The Creative Process #26 - Ride the Tsunami

The last two newsletters I mentioned that I was in a creative ebb and was preparing for the flow back in. I didn’t realise it was drawing back strength to bring in a tsunami.

August has been many months.

Funny Little Guy

It’s been two years and two months since I started this newsletter. The importance of this is not just a Seinfeldian “Don’t Break the Chain!”, but that I started it just before the birth of my baby boy. He’s two now and it’s a delightful age. He’s talking and getting stuck into learning colours, countdowns and recognizing animals and vehicles. We watch a lot of space shuttle launch compilations on YouTube.

He had a great birthday. He and I got up perhaps too early on his birthday and he opened some of his presents. He seemed to get it and was delighted. He thoroughly loved having “Happy Birthday” sung to him. His mum made him a superb rocket cake which I joked was a little like a lighthouse. My son, unprompted, shouted from across the room, pointing, “ROCKET!!!” He did well for himself.

He’s in a stage of not sleeping well by himself. He’s improving, but most nights a parent co-sleeps with him. Which suuuuucks because he headbutts you, or plays with your face, or donks the wall, or blocks you from rolling over.

But to bring this back to creativity, he’s been able to teach me to try to chill out, accept the moment and revel in the good stuff. I don’t like waking at 5am, but I do like tickle battles and laughing together. I don’t like getting my creative time at night disrupted, but it helps me recognize when I’m myself disrupting my creative work by playing zombie games instead of doing the things I yearn to do.

He’s a funny little guy, different in many years to his big sister, but I’m so glad they’re in my life.

Though, I admit, I’d love a thorough sleep in.

IF Comp

On top of this month’s canvas of broken sleep, Book Week costume parades, and pint-sized marvels, I’ve been busy this month. Last year The Powers That Be decided to move the Interactive Fiction Comp up a month to give Ectocomp some breathing room. I volunteered to help behind the scenes, which has been fun. I got to work with and help out some names that loom large for me in the Interactive Fiction community. They’re all just people, but it’s nice to hang out and find ways to be useful.

I also did some beta-testing — one game much more thoroughly than another. Beta-testing can be quite interesting. You can see how they have effortlessly leaped over a problem that you might have had, or you look at what they have and wish you could give advice something akin to the joke about getting directions to Aberdeen: “Well, I wouldn’t start from here.” I think both games should do well in the Comp.

I hope to review a whole bunch of games in the comp, but we’ll see if that dream survives the encounter with September.

AI Rascal

There was an epic thread of conversation over on the Interactive Fiction forums: AI in Competitions. IF Comp had announced that entries should declare any use of generative AI, be it cover art, game art, music or text. This was just for judges to make an informed choice, since some people are quite allergic to anything AI.

Anyway, the discussion opened the can of worms whether competitions should regulate or ban AI use. All the usual arguments came out.

My personal views on generative AI have changed over time. I’m not particularly gung-ho on its use, and have stopped using it to illustrate my newsletter. I’m not against it, though. There’s an ethical dimension that remains complicated, but to me, the main ethical debt is in the hands of those who profit from selling the generated products without compensating their sources. I think the existence of these products makes it harder for artists to earn a living, but I think the long-term trajectory is probably not doom. Probably? Or more that it’s the corporations that will bring doom, not AI itself.

In any case, I feel like I’m reasonably informed about artists (trying to make art myself and having commissioned a number), and I’m reasonably informed about AI. The discussions on the forums weren’t as good as they could be.

My spiritual role model is a guy called Alan Watts, who was an English philosopher who did a great job popularising Eastern traditions. He would give talks in a way not of a preacher or a teacher, but - as he put it - a rascal. This is a strong flavour of a certain kind of Zen. And punk rock. And the trickster. In amongst his wisdom, you would be left with a feeling that throughout he was somewhat pulling your leg. Using humour as a way to jolt you out of your trammelled thinking. Using rhetorical traps that force you to grapple with a truth.

Anyway, I like his style and occasionally try to emulate it in spirit. My contributions to the AI in Competitions thread were in that rascal nature. I wanted to highlight the weird economics in the discussion like throwing away AI by supporting artists to the tune of $20 a piece, or the asymmetry of how negatively AI art is valued and how little paid art is. And the common rejoinder from skilled artists to just “make art”. All silly points made with a touch of irony, but different from the routine arguments that come up in this topic.

But I am a mere fumbling idiot when you compare to kaemi’s masterful contribution.

Making Your Own Art

For many reasons though, this month I was eager to improve my artistic skills. For my next project Anne of Green Cables I want to add in some art to my game.

When I was free and diligent this month, I got back into Blender 3d art, trying to make some cyberpunk artwork for Anne. I had an idea for a cityscape shot and spent a long time in geometry nodes trying to build it up. Geometry nodes is basically like simplified programming for geometry. To build a window you start with a cube, inset a square on one face, extrude it inwards, apply materials to different bits, assemble a few cubes into a windowsill…

I have experimented with this in the past, but this month I managed to make an okay building generator.

I also made a neat-looking cyberpunk building:

While the geometry for these ended up not too bad, the materials and composition just plain sucked. So I have a lot to learn. In my mind’s eye I can see the scene, but just can’t make it. But this is okay. I’m learning.

Stemming from this, I wanted to sketch a few of my ideas for images in Anne. And I remembered that I suck at sketching. To remedy this I bought a few sketch tutorial books (How to Draw and You Will Be Able To Draw Faces By the End of This Book, both by Jake Spicer and recommended by Reddit’s /r/learnart) and a minimal set of new pencils and a mini sketch book. Every day I try to do 15-30 minutes of mindful sketching, mostly over my lunch break.

I’ve been sharing some of the results with the NeoInteractive Discord, but trying not to spam people too much with my amateur attempts. I have a lot to learn and am just taking it slowly. I got some good tips from fellow IF writer mathbrush.

I did a course from Drawing on the Right Side of Your Brain back when I was first dating my now wife. I drew a picture of her that she still has up on the bookshelf. I’m hoping to reclaim some of that skill and improve from there.

Anne of Green Cables

All this artwork is secondary to me actually working on my next big IF piece, Anne of Green Cables. I’ve been getting back into the vibe of it, and continuing to listen to the audiobook of the first novel. I never would have thought of how hilarious the book is. I’m taking copious notes on Montgomery’s style of acerbic wit, softened by the occasional indulgement in naturalistic beauty. And then trying to figure out how to do that in a cyberpunk setting.

I had a tiny offshoot from the discussions of AI and crediting artwork in that I again looked into the legal situation of Anne of Green Gables. Copyright is weird, y’all.

The original novel Anne of Green Gables is in the public domain. You can package it up and sell it on Amazon. I think that’s how a few of the copies I bought came to be. Specific instances of Anne Shirley might be copyrighted (so one can’t just sell bootleg copies of Netflix’s Anne with an E).

Lucy Maud Montgomery is one of Canada’s best-known writers, and her legacy has transformed Prince Edward Island. The heirs to her estate and the Province of Price Edward Island have amalgamated to control licensing of her image. While I think they are predominantly focussed on big TV shows and movies, they are doing their best to preserve the legacy.

It’s hard to say what that means for my project, which is basically a fan fiction work, reimagining the original in a cyberpunk setting. Does this require licensing, especially since I intend it to not make any money? What does it mean to preserve Anne when the entire point of my project is to move her to a completely different setting? Given the wild embrace and reinterpretation of Anne in Japanese culture, have they already lost control?

I’ve contacted two people (one from the Heirs of L.M. Montgomery, and one from the Prince Edward Island government) for advice, but they haven’t responded yet. I certainly want to respect the original (and not get into trouble). Reading through Montgomery’s own battles with publishers and copyright is sobering, though.

I’ve floated the idea of “what if they say no with some legal power?” I’m not sure. I could rejig the game with the newfound freedom and make a generic cyberpunk game, but it loses a central idea I’m playing with.

I know IF Comp have explored this realm of fan fiction adaptations, and asked a lawyer for advice. But every case is different. I don’t want to invest a lot of time based on a blind hope and then have tungsten rods of lawyers drop from space to destroy me.

A Koan

My philosophy through this month of excitement, new ventures and worry comes again from a koan recounted by Alan Watts:

It’s said one day Confucius was standing by a river where there was a tremendous cataract plunging down. And he suddenly saw an old man coming out of the forest who fell into the river, and suddenly disappeared into the cataract. And he said, “Oh dear! Too bad. Probably some old fellow tired of life who wanted to put an end to it all.” The next moment, way downstream, the old man gets out of the water and starts bouncing along. And Confucius is amazed. And he sends one of his disciples to catch this fellow before he disappears. He said, “Sir, I was thinking that you were going to commit suicide. And I suddenly find that you came out of that cataract alive. Do you have some special method by which you do this?” “No, I have no special method,” said the old man. “I just go in with a whirl and come out with a swirl, because I don’t resist the water, I entirely identify myself with water.” So, you see, here he is, utterly relaxed, just rolling around in the torrent, and not resisting in any way—and so he is preserved. He goes with the stream, rolls with the punch, or whatever you want to call it.

This is a rascal’s way of suggesting that despite the chaos of life, the best you can do is to go with it. If you have to swirl, swirl. If you have to whirl, whirl. And if you have to make art, make art.