Creativity and “Tectonics”

All of us have it. It is a human trait. In my opinion it is too often reduced in importance by folks who insist that everything is simply a rearrangement of what we have already seen. In my opinion this is completely untrue. If it were the case then one would have to ask the question, “Where did it start?”. If all creation is simply the result of what we’ve seen, then was what we see created? If that was also the rearrangement of preexisting data then the question would continue right on back and actually become a bit ridiculous.

In my opinion all of us create. We create uniquely. It gives us the greatest joy of our lives. Regardless of the creation – as long as it is ethical, it feels good and is good.

I am fortunate to be in a field where creation is part of the package. An engineer and designer considers creation his or her stock in trade. As I have said in other articles, if you are lucky enough to do something which causes the clock to spin (meaning that you loose the sense of time – and actually forget that time is passing) then you’re a lucky person.

I’ve dabbled at many things – one is animation. In 2008 I decided to make a little animation, right after the Summer Olympics of that year, defining the term “tectonics”. Most folks know the mostly commonly used meaning which is a geological term describing the movement of large plates along the surface of the earth. However look the word up and you will see that it has an entirely different meaning as well. Likely the meaning I am talking about is a more senior meaning from which the geological term derived.

Some might think it is corny – but I’ve included it on this page – upper right.

The setting was actually created in my CAD program. The other settings, the stadium, the Greek building and the pyramids were brought in an scaled from Google 3-D. I learned a lot about 3-D while making this animation.