A drawing system with an interface that can be used to impose limits and unleash creativity

Abstract: In order to enjoy creativity, the creators need to be given environmental restrictions. For example, there are rules such as Japanese Haiku or Chinese Zeku for poetry, or musical grammar for music, and these rules are supposed to enhance the creativity of the creator. However, most existing drawing software focuses only on making the process of completing a work comfortable, and does not provide much support for the goal setting process that requires environmental restrictions. In this study, based on research on creativity, such as the idea method, we were able to show that developing a drawing system that imposes environmental restrictions, such as the appearance of obstacles on the canvas, causes changes in the creativity of the subjects. In conventional drawing software, it is common to start the creative process with a blank canvas so that the painter can paint freely. However, in our experiments, many of the participants said that they were able to come up with more ideas and enjoy painting more when obstacles appeared on the canvas. By creating obstacles, we succeeded in approaching the characteristics of human visual cognition and structuring the creative process. Digital creative activities give us more control than analog creative activities. This advantage can be used to make the first step of the creative process, the idea generation process, more convenient. In analog creation, you could not choose irreversible methods such as creating obstacles on the canvas. The drawing software of the future will emphasize the process of externalizing human images and make the creative process more enjoyable, without the need to stick to a blank canvas.

Keywords: Interfaces, Graphic Software, Creativity, Constraints

DOI: 10.54941/ahfe1001503

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