Snowflake Challenge: Day Three
Jan. 3rd, 2015 12:46 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
kiki_engIn your own space, talk about your creative process - from what inspires you to what motivates you to how you manage to break through blocks. Does your process change depending on the type of creating you're doing? Leave a comment in this post saying you did it. Include a link to your post if you feel comfortable doing so.
I tend not to spend time thinking about my creative process, so writing about this is slightly more challenging than other things might be.
Recs are sort of just how I work. I rec because I see links between fanworks or because I want to share something with someone or because I've decided that I want to post a journal entry and I've decided that it's going to be a rec or because I want to do a reccing thing. There are some things where I'm looking for a fanwork to complete a rec set, where I'm not actively searching, but someday I will maybe find it and then make that rec set. A lot of times I'll decide to do something, open a bunch of bookmarked fanworks in tabs and then narrow through them until there's only three or four, figure out an order that makes sense to me, then start writing the recs from the top. (Somewhere in there re-reading or viewing or listening happens, at least once, often more than once.) Why or what I want to do with a rec set matters a lot and changes the process.
I probably have, like, forty fannish projects that I want to complete - recs and fics and other things - so, if I'm having issues I'll generally shelve something for later and pick up something else to work on.
Writing fic for a deadline is different. In an exchange, I start with my recipient's preferences, review the canon with that in mind, mull things over for a bit, brainstorm, then write. The brainstorming usually flows into writing. A lot of times I just start writing things and eventually something will stick and I'll end up writing that story. Sometimes I have a plan. Usually it's sort of a combination.
I like exchanges and deadlines because they make me write things and that generally gets me into a sort of writing zone, where I will write things without deadlines after. Challenges are also good for that. Prompts can also be inspiring.
There are a chunk of stories that I want to write that don't start off tied to a fandom, so, I know what tropes or tone or the rough plot I want to do, and then I'll think about how to do that and build the story around that, like: I want there to be more woke-up-married femslash fic. I think I've read one, ever. > That is a thing I'm going to have to do myself, isn't it? Yep. > Leverage? No. White Collar? No. Calvin and Hobbes? Susie Derkins/Rosalyn where they both go into academia and there's a conference in Vegas that they're both presenting papers at and then they... not go with it, but they can't annul it for some reason. They decide that it would look too bad, Rosalyn's going for tenure and doesn't want any shit attached to her and maybe coworker that she doesn't actually like ended up being her witness and he's totally telling everyone, so it's not like a quiet annulment is on the table here, and Susie's working on her Master's or PhD or something, and Susie would totally not go with that shit without a reason, so she would maybe have really, really liked Rosalyn and allowed herself to be persuaded because she's fucking charmed against her will and, yeah, it's only temporary, and she would be internally cursing her decisions a lot, *head-desking* or maybe she got into an argument with Calvin and she opened her mouth and said something really stupid and now she feels obligated to see this thing through. OR, there's that scavenger hunt marriage that turns into more fic that I want to exist. [U of Chicago runs a giant one and some people have actually gotten (briefly) legally married to check off a thing on the list] I want the one where they end up staying married and it turns into more. So I would have to research how that paperwork actually works, but: University AU, Shenanigans. Shenanigans and then love. So, bandom? Greta is actually a Chicago person. So, pair her with Victoria or Z Berg? With Victoria I can have her hanging out with Cobra Starship people and with Z I can do The Like and Panic and her and Ryan and Jon being friends? Probably they would have signed up together. How many people do you need on a team for this thing? So, yeah, Greta/Z-Berg... okay, that's odd. It happens because of Pete? Or maybe Jon? IDK. Probably Pete, but Greta and Z end up on the same team, and they get along because... > *goes to youtube for Greta interviews since I don't know her as well* > look, there's a thing on the first page... they seem really different. I could maybe do something with that Joni Mitchell bit? Like, that sort of works with the way Z Berg's solo stuff is. Greta used to hang out in graveyards. Okay, a graveyard, that's a thing that could be useful. So... I could see them not getting along at first. Greta sort of seems like she might sit at the front of class and Z not so much, despite being really, really into books and stuff, so they might write each other off or rub each other the wrong way at first before figuring out all of the things that they have in common . ...Greta knows Michael Runion and has performed Suicide Pact. *listens to both versions*.
Anyway, yeah, I don't want to do the canon review that I'd have to if I was writing Calvin and Hobbes, so if I actually did this I would write the Z/Greta fic. There's apparently just one fic with that ship up on AO3, so it would be cool for there to be more, and I just wrote a story with Z Berg in it, so that would be way easier. ...and then I would do canon review and start plotting and writing. I do think that the Calvin and Hobbes fic would be a lot of fun, but: work.
...and I feel like I have written enough, if slightly randomly, about my creative process.
I tend not to spend time thinking about my creative process, so writing about this is slightly more challenging than other things might be.
Recs are sort of just how I work. I rec because I see links between fanworks or because I want to share something with someone or because I've decided that I want to post a journal entry and I've decided that it's going to be a rec or because I want to do a reccing thing. There are some things where I'm looking for a fanwork to complete a rec set, where I'm not actively searching, but someday I will maybe find it and then make that rec set. A lot of times I'll decide to do something, open a bunch of bookmarked fanworks in tabs and then narrow through them until there's only three or four, figure out an order that makes sense to me, then start writing the recs from the top. (Somewhere in there re-reading or viewing or listening happens, at least once, often more than once.) Why or what I want to do with a rec set matters a lot and changes the process.
I probably have, like, forty fannish projects that I want to complete - recs and fics and other things - so, if I'm having issues I'll generally shelve something for later and pick up something else to work on.
Writing fic for a deadline is different. In an exchange, I start with my recipient's preferences, review the canon with that in mind, mull things over for a bit, brainstorm, then write. The brainstorming usually flows into writing. A lot of times I just start writing things and eventually something will stick and I'll end up writing that story. Sometimes I have a plan. Usually it's sort of a combination.
I like exchanges and deadlines because they make me write things and that generally gets me into a sort of writing zone, where I will write things without deadlines after. Challenges are also good for that. Prompts can also be inspiring.
There are a chunk of stories that I want to write that don't start off tied to a fandom, so, I know what tropes or tone or the rough plot I want to do, and then I'll think about how to do that and build the story around that, like: I want there to be more woke-up-married femslash fic. I think I've read one, ever. > That is a thing I'm going to have to do myself, isn't it? Yep. > Leverage? No. White Collar? No. Calvin and Hobbes? Susie Derkins/Rosalyn where they both go into academia and there's a conference in Vegas that they're both presenting papers at and then they... not go with it, but they can't annul it for some reason. They decide that it would look too bad, Rosalyn's going for tenure and doesn't want any shit attached to her and maybe coworker that she doesn't actually like ended up being her witness and he's totally telling everyone, so it's not like a quiet annulment is on the table here, and Susie's working on her Master's or PhD or something, and Susie would totally not go with that shit without a reason, so she would maybe have really, really liked Rosalyn and allowed herself to be persuaded because she's fucking charmed against her will and, yeah, it's only temporary, and she would be internally cursing her decisions a lot, *head-desking* or maybe she got into an argument with Calvin and she opened her mouth and said something really stupid and now she feels obligated to see this thing through. OR, there's that scavenger hunt marriage that turns into more fic that I want to exist. [U of Chicago runs a giant one and some people have actually gotten (briefly) legally married to check off a thing on the list] I want the one where they end up staying married and it turns into more. So I would have to research how that paperwork actually works, but: University AU, Shenanigans. Shenanigans and then love. So, bandom? Greta is actually a Chicago person. So, pair her with Victoria or Z Berg? With Victoria I can have her hanging out with Cobra Starship people and with Z I can do The Like and Panic and her and Ryan and Jon being friends? Probably they would have signed up together. How many people do you need on a team for this thing? So, yeah, Greta/Z-Berg... okay, that's odd. It happens because of Pete? Or maybe Jon? IDK. Probably Pete, but Greta and Z end up on the same team, and they get along because... > *goes to youtube for Greta interviews since I don't know her as well* > look, there's a thing on the first page... they seem really different. I could maybe do something with that Joni Mitchell bit? Like, that sort of works with the way Z Berg's solo stuff is. Greta used to hang out in graveyards. Okay, a graveyard, that's a thing that could be useful. So... I could see them not getting along at first. Greta sort of seems like she might sit at the front of class and Z not so much, despite being really, really into books and stuff, so they might write each other off or rub each other the wrong way at first before figuring out all of the things that they have in common . ...Greta knows Michael Runion and has performed Suicide Pact. *listens to both versions*.
Anyway, yeah, I don't want to do the canon review that I'd have to if I was writing Calvin and Hobbes, so if I actually did this I would write the Z/Greta fic. There's apparently just one fic with that ship up on AO3, so it would be cool for there to be more, and I just wrote a story with Z Berg in it, so that would be way easier. ...and then I would do canon review and start plotting and writing. I do think that the Calvin and Hobbes fic would be a lot of fun, but: work.
...and I feel like I have written enough, if slightly randomly, about my creative process.
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Date: 2015-01-03 07:20 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2015-01-03 09:31 pm (UTC)