CAPTN OffScript

There's a version of the creative career conversation that almost never gets recorded. Not the award acceptance. Not the process breakdown. Not the polished origin story where every setback was secretly a setup. That version exists everywhere. This isn't that. CAPTN OffScript is where designers, founders, illustrators, and makers sit down and talk about what's actually going on — the fear before the pivot, the year where the work dried up, the identity crisis that came with success, the moment they almost stopped, and what kept them moving. The messy, honest, deeply human side of building a creative life. I'm Alen. I run a one-person type foundry called SilverStag Type, and I've been working in and around the design industry long enough to know what gets edited out of most interviews. I started this show because I was tired of highlight reels dressed up as conversations. I wanted to hear what creative people actually think — about money and meaning, about burnout and reinvention, about imposter syndrome and identity and the thousand invisible decisions that quietly add up to a career. So that's what we do here. We go long. We go deep. We don't rush to the takeaway. And because I'm not just a host — I'm a working designer who's navigated a lot of the same terrain — the conversations tend to go places most interviews don't reach. Guests have included Jessica Hische, Elliot Jay Stocks, Sophia Yeshi, Kieron Anthony Lewis, Philipp Louven, and Sergio del Puerto. What they share isn't a follower count or a famous client list. It's that they showed up willing to say something real — something I hadn't heard them say before, in any interview, anywhere. That's the bar. The show runs in two formats. The long-form Conversations are the main event — unscripted, one-on-one, unhurried. The kind of interview where we're still discovering things an hour in. Then there are the Monday Break(Through) episodes: shorter solo pieces from me, working through ideas and observations as a creative founder. Less polished. More honest. No five-step frameworks. No sponsor reads dressed up as advice. No artificial urgency. Just two people taking creativity seriously, and seeing where that leads. CAPTN OffScript started as The Type Convo — a typography-focused show — and evolved into something bigger when I realised the conversations I most needed to hear weren't about fonts. They were about what it actually costs to build something on your own terms, and what it means to keep going when the path stops being clear. If the "official" version of a creative career has never quite matched the one you're actually living — the doubt, the detours, the days when you're not sure what you're building or why — this show was made for you. New episodes drop regularly. Come in anywhere. Stay for the honesty.

CAPTN OffScript is a arts podcast hosted by Unknown Host, with 96 episodes on record and a Required Pod Score of 80. PitchCentric scores this show on Booking Probability, Listen Score, and live audience signals refreshed every 24 hours.

Unknown Host hosts CAPTN OffScript, a arts show with 96 episodes published.

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  CAPTN OffScript

  E95 — Second Take: Gemma O'Brien, "What Flow Actually Feels Like"

  Aug 26, 20268 minS2

  Gemma O'Brien describes flow as a forgetting of yourself. Fully absorbed, at one with the work, no sense of time passing. Then the conversation turns to boredom, and that half is the sharper one. This is Second Take, a short format on the show. One idea, one guest, lifted out of a longer conversation. You do not need to have heard the original. Gemma talks about why flow arrives by surprise rather than on demand, the difference between being absorbed and being zoned out, and why filling in a mural outline does not count. She contrasts it with scrolling, which also makes time disappear but leaves you without any sense of agency or control. She is also open about the parts of her job that bore her. Admin, client emails, the middle phase of a project that is all small tweaks and colour changes. A few years ago she resisted all of it, on the logic that this was supposed to be her passion so it should all be fun. She does not think that any more, and what she says instead is the part worth hearing. Full conversation with Gemma: https://captnoffscript.com/s02-e35-gemma-obrien-bored-of-herself/ Find Gemma here: Website: https://www.gemmaobrien.com/ Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/mrseaves101 Find me here: Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/captnoffscript Website: https://captnoffscript.com/

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  CAPTN OffScript

  E94 - Second Take: Mat Voyce, "I Hated Motion Design"

  Aug 18, 20267 minS2

  Mat Voyce makes motion work for Nike, Pepsi and Disney+. He also tried animation at university, hated it, and decided he would never do it again. This is Second Take, a new short format on the show. One idea, one guest, lifted out of a longer conversation. You do not need to have heard the original. Mat got one A across eleven GCSEs. It was graphic design. He dropped out of AS levels because the school would not keep him on for two subjects. He went to art college, did nothing but design for two years, and left with a distinction and student of the year. Then he got to university, dropped back to the bottom of the pack, and sat the animation module he still shows in talks as the thing he swore off. He also talks about the big brand names arriving, and the imposter syndrome that came with them and never really left. Full conversation with Mat: https://captnoffscript.com/s02-e08-mat-voyce-on-anxiety-creativity-and-finding-your-thing/ Find Mat here: Instagram: https://instagram.com/matvoyce Website: https://www.matvoyce.tv/ Find me here: Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/captnoffscript Website: https://captnoffscript.com/

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  CAPTN OffScript

  Bonus 007 - Simon Flöter: His Grandfather's Love Letters & What He'd Make if Money Didn't Matter

  Aug 14, 20264 minS2

  This is the seventh Captn OffScript bonus, and the last one of Season 2. After a main episode spent in the trenches, I asked Simon Flöter one question that flips it all upside down: if you woke up tomorrow with complete financial stability, never worrying about money again, what would you work on? It went to newsletter subscribers first as a private YouTube link. Today it's available here too. His first answer: he'd finish things. And then he told me about the letters. His father found a bundle his grandfather wrote to his grandmother, from 1930s Germany onwards, love letters mixed with the small facts of daily life. Simon barely knew him. His dream is to turn them into what he calls an online timepiece: the letters sorted so they read like a book, searchable, with the old words and the history behind each moment explained as you read. Two people in love, talking to each other across the darkest of decades, with the human side of it, in his words, kind of beautiful. Also on the list: fusing his design, code and illustration into something that doesn't exist yet, a zine with friends, and the video game he's always wanted to make. In this conversation we talked about: What he'd work on if money stopped mattering His grandfather's love letters from 1930s Germany The online timepiece he dreams of building from them Fusing design, code and illustration into something new A zine with friends, and the video game he's carried for years The main episode this bonus extends: S02/E38 — Simon Flöter on Life in the Trenches & Not Making Decisions From Fear https://captnoffscript.com/s02-e38-simon-floter-life-in-the-trenches Find Simon here: Design: https://floter.design/ Illustration: https://floter.ink/ Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/floter.ink LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/floter/ Find me here: Website: https://captnoffscript.com Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/captnoffscript If this resonated, listen to: Kristof Devos (S02/E31) — another conversation about making things for the joy of making them. This was the final Captn OffScript bonus of Season 2. Newsletter subscribers get every bonus on YouTube a week before it reaches the podcast feeds. Subscribe at https://captn.myflodesk.com/newsletter to get them first when the show returns.

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  Episode #38

  S02/E38 - Simon Flöter on Life in the Trenches & Not Making Decisions From Fear

  Aug 4, 202657 minS2

  For the final episode of Season 2, I didn't want a victory lap. Simon Flöter is a German illustrator, designer and developer living in Amsterdam, and he told me early on: this is not a success story. This is from the trenches. His commercial illustration work vanished this year, and he suspects AI swallowed it. Money got extremely tight. He just landed a job that should carry him through the rest of the year. And through all of it, he kept drawing, the way he has since he was a kid tracing Batman comics and getting rejected from every art school he applied to. We talked about the trenches most designers are actually in right now, why the anger at AI is really anger at corporate greed, and his advice that gives this episode its title: never make decisions from fear. In this episode: Growing up in Munich, where nobody said the word artist Tracing Batman comics and Playboy pages to learn anatomy Getting rejected from every art school, and drawing anyway Germany vs the Netherlands: who asks for your diploma The year the illustration jobs vanished His Zwarte Piet website, and why traditions can change Why coding feels like a puzzle, and what AI took from it "We can do this now, but is it good? Do we have to?" Don't decide from fear, and separate yourself from your work The poster he made for his partner Tracy Find Simon here: Design: https://floter.design/ Illustration: https://floter.ink/ Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/floter.ink LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/floter/ Find me here: Website: https://captnoffscript.com Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/captnoffscript The final Friday bonus of the season: I asked Simon what he'd work on if money stopped mattering tomorrow. His answer involves his grandfather's love letters from 1930s Germany, a zine with friends, and a video game. Newsletter subscribers get it first, a week before it's public. Subscribe at https://captn.myflodesk.com/newsletter . If you enjoyed this episode, leaving a 5-star rating on Apple Podcasts or Spotify takes less than a minute and helps more people find the show. I'd be incredibly grateful. If you liked this episode, listen to: Martyna Wędzicka (S02/E33) — another conversation about holding onto your own way of working when everything pushes you to compromise. That's Season 2. Thank you for listening to every conversation, the big names and the trenches alike.

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  CAPTN OffScript

  Bonus 006 - Halli Thorleifsson: Rebuilding Yourself Brick by Brick

  Jul 24, 20267 minS2

  This is the sixth bonus episode of Captn OffScript. In Halli Thorleifsson's main episode we covered everything he's built: the agency he sold to Twitter and rebuilt, the almost 2,000 wheelchair ramps, the tax he chose to pay. This is the conversation about what he's been rebuilding underneath it all, himself, in his words, brick by brick. It went to newsletter subscribers first as a private YouTube link. Today it's available here too. When Halli stopped drinking, he stopped the numbing but never went looking for what he'd been numbing. It took more than twenty years to come back to it. The hard things in his life, his disease, losing his mother young, had each gone into a box he never looked into. A survival technique that worked as a kid, and quietly stopped working as an adult. So he opened the boxes: two to three years of therapy, physical and mental, and, gradually and with help, letting the numbness lift after two decades. He's honest that nothing is fixed, that he's holding himself together mostly, and that he's better equipped than he's ever been. This is his path, not a template, and he shares it with an honesty very few people manage. In this conversation we talked about: Why he needs many things to work on, and what happens when he doesn't Rebuilding yourself brick by brick The boxes he packed away as a kid and never looked into Two to three years of therapy, physical and mental Learning to feel everything again, slowly and with help Timestamps: No chapters for this bonus. The main episode this bonus extends: S02/E37 — Halli Thorleifsson on Building Ueno Twice & Designing Things People Actually Use https://captnoffscript.com/s02-e37-halli-thorleifsson-building-ueno-twice Find Halli here: Website: https://www.haraldurthorleifsson.com/ Ueno: https://www.ueno.co/ Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/haraldurthorleifsson/ LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/haraldur-thorleifsson-359aaa5b/ Find me here: Website: https://captnoffscript.com Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/captnoffscript If this resonated, listen to: Andy J. Pizza (S02/E30) — another honest conversation about the slow inner work behind a creative life. This was the sixth Captn OffScript bonus episode. Newsletter subscribers get future bonuses on YouTube a week before they reach the podcast feeds. Subscribe at https://captn.myflodesk.com/newsletter .

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