated with ambulances, stop signs, emergencies and blood. With red you are more inclined to be vigilant and careful.

Blue makes folks think of expansive skies and open oceans--perhaps of endless possibilities--which may explain the link to creative, unencumbered thinking. Funnily, the people tested thought blue would help them with both creativity and attention to detail (66 per cent and 74 per cent respectively).'

so this week's studio tip is to try using blue in your work and see what happens as far as creativity. i've started doing this and i'll post the results by the end of the week! click here for robert genn's complete post about the color blue.