The Creative Process

I guess I do it all the time, but it still amazes me, this process of creating something from nothing. Every day I stare at a stark white, blank "New Post" form in Blogger and manage to conjure up a cohesive (I hope) entry. For the last almost fifteen years I've spent my days cobbling together commercials, training films, and other corporate communications, often from thin air. It's all gotten easier over time, of course, the process becoming more organic and natural for me. But it's no less mystifying. I often feel like I'm simply along for the ride. A bystander more than an active participant.

I've heard that many artists already know what the project they're working on is supposed to look like. They can see it in their heads, or at least have a strong sense of the final work before they land the first brush stroke. The process of creation then becomes a realization of that vision. They know they're finished when the two images match. For me it's not like that. I do have a vague sense of direction before I start a project. An impression of a potential path. A jumping-off point. But that's it. To chip away at the white space I simply start somewhere and watch along with everyone else as the work develops. I'm usually pretty surprised by the final product, having simply been the button pusher for my subconscious mind.

The creative process, I think, remains both intimate and alien for a large percentage of the people who engage in it. It's a familiar set of experiences that's never the same twice. An extremely active pursuit followed in a sort of haphazard, passive manner. Sort of like shooting baskets at a moving target with your eyes closed, with only muscle memory and vague sense of the space around you as your guides.

Case in point. I never would have guessed I'd be using basketball analogies by then end of this entry.