Then I sit at the keyboard, open a document and let my fingers go. Silly me, all this time I thought ideas came from my brain.
Saturday, April 30, 2011
Idea
Then I sit at the keyboard, open a document and let my fingers go. Silly me, all this time I thought ideas came from my brain.
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14 comments:
So true, Petrea. Actually, I have a folder in my pc where I put all my ideas when I'm too creative. So, in a period of "famine" I open the folder and try to continue a story.
Inspiration comes from the strangest places, Petrea. I keep a little moleskine notebook with me all the time and jot down everything before I forget it.
That's a fabulous photo. It looks like the leaf has exploded or been zapped by some alien ray.
Cool!
I love this photo too! In photography and in writing, they say it's all in the details.
What an excellent idea, Italo, speaking of ideas.
I have notebooks with me everywhere, Dive--purse, bedside, toilet-side, car. I tend to be so obsessed with whatever story I'm working on that I don't get ideas for new stories while I'm immersed, so when one is finished I flail a bit, looking for the next.
I'm glad you like the shot.
It is, isn't it, Elaine? That's why I stand around, pointing my camera at the sidewalk.
I thought at first that this must be a J.S. photo, but I see now that I was mistaken. You have learned well, grasshopper.
Leaf as light bulb. That's what I call creative spark.
I have lots of ideas, but couldn't transform them into a novel with different characters, subplots, twists, turns, and a decent, not too predictable ending. And then there's the worry that someone's already used your plot line and will sue you for copying.
Thank you, Cliff. High praise indeed.
I like that, Susan. I hadn't thought of it that way, speaking of creative.
Not to worry, Bellis. Write it down. You can't be sued for copying unless you actually copy--like sentences and paragraphs. Too many plotlines are too similar for the courts to bother with them.
I do the same, but with a sketchbook. I've carried one ever since college. Even if I put in a lot of bad ideas, there will be a few good ones that will be useful.
Now I'm trying to learn to do it with a notebook. I'm not a fiction kind of person, though. When I finally think of a way I want to word a transition or description, I try to write it down ASAP! or it leaves, usually forever.
With both, I seem to end up with a series of notions to build on. I guess I'm happy doing just about anything that involves spiral-bound paper and a blue BIC pen.
Idea sounds like a store styled by a Europeean culture so rarified & sophisticated that it sells only the inspiration for home furnishings (Platonic Essence of a Colander on sale this week at Idea!).
Do you keep a sketchpad on your nightstand, Speedway? Sometimes I can't read my notes in the morning. Might make for interesting drawings, though.
J...and they'd name the products things like "Thot," "Consept" and "Purplex." There would be umlauts all over the place.
Petrea, this photograph leaped into my mind at first viewing and has since made itself quite at home. I believe this to be your most successful venture into the world of small and/or graphic. John excels at both of these, which is why at first I thought it his, but a day later, I see more.
The compositional elements are as strong as John's often are, but achieved differently and to different ends: a centered subject suggests intense scrutiny, rather than passing whimsy or hurried glance, as if under a microscope; strong forms dominate, not for their own sake (nor as platonic essences!), but to uncover both individuality and universality (the leaf's uniqueness diffuses first to regularity, then to uniformity); strong contrast segments the scene and gives it textures, but is not from variance of light and shadow, emerging directly from the processes of life in a sun-baked* world.
This image is a great example of why I hate the term "rules of composition." A centered subject in full sun sounds like an open-and-shut case for a photography judge. Instead, we have a perfect argument for freedom of speech.
*Petrea's term for her own work when looking a photograph of mine that I took with her style in mind.
What Cliff said.
Cliff, I'm going to read that again in the morning when I've had some sleep and some coffee and a chance to look up a few things in the dictionary. Thanks.
I once had the good fortune to study with the great British actress, Fiona Shaw, for one short week. Besides being a brilliant classical actor (for which she should be world famous) and Harry Potter's evil aunt (for which she is), she's a daring and memorable teacher. One of the many things I learned from her is that the play happens not on the stage with the actors, nor in the audience, where you sit and watch, but somewhere in between, where the two of you meet. Each individual has a different experience of it. That's what makes it art.
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