notes from the other side of a creative rut
a creative projects report & thoughts on creating
i’ve been going through a creative block lately. one of my goals i set for 2025 was to post a weekly youtube video to go after my dream of becoming a youtuber; i’ve been craving a stronger sense of community that platforms like tiktok and instagram aren’t always built for. so despite my natural affinity for short-form content, i wanted to challenge myself in creating more long-form content. i had been successful in my quest to do so, posting a video (sometimes even two!) once a week—until mid-march.
it was as if my internal well of ideas had dried up. no matter how much i wanted to create and share a video, nothing felt promising enough to follow through to execution. the spark of inspiration would strike me occasionally, only to leave me halfway through the project. and so, like a pile of discarded hobbies in the corner of my room, these half-finished vlogs haunted me, filling me with guilt, frustration, and reminders of my inconsistency.
the truth was, i had nothing to say. as i’ve created more and more videos, i’ve honed in on my taste and style and realized that i need a story to tell in order to feel fulfilled in creating it, something that will push me through the slump when it gets boring because i can see the ending. but none of my ideas felt enough to justify the energy required to video edit a long-form vlog. so, i let myself take a step back. i couldn’t eat the elephant all at once. instead, i allowed myself to follow wherever my creative spark would take me.
i did end up making a vlog this past weekend so i thought i’d share this post as a container of some of the projects i’ve worked on during these past couple of weeks. i included what inspired me to make them and how i did it because i know i’ll love to look back at my creative process one day :,) everything i make is done with a lot of thought, intention, and love, so i hope you enjoy:
march monthly recap, designed in the style of Apple’s desktop UI
i made my march monthly dump on canva & im soooo proud of how it turned out 🥹!! i wanted it to reflect how i’ve been feeling lately but, with the creative rut i’ve been in & all of the pictures/videos i never got around to sharing it’s been hard to figure out how i wanted to best encapsulate everything :/
but then this idea of making it look like how my brain feels (open tabs, open files, open windows with everything scattered everywhere) came to me & it just felt like the perfect way to convey my month :,) there’s so much i want to share that would be overwhelming as a single carousel + a lot of what i create is digital, so i thought it’d be fun to design it like how my desktop looks like :o
i grabbed the apple design resources from figma so that i could have accurate design assets but other than that, this has been a creation of my own! it helped me to make sure i got the fonts & icons right but i still added some of my own personal touches hehehe i loved that i got to include so much of my month in a way that felt cohesive & in the theme: my thoughts with the notes app, the pictures & videos i’ve been wanting to share, etc
it took a lot of time & effort to make this but honestly…i enjoyed every second of it :,) i felt so in the flow of my creative process bc i got to see my vision slowly come to life, even if it meant having to play around until it looked just right.
as i mentioned, there’s intention with every detail so i highlighted some from the first page:
pictures i (or my friend erin) took on my new digital camera!
i liked how warm and vibrant the pictures turned out, as my other digital camera tends to make pictures a bit cooler! plus, i loved the flash look that a digital camera has. i used the vivid setting and put it on program AE
it’s super interesting how me and erin both took pictures of each other in the same location using the same camera, but our pictures don’t come out the same. yes, the tool can matter as some cameras are equipped for specific situations better than others, but it’s simply an extension of the vision that we already have.
vlog in which i tried my new digital camera for the first time
i love making these little intros because it’s kinda like a dead wife montage lol. intros are super important for youtube as watch time is a metric that youtube uses to track performance and push it out more.
i am super proud of how i decided to format my video!! i was testing out my new digital camera, the kodak pixpro fz55 but the footage i had gotten at the flower fields wasn’t necessarily storytelling..i had mainly recorded because i wanted to be able to screenshot later on plus i was trying to show the pictures i had taken. but a video isn’t the most conducive for that…….
but then i got hit with an idea to overlay the pictures with the moments that i had taken them !! it helped it become a lot less easier to excuse the lack of straightforward storytelling & made sense for the overall story of the video while also allowing me to share the photos i had taken.
i still had a bit more footage that didn’t necessarily correspond to a photo taken from the camera, so i used it as b-roll for my voiceover, which also helped me to add on extra time length for the video!
i’ve been getting back into the groove of video editing long-form vlog content again after a month-long creative rut. it might not be my magnum opus or anything, but i’m glad i finished something that would help me break that streak. that, hopefully, i can use this momentum to get that consistency up & running again. & ahh i’m so happy to share
pictures of things i noticed over the weekend
while the tools don’t matter as much as the story, i’d be lying if i said that my fujifilm xm5 hasn’t fundamentally changed me and how i view the world. i’d like to think i’ve always had an eye for aesthetics, but since getting my fujifilm back in november, i’ve completely leveled up. the camera’s rich color science has helped me to more accurately capture the essence of a moment in the way that i felt it. this has helped me become more grounded in the present moment as i’m always on the lookout for anything beautiful that may catch my eye.
i think what frustrates me a lot is that i think a lot about art, creation, etc., but it’s that overthinking that pushes me into inaction. i’m trying to be more intentional about what i want to share (especially after posting nearly every day for two years straight when i had first started my tiktok) but i don’t want that to paralyze me. so, here are some of the questions and thought processes that have been going through my mind:
i’m trying to find the balance in my posting cadence: do i value consistency or only putting out work that i’m proud of?
what’s my optimal content ecosystem that can allow me to compartmentalize these different parts of me? but in compartmentalizing myself, am i hiding away parts that could resonate with others, things that they want to hear from me?
do my videos have to be “good?” does my life have to be “interesting?”
i want to remember my “boring” days too because after all, there is beauty in the mundane. my life consists more of those than of “bigger” events, ones that are seemingly more “worthy” of being posted about. so how do i justify the amount of energy it takes to record and edit a video in order to embody the belief that there is beauty in the mundane?
do i need to be a girlboss?
do i have to constantly ensure i have consistent branding in order to get clients? what if im happy with where i am? i guess im just worried about accidentally kneecapping myself, about cutting myself off from potential opportunities because im too lazy to do the work
is there anything im missing slightly that would help me continue to attract opportunities? or maybe this is how im carving my own path. i’m not seeing anybody like me because it doesn’t exist yet
i think the thing that frustrates me is knowing that i *can* do something, that there are people out there who are less talented than me getting more opportunities, but in just not. and why is that? what’s missing?
i think im stepping more and more into my artistry and identity as a creative, which it’s why it’s been so challenging lately.
i’ve begun to figure out my tastes more and my filters are stronger. it’s a slow period not because i’m not knowledgeable or not qualified but because i’m intentional about ensuring i’m on the right direction, that i’m walking a path that feel true to me. this is something i need to learn through the experience of creating projects and reflection on them lately.
i just am scared to fall into a trap of doing so in a way that is overly critical. that, yes im putting out my work and i’m extremely proud of it, but i want to make sure it’s not just the highlights. that i’m not stunting my growth that comes with starting and finishing consistently, simply because i’m being pretentious. i treat my craft with care, but at what point is it hindering me?
why i’m having difficulty figuring out my “content ecosystem”
i want to have so many different pieces of content / i know the types of things people come to me for or that im knowledgeable about. but does it feel cohesive? not really. it’d be so cool to be one of those girls who could just post their beautiful life and get thousands of likes and hundreds of comments, professing their adoration for her beauty. but does that really fulfill me?
i’ve come to realize that those things are nice but maybe, i’d feel empty after a while. that those comments wouldn’t fuel me in a way i hope they would. and i think it’s because i know me and that, yes i love to be viewed as beautiful (who doesn’t?) but it’s not the most exciting thing about me—not even close.
what i’m envious of isn’t their beauty: it’s their access to opportunities as a result of the platform they’ve built. despite their effortlessness (or at least from what it seems), they’re able to receive PR, paid brand deals, brand trips, etc., that i can only dream of. i’d have to do far more work for the chance to even be noticed by those sought-after brands and it’s hard not to feel prickles of envy.
[and just to be clear, this is not against those who fall into that category of course. i understand that beauty is a skill that can be learned and practiced.]
but i do have to ask myself this: do i want those opportunities they’re being afforded? they’re sent those things because it’s in alignment with what their content revolves around already. and so, as much as i believe that “i am the niche” and i shouldn’t have to separate out different parts of myself in order to be palatable for a specific group, i have started thinking about this: do i need to create a separate account for my different interests? or should i just parse out different things for different platforms?
and yup that was a peek inside my brain and all of the thinking that goes into what i create and share. if you wanna see more of it in real time, here’s where you can find me
let me know if you like these & what you wanna see next! talk to you soon byeeee
INSTAGRAM: @imherculeankate
YOUTUBE: @herculeankate
love,
kate 🩷
so much creativity here.. omg i love the apple desktop monthly recap!! This is inspiring!