Don鈥檛 Forget the Fun: ANZ Creative Experts on the Necessity of Play
Remember when you were growing up, and someone would ask, 鈥渉ey, do you wanna play with me鈥? Without a second thought, you respond with the most enthusiastic yes.
Then all of a sudden, the floor is lava, there is a dragon that needs slaying, you鈥檝e put on your best adventure clothes (aka whatever the costume box had at hand), your stick is magic, you can fly, and your friends are crusaders in an epic backyard quest.
But as we get older, we lose the ability to be comfortable with silliness. It鈥檚 become a dirty word. 鈥楧on鈥檛 be silly,鈥 we鈥檙e told as our homework piles turn into spreadsheets and calendars filled with meetings instead of park visits.
For those of us who are lucky, the long forgotten days of creativity become our jobs. To be a creative, there needs to be an importance placed on play. Without it, there is no room for creativity. Play is how we explore new ideas, how we solve problems and, perhaps most importantly, it鈥檚 incredibly fun.
天美棋牌鈥檚 Casey Martin spoke with creatives from production to creative agencies and everyone in between on the necessity of play within the industry.
Chris Clark - director, Film Construction
I鈥檝e always been envious of the one word that musicians have at the core of their craft: play. The word itself is used for any interaction they have with an instrument, and for the work they do together. They鈥檙e in a perpetual state of 鈥減lay鈥. Doesn鈥檛 that sound amazing? While the phrase 鈥淚鈥檓 going to play a camera鈥, or 鈥減lay an actor鈥 doesn鈥檛 quite work, I find the role of playfulness paramount in my working life.
Didn鈥檛 Picasso suggest the essence of existence lies in rediscovering the playfulness of childhood?
Sounds about right to me. Having begun my directorial journey as a young child as a form of amusement and exploration, I鈥檝e worked hard to preserve that element of joy and experimentation even inside the commercial space. It seems essential to me.
Our ability to innovate hinges on the freshness of our imagination, and the ability to work in this changing landscape depends on agile methods. Nothing keeps these vital traits as alive as a spirit of playfulness.
I don鈥檛 really have a recipe for this professional playfulness, but from where I stand, maintaining a sense of joy, creativity, and laughter in all things seems to be a great measure of success in life - which includes directing commercials.
Abby Dorrian - head of new business, Smith & Western
Play isn鈥檛 just for fun. It鈥檚 an essential part of human nature. The right to play was adopted by the United Nations as a fundamental birth right in 1989. More recently, a network of global organisations and play experts (like Lego, Nike, Mattel and Save the children) have called upon the UN to action the first #InternationalDayofPlay on 11th June, 2024 indicating that play is serious business.
At Smith & Western, we not only play, we invite our clients to come play. It helps free us from fear, unlock potential and create possibilities while maintaining our well being. Play for us, is the freedom to be, to make weird noises, not take ourselves too seriously, eat together, take turns, share every idea, ask 'what if', find the funny, cheer loudly, avoid the chaos and pack away after. If it鈥檚 not fun, it鈥檚 not working. Play is recreation. Recreation is our business.
Taneia Ke - digital designer, Wellcom
I think it鈥檚 important to be open to new things 鈥 that鈥檚 how I keep the fun alive. I鈥檓 always seeking inspiration from different places, exploring trends around me, collaging with magazines and connecting with creatives at design meetups.
Playing comes naturally when I鈥檓 searching for a creative solution to a brief. To problem solve as a designer requires collaboration on new ideas, testing different tutorials and allowing yourself the freedom to experiment and fail.
Remembering to play is vital within the creative industry because we鈥檙e not just making a beautiful campaign; We鈥檙e laughing, failing, stressing, problem solving and working together to produce an end result. It鈥檚 the emotional journey and process that I enjoy the most when we're making memorable work.
Tom Campbell - director, Good Oil
As a director, I've always found that keeping the fun alive on set is essential. I view my role as inherently playful; whether working with actors or non-actors, adults or children, it's all about games, play, and finding the joy in make-believe. But I actually make sure I play these games with them, showing them that if I can put myself out there and make a fool of myself then they can feel safe to be vulnerable and open too.
So maintaining a sense of play isn't just about having fun; it's also about unlocking creativity. I surround myself with people who excel beyond my own abilities and I like to give them plenty of room to bring themselves to the project. I find that when people feel liberated to play, explore, experiment, and take risks, they produce their most authentic and compelling work.
Personally, I've recently discovered that the key to keeping the fun alive for myself is by embracing risks on each new project. I鈥檝e been making a conscious effort to constantly challenge myself and encourage the crew to push me to explore new things and step out of my comfort zone. I鈥檝e found that the fun lies in both the risk itself and the eventual reward.
Dalton Henshaw - founder, Bullfrog
One of my favourite lines about the work we do as a creative business comes from our Strategy Partner, Mike Doman, which is 鈥淲e get paid to essentially, colour in, write words and use our wildest imaginations to solve problems, and if I knew that was a job when I was a kid at school when I was having fun every day, jeez who wouldn鈥檛 want to start there as a career鈥.
I love that reminder and often use it, because this industry should be fun and while there is a very serious side to the work we do, because at the end of the day creativity at the right time, right moment can shape the world and that requires incredibly smart different people from all walks of life to deliver it. Often, 鈥榝un鈥 is not the highest priority and I think that is due to environments that businesses in any industry can fall into creating due to so many pressures. I think the biggest opportunity for any business having fun through the good times and the bad is an environment that prioritises psychological safety. A place where it is okay to get things wrong, speak your mind, be honest and be authentically the person you are and not have to conform to your workplace culture.
And while, I say the above, it takes work every day, not just at team parties, it鈥檚 the smallest moments and nobody can ever always get it perfect, we certainly don鈥檛 but I am lucky, because at the core of Bullfrog, is a bunch of individuals wanting the best for each other in life and that includes our partners too. It鈥檚 pretty cool to watch.
Tom Bradbeer - senior copywriter, We Are Social
Have you ever been to a party where the host is desperately trying to make people have fun? It鈥檚 awkward, weird and decidedly not fun. People are hardwired to have fun, they don鈥檛 need to be forced. The same goes for our industry. If you give people the space and freedom to have fun, 99% of the time they will. That other 1% were probably told to 鈥榡ust have fun with it鈥.
For me personally, that freedom and space to have fun exists between receiving the brief and the first review. It鈥檚 in these moments that anything is possible. You can let your imagination run wild, forget budgets, and production realities. Because the way I see it, it鈥檚 better to be told you鈥檙e having too much fun than not enough. Ideas can always be pulled back. It鈥檚 almost impossible to force fun into them.
When advertising is at its best it should be indistinguishable from entertainment. And since moving into a socially focused agency, that fact has never been more apparent to me. Fun is infectious. If we can have fun making our work, it finds its way into those tiny slices of our audiences鈥 time that we fight so hard for.
Georgia Shillington - design director, Paper Moose
As a typical perfectionist designer, bringing play into my work is sometimes harder than it sounds. When you鈥檝e got a tight brief and an even tighter deadline breathing down your neck you just need to get to the solution as quickly as possible. But sometimes this is counter intuitive and can lead to generic looking work. This is why it鈥檚 so important to remember to let go every so often and just let the pixels fall where they may, because 9 times out of 10, a beautiful, happy accident will occur. Any designer reading this is familiar with the joy of the Happy Accident, when you鈥檙e completely tearing your hair out when you can鈥檛 crack a layout, or the client feedback just has you stumped. When this happens I like to just go off to the side of my artboard and try a new tool I鈥檝e just learned, or play with some colour or type that鈥檚 completely left of field. Then all of a sudden you鈥檝e accidentally layered some shapes over one another and sparked the idea of a solution. When efficiency is drilled into us from day one of our careers, every instinct tells us to find the quickest road from brief to finished art, but sometimes a little detour to silly-town can become a short cut to the finish line.
Marcus Byrne - head of art, Thinkerbell
Einstein once said 鈥淥nce you stop learning, you start dying鈥
When you look at how kids see the world, in early childhood, curiosity drives them to explore, to ask questions, learn and play. However, the traditional education system often beats it out of us, leading many to conform rather than explore. Play is the foundation of learning. By embracing play in our adult lives, we can get back that sense of wonder. I have had many roles within the creative industry, from art direction and design to being a Photoshop educator, 3D, Photography, Motion and now AI. Curiosity is what led me to Australia from Ireland via South America, with extended trips in Asia, India and I鈥檝e been lucky to live in NZ, USA and The Netherlands. Seeing the world through a lens of curiosity is what keeps the fun alive.
In the industry, innovation and creativity are currency, staying ahead of the curve keeps it fresh. Thinkerbell encourages personal development, they have a few initiatives, Pot of Gold, 5K to help bring ideas to life and Mind Expansion, a paid week off to explore and challenge yourself.
Being open-minded and adaptable in the face of new information is important. Get comfortable being uncomfortable. Embrace intellectual curiosity and be willing to challenge preconceived notions. Let鈥檚 face it, everyone is so serious these days. Not enough playtime. Whether it's through exploring different countries and cultures, delving into the intersection of technology and art to learn, or immersing ourselves in playing music, play is vital to evolve and grow.
Jon Austin, co-founder, Supermassive
鈥楩un鈥 is a tricky word. Agencies that say they鈥檙e fun are like agencies that say they鈥檙e cool.
In my experience, 9 times out of 10, they鈥檙e neither, and 鈥榝un鈥 is a thirty minute bong hit of 鈥榗ulture鈥 to numb the crushing tedium of the other nine and half hours.
Fun tends to be something that fits into the tiny spaces between the 鈥榬eal work鈥.
It happens on every third Friday afternoon unless you have meetings, in which case, work comes first, obviously.
It鈥檚 putting a card behind the bar for an hour, but let鈥檚 be sensible please.
It鈥檚 the ping pong table stuffed into the corner that you feel too guilty to ever use.
As a word, 鈥榝un鈥, at best, makes what we do feel shallow and lightweight, and at worst, has been weaponised against us.
As such, there鈥檚 this divide between the idea of 鈥榟aving fun鈥 and 鈥榙elivering excellence鈥.
We鈥檝e been led to believe that the former can鈥檛 lead to the latter, and the latter gets rewarded with a taste of the former. And that鈥檚 a problem.
Because the two should be one and the same.
At Supermassive, we鈥檝e set out to be excellent. In pursuit of this, we prioritise values like energy, curiosity, playfulness and optimism in everything we do and in the clients we choose to work with. Because people who feel curious and energetic and optimistic will be inspired to push further, aim higher, and strive for excellence. And fun is a natural by-product of that.
Fun shouldn鈥檛 be a forced input into doing work you hate. It should be a natural output of doing work you love.
Simon Lee - CCO and joint owner, The Hallway
The act of playing, and the sense of having fun that comes with it, are not just nice-to-haves or happy accidental bi-products of working in the creative industry; they鈥檙e an essential part of the process itself. When you鈥檙e playing, your brain鈥檚 prefrontal cortex is firing, and fresh sparks of new ideas are flowing. When, instead, your consciousness is filled with the pressure of not screwing up - i.e. when you鈥檙e definitely not having fun - generating those sparks of magic can be like getting blood from a stone.
This poses a unique challenge for creative business leaders who are all too aware of the intense commercial pressures we face, but know that a sense of carefree abandon is essential to our success.
So how to respond to this tricky predicament? In a nutshell: acknowledge the pressure and consciously choose play - at an individual and organisational level. At The Hallway, we鈥檝e embedded 鈥淔earless Play鈥 as one of our three core values, and are on an ongoing mission to create and nurture a culture that enables this value to be lived by everyone in the agency each and every day. Key to this culture is ensuring that everyone in the team feels psychologically safe in their working interactions - it鈥檚 not rocket science: you can't play if you鈥檙e not feeling safe! It鈥檚 a work in progress, and probably always will be, but since embarking on our Fearless Play journey, our pitch win rate has gone up a gear, our work is better than ever and our awards cabinet markedly fuller. Most importantly though, the pressure鈥檚 still there, but coming to work every day is a whole lot more enjoyable.
Nick Hunter - CEO, Paper Moose
We are saving the world one ad at a time by making art and entertainment, what isn't fun about that? Haha, ok, now not every campaign has the opportunity to be outrageously funny or has the budget to be crafted to an inch of its life and is realistically rarely saving the world, so in those times, I find one thing that I can love, an animator once said to me that he always had to find just one thing that he could pour his love and attention into in each project, whether that be the way a shape moves or a nuance of the way a characters walks etc. That has always resonated with me, so I always make sure I find one thing that I can perfect and love in every project no matter the subject matter and as long as I can achieve that, I can feel creatively satisfied.
I also think of a quote from Dune 鈥渇ear is the mind-killer鈥 I think in our space it is also the creative killer, you need to have a safe space where play is ok, I think if we as creatives are having fun then that is often evident in the final work.
As a senior creative I also think it's important to be able to stay on the tools as much as you can, I like to jump in and direct certain pieces of work or personal projects, as storytellers it helps us remain connected and keeps us sharp.
