Every creative technique has its pitfalls. My favorite method is not spared from this either.
Over the last few years, more and more people have approached me and reported major obstacles in dealing with the Impulse Pictures. In the usual exchange with colleagues or with employees from innovation management about methods and techniques, statements such as these occurred more and more often: “I think I scared my participants with it”, “Our engineers don’t like the technique at all”, “My colleagues don’t take the Impulse Pictures technique seriously”, or: “If I use it more than once, it feels boring for the participants”.
I cannot and do not want to leave these statements as they are, especially because I actually had similar experiences many years ago. Today, however, I consider the Impulse Pictures technique to be one of the most valuable creativity techniques of all. That’s why I’ve prepared tips, tricks, lots of experience and a little Impulse Pictures sample for you to try out yourself.
Let’s start with the rather negative experiences you can have with the Impulse Pictures technique, which I have also had in the past. Such negative experiences have always sparked an ambition in me to find out exactly why these things happen. Here are the most important experiences and results:
1. factor “quantity”
Impulse Picture packages have to contain many images. Impulse Picture packages with only up to 50 images do not really work well. They quickly become boring and the all-important drive of curiosity and discovery cannot be lived. My standard packages contain at least 190 images, the largest even over 750 images.
2. factor “size”
Impulse Pictures must be neither too small nor too large. If they are too small, then they are too unattractive, if they are too big, then they actually frighten inexperienced participants. Sizes in the 15 x 20 cm frame have proven to be the most optimal in many years of testing.
3. factor “paper”
Please never print Impulse Pictures on plain copy paper. It should be heavier photo paper or photo cardboard. This also significantly increases its attractiveness.
4. factor “print quality”
There is a clear realization here that images produced in high gloss work much better than images in matt or silk gloss. The slightly higher printing costs pay for themselves immediately in use.
5. factor “motive”
Image direction and dramaturgy play an extremely important role here. The stimulating images should be exciting and pleasing at the same time, so the picture direction should always follow the golden ratio. Furthermore, they should show either a small scene or a detail that always leaves room for a secret. It is precisely this secret that tickles the imagination and creativity. On the one hand, the motifs should certainly be totally diverse, but each individual motif must never be arbitrary in terms of image direction and dramaturgy. A customer once coined the term “everyday macros” for my pictures.
Targeted use of Impulse Pictures
Let us now turn to the experiences that have to do with the direct application of the Impulse Pictures. Here, too, I have gained many exciting insights for myself in recent years:
- Only people who actually use this technique to solve their own challenges will be successful in innovation coaching. This is not relevant for many techniques, but it is true for the Impulse Pictures technique. So that there are no excuses here, you can download a Impulse Pictures sample, for self-experimentation, with 11 Impulse Pictures at the end of the article and there is a quick guide to the basic version of the Impulse Pictures technique.
- As a trainer, always set a good example with the Impulse Pictures technique and express your own initial thoughts with an Impulse Picture – be a role model and the participants will follow with ease.
- Arrange the Impulse Pictures so that all participants have easy access. Spread out the Impulse Pictures before the participants are in the room. When I spread out my large Impulse Picture package with over 750 pictures on the floor, even the room takes on a totally inspiring character and the participants spontaneously start to rummage through the large pile and a great dynamic automatically develops.
- Use the Impulse Pictures technique in its wide range and in many different variations. There is a real treasure buried in the wide variety of possible applications of the Impulse Pictures technique – more on this in the next section.
Quick guide and other possible uses
There is actually not just one Impulse Pictures technique. The Impulse Pictures offer an extremely wide range of applications. Here is the perhaps already classic basic version:
Step 1: What is your challenge? Now form your challenge into a question. Example: “How could our trade fair stand score better?”
Step 2: Quickly, spontaneously and randomly select an Impulse Picture from the large number of Impulse Pictures.
Step 3: Now all participants should link their associations to the picture with the challenge and write down their thoughts as complete sentences on, for example, moderation cards. Which objects, colors, feelings, experiences, details stand out in particular? E.g.: “The stand could be outside the hall.” “The stand conveys the atmosphere of a fireplace room.” “The stand could look like a shooting gallery and our products could be the prize.” “If the stand smelled of coffee, more visitors would come.”
Step 4: Let the sentences carry you away and lead you to new ways of thinking.
But the Impulse Pictures technique can do much more, here is a list of possible applications:
- Basic variant – All participants are inspired by one picture.
- Basic variant 2 – Each participant picks up their own picture and derives thoughts and ideas.
- Advertising slogans – The images are used to directly form sentences as advertising slogans.
Sentence with instructions – The participants have to form sentences with the help of the pictures, for example using certain words. Example: Form sentences using the pictures in which our company name and the word efficiency appear. - Presentation rounds – The Impulse Pictures technique is an excellent tool for presentation rounds. The method is particularly attractive for teams that have known each other for a long time. Example questions for a round of introductions after each participant has taken a picture: “What do you associate with this picture?”, “What does this picture have to do with your job?”, “Why do you think your colleague chose his picture?” – or the participants are given the task of finding a picture that describes them well.
- The Impulse Pictures are also suitable as an ICE breaker and reactivation tool after lunch breaks or strenuous work phases.
- Perception training – As perception training, have the participants each make a list of the things they see in a picture. The participant with the longest list wins.
- Mood pictures / creative casting – Creative casting (based on Harald Braem’s brain-floating principle) is a light, refreshing way of broadening your perspective with Impulse Pictures, which produces a mood chart (a kind of collage of Impulse Pictures) as a result. This sentiment forms the basis, for example, for the next steps in a particular project.
- Creative Collages – The combination of Impulse Pictures generates mental images that stimulate creativity and lead teams to even more new ideas in the discussion. For example, when two unrelated images collide in a collage, our imagination transforms them into a common, new reality that is higher (“transcended”) than the two individual images. The collage is more meaningful than the source material and may represent something completely different.
- … and there are many more techniques that make use of Impulse Pictures, such as “image-text potentiation”, “mind mapping”, “images instead of words”, “storyboarding”, “random stimulus”, “visual synectics” and many more.
I hope you can now understand a little more about “how Impulse Pictures give you a real impulse”. Immerse yourself in one of the most exciting creative and inspirational techniques of all. Take advantage of our Impulse Pictures sample and try it out for yourself – true to Leonardo da Vinci’s great insight “We are creatures of the eye!”. For all those who find the Impulse Pictures technique particularly exciting, our self-study course to become a “stimulus image facilitator” is particularly suitable.
