This year has been a wild ride so far, but a great one — probably my best year ever! One of the primary highlights of that wild ride, would have to be my experience presenting and participating in the Creative Freedom Summit (2024), hosted by the Fedora Design Team.
The Humanality Project
Slides (PDF): The Humanality Project Slides
I was fortunate to deliver two talks in two sessions, the first of which was an interactive session, demonstrating my design language The Humanality Project.
The Humanality Project is a simple design language that utilizes simple primitives (circles) to create more complex designs, ranging from human faces, to cats and dogs, to bicycles! From the inception of the project, I've got a surprising amount of positive feedback, even from some people in the world of design who inspire me most! That's always been quite encouraging and validating. Even more so, presenting my work at the Creative Freedom Summit, and seeing in real time the response of fellow creators across different fields, brought a great sense of community and told me I've got something others were looking for.
What's more, I've been invited to make my work available to designers around the world through one of my favourite open source creative tools: Inkscape!
Note: The session I demonstrated at the Creative Freedom Summit (CFS), was merely a summarized version of a longer project that I started on my Twitch and YouTube channels. You can get caught up on more of the Humanality Project by watching the past videos on my YouTube (see below), or subscribe and enable notifications, so you'll know when I release new content.
Creative Freedom: Luxury Or Lifeline?
Slides (PDF): Creative Freedom: Luxury Or Lifeline Slides
Can I just say I'm proud of this talk? I spoke from real-life experience, through a journey that started with MS-DOS and the early days of Windows and MS Paint, all the way to today, where a full Linux installation, packed with F/OSS goodness is my daily driver.
For me, the highlight of this talk was the opportunity to tackle and dispel many of the popular myths and misconceptions surrounding the “why” behind people using open source software, especially in creative fields. I showed the hidden costs of proprietary software, from lost work (due to non-standard formats), to lack of access, to transient support, when services are shuttered or developers move on. Furthermore, I dove into the hidden benefits of an open software ecosystem, from sustainability, to ease of access, to making it easier for critical technologies to survive over time.
In short, I made it clear: creative freedom, contrary to popular belief, is a lifeline.
Frankly, I almost wish I'd asked for more time in this session, because I could've gone on and on! That said, I had a great time presenting this talk, and I'm confident that it will continue to have an impact, and encourage others to embrace the open source model.
Note: I'm open to expanding on this talk at other events. Want to get in touch? Feel free to reach out!
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Conclusion
I enjoyed learning from other creators, participating in exciting discussions, and working together with other creators to make plans for next year. Once the edited versions of my talks are made available, I'll be sure to post them to this blog for anyone looking to get caught up. For now, you can check out the Creative Freedom Summit (2024) on YouTube and PeerTube.
Really looking forward to the CFS 2025!
