Building Fragments — A Process

A creative process

Something I really wanted to share with you is my own process or framework for creative coding. It's something that I've developed over a few years that really works for me. Hopefully if you need some inspiration, or some direction, then maybe it, or parts of it, can work for you too.

It's all centred around five pretty broad points:

• Inspiration
• Functional knowledge
• Experimentation
• Repetition
• Rest and digest

Inspiration

This first step is all about figuring out why you want to create. It's absolutely paramount that you find something that you're actually interested in. If you can't get excited about it, you most likely won't want to spend time on it. That's certainly been true for me.

Inspiration can come in many forms: a photo, a video, a sound, a texture, a concept, or just a drive to create. Inspiration is your unique voice to help you create.

Functional knowledge

I think in a world where there are just so many amazing artists and creators, it's easy to be intimidated, or lose enthusiasm for something if you aren't an expert in the subject. It's easy to feel like you're not good enough when you compare yourself to your idols. I feel it all the time, so I needed to find a way to shift my thinking, and not try to achieve perfection, but to be authentic and true to myself.

So instead of striving to become an expert, I strive to have just enough knowledge to be functional and effective with the technology I'm trying to use. Even a small bit of knowledge can compound into creating something unique. Some of the amazing things you can create are the interplay between different techniques, or the unexpected results of a simple change.

Experimentation

For me, experimentation is the joy of discovery in a modern age. Stumbling across something you've never seen before, or fumbling your way into a happy accident is one of the most satisfying and exciting feelings for me - like I'm forging new ground, or discovering something novel. I crave and chase that feeling wherever I can. Embrace the chaos and just try stuff - it's a great way to go.

Repetition and consistency

I'll let you in on a secret that has taken me over 20 years to realise: The key to getting better at your craft - or anything really - is intentional practice, and consistency.

I have a young kid, a full-time job, a mortgage - all the things. It's hard to find the time to practice, and even more difficult to visualise yourself improving. But even spending as little as 5 or 10 minutes a day, or every other day either focusing on something, or practicing something with intention is enough to dramatically improve your skills. You'll look back in a month, and be shocked how far you've come by just doing a little something every day.

Rest and digest

Something I think is often overlooked is the importance of downtime - letting your body and mind rest and digest. How many times have you been completely stuck on something, only to have the solution, or an idea just pop into your head when you're doing something completely different like going for a walk or taking a shower? That's your brain subconsciously processing what you've been working on - it's an extremely powerful and underrated trait that you can actually take advantage of.

Sometimes I like to think of my brain like I would a muscle - you put it under some stress, then give it some time to recover and it gets stronger. It's not exactly like that, but you get the picture.

Remember, progress is not linear - we can't just go from A-Z in a day. Making sure we practice when we can, but also give our brains time to rest and fully recover is key to getting lasting results.

This is just a really brief summary of my process, which I get into in quite a bit more detail in Fragments as its own section. I think this is a really important aspect of what Fragments is, so I wanted to spend some time to write about it.

Launch in (Early?) August

So, I'm really excited to announce that my current plan is to launch Fragments early in August! Over the few couple of weeks, I'll be working on finishing the landing page of the website, making sure all the membership stuff is working properly (harder than it sounds) and sharing some more things in the newsletter. It's really exciting to be so close to launching this thing, I really hope you'll like what I've been working on!