Autistic and me

As I mentioned before, I recently opened a Community Interest Company called Yestem Project. The company will focus on improving access to digital creativity for artists facing barriers.

How did it come to this? Well, it started because I wanted another dopamine hit.
Just over a year ago, I opened a YouTube channel where I publish abstract visuals based on patterns and geometric shapes. At first, the visuals were simply an attempt to do something with my existing pattern work. But after I created a few pieces, I really liked the effects — the experience of seeing a pattern in motion was fascinating. After a few more experiments, I realised it was possible to design visuals in a way that makes the viewer unsure whether the pattern is in front of or behind the shapes. This effect is achieved using what are called blending modes.

That’s when I really got hooked. I felt like I had found my creative voice. The fact that I was doing it all myself made it even more exciting — there were no tutorials for this kind of work, and I had to figure it out on my own.

It was a huge dopamine hit.

I feel a bit ashamed to admit that, despite being 47 at the time, I had never felt anything quite like that before. I did well at school, especially in maths, and it was always satisfying to get good grades, but I was never inspired by it in this way. I had never felt this level of creative excitement before.

So I kept making the visuals, and I doubt I will ever stop — working on them has become a form of stimming for me. However, the intense feeling of discovery gradually faded after about a year. I found myself wanting to feel that sense of novelty again. That’s what led me to start Yestem Project. The project is still in its early stages, and I do still feel that sense of newness.

My aim is to design pattern-based logo animations for businesses and use the income from this work to fund donations of iPads for creatives facing barriers. At the moment, I’m a bit stuck, because animating with logos requires a different approach than abstract visuals, so it will take me a few more weeks to figure it out.

One could argue that I should have learned how to do that first and only then set up a project around it. But as I said — I was chasing a dopamine hit. I think I may be addicted to it.