Episode 25 – Austin Light, The Mind Behind Movie Title Typos

If you’ve ever participated in a monthly creativity challenge—think National Novel Writing Month, you’ll know that often the best takeaway is having completed the challenge at all. I once completed National Novel Writing Month after starting the 50,000-word story with “Bill sat in the street with his donkey by his side.” I don’t look at that story very often but think of the accomplishment on plenty of occasions. Austin Light, our guest for Episode 25 of the Creative Minds Podcast, has a little bit more than memories of a cramped drawing hand from his own exploits in Inktober. Over the past few weeks, his Movie Title Typos artwork has made its rounds across the internet, making his Reddit-thread inspired work well-known around the world. The illustrations themselves are amazing, the story behind how it happened over the course of a few days is equally intriguing to hear about. From sharing a few sketches on Instagram to having thousands of emails asking for his designs on shirts, Austin goes through the strange process of becoming internet famous. While I get plenty of creative inspiration from an image like the ones he put together for Ron Man, T. or Obocop, it’s obvious Austin has creativity beyond Movie Title Typos. In this episode he talks about his creative process, how he got into writing and illustration in the first place and how when it comes to creativity, there’s always room for growth. One of the messages that sticks with me most from this episode is his discussions around making sure the creative things you do are things that also make you happy. When you’re being creative, be creative for you. When you’re happy, it’s more likely the others will be happy. If you laugh, they’ll laugh. If you cry, they’ll cry. With that in mind, it’s worth repeating that the Movie Title Typos series is extraordinary and worth checking out as you listen along to the story behind the pictures.