The Curse of the Lazy Brain

by WK Studios | December 31, 2012 | Filmmaking

If you are a creative professional, you have an enemy:  a horrible monster that seeks to destroy your potential and limit your results. Many are enslaved by this insidious curse, not even realizing that it has control over them.  These poor souls languish under the weight of mediocrity, never quite understanding why their work doesn’t satisfy.  They long to create something original, epic, amazing, but it continually eludes them.  What’s worse, is that the monster lives inside of all of us, defiling even our best days with it’s subtle whisperings.

This monster is none other than Lazy Brain and here’s how it works.

I’m approached by a client to produce a :30 second spot on how widget A will help save time in the chopping of onions. Not the most exciting project. Hmmmm.  How are we going to show this?

  • Lazy Brain:  “Interview the client talking about how much time you can save in chopping onions and film b-roll of the widget actually chopping onions.  Put the two together with cool music.”

Sounds like a good idea.  It will be fast, easy, cheap…. LAZY.  MEDIOCRE.

Those of us who have identified this enemy have found that our first thoughts are usually the lazy ones. That’s why WK has developed a culture of challenging one another to dig deeper; to bypass the lazy brain. The collaboration continues… maybe we could show two people, one is crying and the other is smiling.  We hold on this for a while and then show that the crying person is cutting onions by hand.  The smiling person puts the onions in the widget BOOM, BAM, BANG. FINISHED:  The widget is so fast that the persons eyes have no chance to tear up from the onion’s odor. We wrap up the spot by showing the widget and the tag line, “Widget A:  Chops onions faster.” (Note:  I think my lazy brain wrote that tag line.)

Which one do you think will be more effective?  Both communicate the message.  Both require a similar investment of time and money.  One is lazy brain and the other more creative.

Unfortunately, the lazy brain is not something we overcome once and are free forever.  For the creative, this is a lifelong battle, one which we sometimes win and sometimes lose.

Have you had any battles with the lazy brain?  How did you conquer?  We would love to hear your story.  Leave it in the comments.