What is a creative?

Business owners and entrepreneurs outside of the commercial arts industry often struggle to understand just what a “creative” is. These days, the term has come to refer to professionals with skill sets inside or related to visual communications, professionals that work to provide communication and design solutions for myriad applications. From designers, to coders, to illustrators, creatives are a major driving force behind the continually changing landscape of media and their consumption platforms. Closely tied to what we think of as traditional visual arts like design and illustration, coders and copywriters often belong on the same teams as those who make the things we look at.

“...the term is a kind of verbal panacea against the attempt to describe the peculiar skill sets many communication arts professionals find themselves with.”

And it isn’t a perfect term. Using the word sort of sounds like it implies that other professions outside of communication arts don’t require creative thinking which (we’re looking at you, science) is simply not true. Yes, the term is a kind of verbal panacea against the attempt to describe the peculiar skill sets many communication arts professionals find themselves with. “Creative” can be used to describe someone who can code…and design…oh, and craft great user experience for the web. It is used to describe someone who can write, shoot, and edit a promotional video…and animate the intro credits in addition to writing the copy used to promote the piece. Or, this could be a person who paints vibrant murals during the day, and designs seductive food packaging at night. At its most basic, it’s a way for someone to communicate that they have skills relevant to today’s media and communications landscape. You just have to dig a little deeper to find out what those specific skills are.