Any Creative Types on Here?

A figure there's quite a few who fashion themselves as game creators or future game creators. Anybody do anything like that, or even something different in the creative field?

My career centers around creativity, so I'm always curious if anybody makes money making things up?

These were sort of the last "creative" thing I did.....

I put a mirror on a specific place on my wall so that I can see my TV from the kitchen when I'm cooking. That may be more genius than creativity, though. Guess I'm a genius.

Independent creative work? I'd love to do it someday.

Otherwise, I feel that my creativity and profession should be separate. I don't want my artistic creations to be dictated by deadlines and obligations.

@4myAmuzumament:

lol nice.

Put small holes at the bottom of your trash can to feel really smart.

I'm creative in my head, but when I go and actually try to create something, it's crap.

I've been a fiction writer for about seven years - it's not a career or anything, but I'll definitely do stuff with it in the future (including, hopefully, games).

I'm a photo guy. I mentioned Lars Von Trier last night, and my affinity for Antichrist and Melancholia was largely based on my photographic experience. How good were those as actual movies? Hell if I know. But I usually focus on images rather than stories, so I like to watch movies and TV and focus on the visual impact of certain scenes (without regard to narrative flow or story).

And again...that opening for Antichrist? Oh my freaking god! THAT is the kind of shit that really turns me on and makes me think, "I've gotta start copying these guys."

Anyway, I'm a photo guy. But more specifically, I'm more of a still life photo guy who fabricates scenes and settings to photograph as part of a largely subconscious expression of thoughts and feelings that I can't define. I get materials, I slap them together until they "feel right", then I photograph them. Then I look at the photographs and try to figure out what they mean. The ones that mean something get to go forward, the ones that don't mean anything get cut.

But...this is why I don't like to call myself a "photographer". That has certain connotations, many of which don't really fit with what I do. I utilize some planning (I try to sculpt light as I'm working, and I sometimes go off rough blueprints, and I try to ascertain theme as I'm working). But to a very large extent, I have no conscious idea what the hell I'm doing. Rather than having something to say and then visually expressing it, I tap into how I feel, then I work intuitively, then I go back and look at the work from an outsider's perspective and try to see if it means anything. I largely have a stream-of-consciousness approach designed to tell me who I am.

But yeah...I think that counts as "creative". The necessary sidenote here is that whatever I create, it doesn't feel like I created it. This does a very good job of protecting me from negative criticism. People say that my images are shit, and it doesn't affect me personally since I never really FELT as if I created them in the first place. But this also makes me really bad at positive criticism. People say that they love one of my images, and I feel ashamed to accept the praise because that feels like taking credit for someone else's work. Some dude will say, "this photograph is awesome", and I'll be thinking, "I agree, but don't thank me. I don't know where this came from, I just captured it."

lol, this.

I highly recommend finding a way to channel into something constructive if it's something you'd enjoy doing, and if you're a creative person, there's almost always some kind of creative medium that you can excel at. It's just a matter of discovering how to constructively channel it.

I started college majoring in animation and video game design only to find out I hated -- and sucked at -- drawing, and didn't have any interest in the mathematics behind computer programming... Then something clicked, and now I write movies and TV shows for a living...

Not trying to assume this is something either of you would seriously want to consider for a career or anything, but I meet a lot of lost-in-their-creativity types and always like to help motivate somebody who would rather make things up than sit at a desk for a living. There's viable options out there if you're willing to work at it.

I'm good at coming up ideas, just not creating them.

I'm creative at using people I guess...

Anything we might know?

@Master_Live: As pretentious, stupid, and utterly cliche-ridiculous-bonkers it sounds, I just listened to what the world was telling me. What it came down to was -- I had all these ideas running through my head that I thought were great ideas for video games; great narrative, amazing plot twists. As I was a week into my animation degree, realizing it was a f**** nightmare, and I was thinking my expensive semester was going down the drain -- the spark fired, the epiphany shed its light -- whatever you want to call it -- but I looked at everything I was writing and immediately knew every single one of my ideas was a TV series. Just the rhythm, the flow, the cliffhangers, the twists... Everything...

I rushed down to my adviser, changed my major the same day and got into screenwriting classes. Lo and behold, I turned out to be pretty damn good at it. It wasn't ever a dream of mine to write for the screen, in fact, I had literally never once in my life even thought about it until I was 21. But I always knew I wanted to create in some way for my career. Pretty much every other avenue I explored bored me to tears and sent me drifting off into my made up worlds, which are now well-written screenplays or TV pilots. And the more I explored the inner workings of the craft, the more it became my obsession. Now I'm living in LA doing something I love.

What it boils down to is looking at what you're good at creatively and finding a compatible medium that could take advantage of your skills. Like I said, I never thought of movies and TV as anything other than entertainment while I was waiting for the next Zelda, Halo, or Uncharted to come out, but now it's what pays my bills... And makes me very, very happy. With that said, pretty much just keep an open mind to exploring new artistic avenues you may not have considered. I looked at myself as a potential game designer and saw nothing that hadn't -- or at least eventually did -- been done before and just kind of gave up on myself for awhile.

The really great thing about not being this big movie-nerd in the same ways I nerd out over games is that creatively I don't get all butthurt when something I'm working on doesn't pan out, or when I get hounded by endless notes and suggestions for rewrites. It's pretty nice being more attached to pumping out an entertaining project than answering "my creative vision" (barfs). And that's very important when it comes to profiting off of creativity. No matter what you do, if you're getting paid for it, you're going to have to alter your vision to suit other people's needs. That can be a deal breaker for a lot of people, as people tend to cherish their personal creations like children... But when someone's flashing hundreds of thousands of dollars in front of you and ask you to rewrite or cut a few pages you're really attached to, you tend to get over it pretty quickly.

@one_plum: Some, including yourself, may not agree, but I've actually found deadline to be great creative-inducers. When you're younger, or just don't exercise your creativity that often, it's easy to think creative work's nothing more than random inspiration, but as you get into the professional field, and you start creating every day, you get into a really amazing routine that both increases the amount of work you get done and also the quality of ideas you create. I would have never guessed, but intricate organization is one of the key elements of channeling creativity.

I try drawing from time-to-time, but I start out doing something and then my wires get crossed. Like I started drawing this woman (can you find her?) and this...crekkimum...thing...showed up:

@br0kenrabbit said:

I try drawing from time-to-time, but I start out doing something and then my wires get crossed. Like I started drawing this woman (can you find her?) and this...crekkimum...thing...showed up:

That is awesome.

Meh, all the details got lost in the scan cause my scanner is a piece of shit. Seriously, all my drawings turn out creepy. Somehow.

Well I like it. Kudos, you are a good artist.

Yeah, used to sketch a lot back when I was in school. Though, some of the stuff I sketched would be considered "messed up". hehe

If I was more creative I'd probably be a science fiction or fantasy writer.

Except that isn't how my brain works - when I look at a page all I see is a blank piece of paper. I couldn't write a short story to save my life, let alone a hundred or more pages. Probably only once every 5-10 years do I ever get inspiration to write creatively - and when I do its nowhere near at the level of any halfway decent sf author. Wish I knew what it was like to able to generate so many ideas naturally, but I don't and probably never will.

I am way more analytical than I am creative.

I'm the art director of one of the top 5 internet agencies of my country. So yeah, I guess I'm pretty creative.

@Lance2500 said:

@br0kenrabbit said:

I try drawing from time-to-time, but I start out doing something and then my wires get crossed. Like I started drawing this woman (can you find her?) and this...crekkimum...thing...showed up:

That is awesome.

I agree. Very interesting.

Thanks, but it would be nice if I could start an image and stick to what I had planned instead of going all whako. I think the main problem is I can't build an image up from primitives, I just simply start drawing and whatever happens I have to incorporate as part of the final product.

Spoken from a fellow creator, your original idea is usually inferior to what it turns into. If that's where your inspiration leads you, who's to say it's worse?

The image above was suppose to be of a woman. A woman. I managed to get half her face in and that's it.

On the other hand, if you want to write an illustrated book of spooky campfire stories, I'm in.

I'm a Computer Scientist / Software Developer, but I also have a deep interest in game design

*shrugs*

If that's how you work, then embrace it. In any case, I sort of work in a similar way, and that's EXTREMELY interesting from my point of view. I honestly think it would be BORING if everything I did came out like I wanted to, because then there's nothing for me to discover. What's REALLY cool is making something and then thinking, ""how the hell did this happen?" Nothing wrong with letting your art take on a life of its own. You don't have to stick to a rigid blueprint.

To be fair, I think there's something to be said for being able to ROUGHLY achieve your goals. Especially for commercial endeavors, if someone is hiring you to do X and Y, then you'd better be able to meet their needs. So I totally understand your concern.

But hey...you'll get better at that with practice. In the meantime, you're just doing this in your spare time, so no obligations or responsibilities. Just keep on working. As long as it comes out cool and interesting, then that's still a plus. This looks interesting as hell, which is more than I can say about many people who are more technically skilled than you. I wouldn't hire you to make art for me, but I certainly might buy something that you already made. If I don't have any specific needs and I just want something cool to hang up on my wall, then you've done that. So now just keep on doing more of it.

I've been composing and producing music as a hobby when I have free time for the last two years. It has become a real passion for me. I've also written books, made artistic designs with Photoshop, created maps/levels in several games (my last one being a Starcraft 2 scenario called Strategic Assault). Of course, creating is only one side of it, since I thoroughly enjoy contemplating art or immersing myself by listening to music, watching movies, playing video games, reading books (especially Fighting Fantasy gamebooks), buying artbooks... Art is the true meaning of life for me. I'm looking forward to the day when I'll be able to fully devote myself to artistic creation.

Hahahaha, after going on this long rant about discovering your passion, I just now realized what you're asking. My answer is -- yes, probably. But I won't say. Anonymity's worth a billion dollars in Hollywood, and this is a place where I can drink wine and say whatever the hell I want without having to answer to anyone... Maybe some day I'll get drunk enough to spill my secrets, but for now, I'll just say I'm out there somewhere, and it's entirely possible you've seen it or heard about it.

^^^ The drunk thing mainly the reason I completely misunderstood your question...

@Iszdope: When you get to 25, the decisions you make when you're 15 no longer have reasonable answers.

I'm writing my novel right now. does that count?

I love writing and photography, writing is mostly a "private hobby" since while I do let people read what I write I have never tried to get my works published, that's not why I write. With photography I do make money out of it but it's also not my profession; I mostly enjoy just taking my camera with me and start shooting when it "hits" or just go somewhere nice for an afternoon and shoot some nice photos.

My fiancé is a harpist/harp teacher by profession and "creative" is pretty much her whole life...whenever she's not composing, doing concerts, organising harp festivals, writing for a harp magazine she's coming up with something else to "create".

I sketch manga and make GIMP art.