Do you do anything creative in your free time?

[Thyroid]

I write. Although what I post on Mixnmojo is not indicative, a lot of people think my (other) writing is good and they laugh at it too (in a good way), but I don't do enough of it. I've been pushing myself now, doing wildly experimental pieces and then posting them on Facebook for people to comment on. I'm still at the "Trying to emulate my idols phase,"* but hey. Oh, and also it's not a conscious thing, I've been told that my writing is similar to Erik Wolpaw's, in this case as compared to this interview (I know, I know, it looks like I ripped it off, but trust me when I say I didn't). I even did a Kroms vs Michael Bay thing when Transformers 2 came out that was a bit too similar to Romero vs Erik for me to post, as my friend Brent pointed-out. I hadn't even heard of Old Man Murray before that.

I also draw a bit, but I'm not as good as I want to be. I used to be more interested in it, but then an unfortunate accident (my mum opening my sketchbook, finding female anatomy and then laughing at me about it) sort of killed that. I do get inspired enough to try again when I look at a painting I really like or something.

Other than that...I find myself trying to come up with creative solutions to problems, so for example I've lately taken to hanging my jeans on my bedroom wall to make it a bit less empty whilst doing something with my old jeans. I'm getting back into shape, so any pair of jeans that gets too big for me goes up. I code a lot, something like 6, 7 hours a day, and I'm slowly but surely getting good at that. Uhhh...I play piano sometimes, and make MixCDs, paint their covers, etc.

What about you guys?

*Tim Schafer, Lester Bangs and William Shakespeare, plus a bunch of others. Don't laugh at the WillieShakes part; that man was an awesome writer.

Edited August 16, 2009 by Kroms

[Salka]

Hehe, your mum sucks. Female anatomy is the most awesome to draw. 90% of people I draw are female, just because I find their anatomy and faces so much more appealing to draw.

I also like drawing, so much I starting art uni in September. That's gonna be cool. I also like playing guitar and writing. Recently I started writing a story that's going well except for that after every other paragraph I seem to have written BLAH BLAH BLAH THIS BIT IS SHITE REWRITE REQUIRED. But hey whatever, it's fun!

Also I'm really poor right now so I'm going to make little greeting cards out of my designs and sell them on Brighton Seafront, and also busk because surely people will give me SOME money for humiliating myself for playing not-so-great guitar at them. Especially if I have a sign that reads I AM SHIT AT GUITAR AND THIS EXPERIENCE IS KILLING ME BUT I'M DOING THIS BECAUSE I NEED MONEY...

[Thyroid]

Heh, as a (somewhat evil) side note, I think it's funny how your post went from discussing what you enjoyed doing into what you're bad at.

The thing with my mum went exactly like this (this was two, three years ago):

Me: "Mum, that's just anatomy practice."

"Sure."

"No, look, I'm -- stop laughing, it was -- "

"Hey, I'm not judging. It's normal for a boy your age."

"NO! It isn't! MUM! It's just practice for -- "

"It IS normal. Why are you beating yourself up like this?"

"MUM, would you LIS - "

"There's nothing wrong with you dear."

"MUM FOR THE LOVE OF -- "

"Hey, let's ask your sister. What do you think of this?"

(By this point it's a mixture of laughter and concerned glances, seeing as that my self-confidence has clearly generated to the point of me thinking I'm 'not normal'.)

Nothing humiliating about playing guitar to people on the street, by the way. Street musicians have a lovely purity about their music that most "professional" artists can't match. I'm sure you're great. Even if you can't play for shit, it's the spirit that counts. Check out The Shaggs for proof.

[Patters]

Drinking is creative right....

In all seriousness though. I pay both Guitar and Bass, Juggle occassionally (mostly during the Uni term), I recently started doing some writing after not writing anything for about 3 years, mostly stuff on video games it's not great but it's a start. I did a hell of a lot of Photography last year (mostly of live music).

[toblix]

It's awesome that you're all able to do all sorts of various artistic stuff. I find myself always giving up almost immediately after attempting something. I've tried writing and drawing, and I've begun making games a million million times on all sorts of platforms, I've started thousands of 3d Studio Max projects and sometimes awesome music appears in my head, but soon after having started coding, or met some minor obstacle, or sat down at the piano I start thinking "this isn't going to work, you didn't plan this out you idiot, you'll never finish it!" and so I go back to playing other people's games, gawking at other people's art and listening to other people's great music. It's depressing in a way, but at least there's a bunch of awesome games, art and music being produced every day, so there's not some hole I'm not filling.

Again, it's awesome that you're able to do all these things. I'm sure you become better people because of it.

[syntheticgerbil]

I try to draw pretty pictures, but other that, which sucks up a ton of time anyway, not much is going on.

EDIT: I guess this is due, but here are website and blog links. They don't get updated enough. Soon, soon. Site & blog If you other art guys want to follow me, I'll follow you in return.

Edited August 17, 2009 by syntheticgerbil

[vimes]

I've just got back on the habit of drawing (a few years ago, it was more like a compulsion than anything else); and bought an awesome pen tablet for the occasion... except, I can't really get used to it. Maybe it's the config or the ratio, but I can't get the line I want with the damn tablet. So buying a small sketchbook is in order for next week.

Anyway, I'm trying to get better at anatomyand get the basis of coloration (I'm completely tasteless when it comes to this) which is a bit of hassle since - as a friend artist likes to say - drawing is like sport, you need to go through painful stuff and never stop training to get to a proper level.

So, I do a bit of boring, tedious technical exercises and then sketch a lot of unplanned stuff because I really get a kick out of it..

[Psych]

I'm an illustrator. So I do a lot of drawing/painting. I want to get a job doing concept art for games, so I have both a portfolio and a blog to showcase my art.

In addition to that I write and draw an online comic series. It's called 70-Seas, it's about a band of animal privateer people who have adventures and get into fights. I'd really appreciate it if you'd all try giving it a read.

It's awesome that you're all able to do all sorts of various artistic stuff. I find myself always giving up almost immediately after attempting something. I've tried writing and drawing, and I've begun making games a million million times on all sorts of platforms, I've started thousands of 3d Studio Max projects and sometimes awesome music appears in my head, but soon after having started coding, or met some minor obstacle, or sat down at the piano I start thinking "this isn't going to work, you didn't plan this out you idiot, you'll never finish it!" and so I go back to playing other people's games, gawking at other people's art and listening to other people's great music.

You can't let that stuff get you down. Sure your projects aren't going to turn out how you expect, but making those early mistakes is the only way to learn. In comics we have a saying; everyone has 1000 crappy pages in them, and before they make any good pages they have to get all those crappy ones out.

Now I can understand that you still might have a bit of trepidation about throwing a bunch of your time away on a project that ultimately won't work out. So you should try giving yourself a time limit, a lot of the comics I've made have been 24 hour comics* (24 page comics made in one straight 24 hour go), they're not master pieces of anything, but they were great learning experiences and it didn't even take a whole weekend to pull them off.

*If anyone is interested in seeing these comics they're here, here, here, here, and here.

[elmuerte]

The only creative thing I do in my free time is program.

Oh, and create stupid websites based on IdleThumbs podcasts.

[SignorSuperdouche]

Like Toblix, I stuggle to ever complete anything but I start loads of projects. My current project, which I've semi abandoned already, is a weird RPG/adventure game loosely based on

. There's also a novel I've had on the back burner for well over 10 years that perpetually mocks me.

I also occasionally dabble in vector art. I'm not particularly skilled but it's easy to look like you are.

[Coldkill]

Wow, lot's of artsy stuff

I'm a photographer in my spare time, along with that I do 3D modelling, drawing (mostly as part of my photography) and painting/modelling. I also play both Guitar and Bass, Drums and Keyboard/piano.

Etc etc

[elmuerte]

I also occasionally dabble in vector art. I'm not particularly skilled but it's easy to look like you are.

nice...

[Roderick]

I'm having trouble defining the concept of 'free time' at the moment. When you've the star of your one-man creative company, everything you do at some point is work and hobby at the same time. It's dangerous, but rewarding as well.

But basically, I do everything and anything that has to do with storytelling. Writing scripts, making comics, drawing animations, envisioning games, journalism, the works. So far it's not making me rich yet, but hopefully that day will come!

[toblix]

So far it's not making me rich yet, but hopefully that day will come!

AHA!

[Nachimir]

I've lately taken to hanging my jeans on my bedroom wall to make it a bit less empty whilst doing something with my old jeans. I'm getting back into shape, so any pair of jeans that gets too big for me goes up.

That's a brilliant idea

I sometimes write, but only when I think I have something really worth writing about, which is about once every couple of years. I was writing a book about human motivation once, but that was stupidly ambitious and I need to wait a long time before I'll be ready to go back to it, if ever.

I also used to take a lot of photographs, and got told by various photographers and lecturers that I was good, but I think that was far more to do with my love of experimenting and eye for oddities than actual photographic skill. When this photo, by far the best I've ever taken, happened by accident, something switched in my unconscious and it's now kind of "Fuck it. That was the peak"

Nowadays, I make stuff, and am devoting time to learning to code, Rubik's cubes (which may seem useless, but there's a lot to them and a dozen or so people have asked me to teach them in the past few months), contact juggling, electronics, and 3D modeling. I suck at all of them, so that's why I'm practicing them. I like this Robert A. Heinlein quote:

A human being should be able to change a diaper, plan an invasion, butcher a hog, conn a ship, design a building, write a sonnet, balance accounts, build a wall, set a bone, comfort the dying, take orders, give orders, cooperate, act alone, solve equations, analyze a new problem, pitch manure, program a computer, cook a tasty meal, fight efficiently, die gallantly. Specialization is for insects.

I used to be a mod maker for Black Cat Games, but haven't really touched UnrealEd in years except to teach it. I miss it, but I get frustrated with just how locked down to verbs engines are. I don't want to make game about shooting stuff, there are more than enough of them.

[Roderick]

That's a great quote! I fully endorse that shit. I'm always looking to diversify my skills, get good or at least adequate at everything.

[Nachimir]

This Schulze and Webb talk is also a good one on the subject of learning:

http://schulzeandwebb.com/2009/scope/slides/ (specifically this last part)

In a nutshell, it's: "experts spend tens of thousands of hours getting as good as they are with a given subject, and if you have similar ambitions that can be a depressing thing to regard. However, if you spend just a hundred hours on something, you'll be quite good at it. So pick something and get to it."

I've been using daytum to track my hours spent on about 7 things.

[elmuerte]

I used to be a mod maker for Black Cat Games, but haven't really touched UnrealEd in years except to teach it. I miss it, but I get frustrated with just how locked down to verbs engines are. I don't want to make game about shooting stuff, there are more than enough of them.

You could always make a game where instead of shooting stuff you have to suck bullets from stuff.

Actually... that's quite an interesting concept. Suck bullets from corpses and thereby bringing them back to life. But you've got to watch out not to resurrect foes and they would kill you. As for people who where gibbed with a rocket you would need to find all parts of the body and reassemble it

[Scrobbs]

Started learning Objective-C. I have some nice ideas for iphone apps, but if that doesn't work out, at least I will be able to write shit in time for that tablet. If it ever materialises. If THAT doesn't work out, I will have learned something new - so it's not wasted effort. Besides that, play a guitar. Poorly.

[UncleSpaggles]

The commute has ruthlessly killed off the majority of my free time, I get about an hour a day to do 'stuff' and it normally takes me about 30 minutes to decide what it is I want to do. I play very limited and basic guitar, doodle (though tend to copy other peoples creations as I lack the originality to come up with my own ideas), take pictures. That's about it.

I've always wished I had the drive to be artistically creative, instead I'll dabble just to see if I still have any ability and then shy away instead of trying to improve and learn. Weird.

[Noyb]

I make freeware games with terrible art: http://realnoyb.googlepages.com/games

Starting to learn Flixel to try and get into the Flash game market.

[Chris]

You could always make a game where instead of shooting stuff you have to suck bullets from stuff.

Actually... that's quite an interesting concept. Suck bullets from corpses and thereby bringing them back to life. But you've got to watch out not to resurrect foes and they would kill you. As for people who where gibbed with a rocket you would need to find all parts of the body and reassemble it

Retro/Grade!

[Jayel]

Retro/Grade!

I was super excited about this game until I played the demo and realized that it's just a guitar hero.

[elmuerte]

Retro/Grade!

Not really... the game time isn't in reverse, and it's an FPS, not a shooter

[Nevsky]

At the moment, all my creative juices are going into all the crazy writing I've been pumping out and sending to places. And most of my 'downtime', whenever that comes around, is spent being either anxious that I'm not getting anywhere, or bitter about everything else I read.

I used to be much more creative - I was in a band, and did other music stuff on my laptop as well. I wrote and directed plays, too. Also had a shot at doing some short film projects.

Most of that has been put on the backburner in the last couple of years, as I went to University, became a workaholic, and fell into a friendship group that felt more comfortable chugging beer and playing Halo 3 than having mutual writing sessions.

That said, recently I've been writing something. And I even wrote a song or two to go along with it. I'd love to work on a comic at some point - but have never been able to draw well in the slightest - the closest to 'good' being that period where I obsessively traced Adrian Tomine over and over. It didn't rub off.

Also...

My current project, which I've semi abandoned already, is a weird RPG/adventure game loosely based on

.

This is a terrifying prospect! Would be interested to see how it turns out, though.