Divinlog no. 4: a passion project, but also a side project
This is part of my series of devlogs about my upcoming tarot music game Divinuet. Read them all here!
Logo by Violet Eris
Sometimes people ask me if I have a release date planned for Divinuet. "I'm honestly not sure yet," I reply. "It's a side project, so how much work I'm able to do on it depends how much other work I have at any given time."
I started working on Divinuet a million years ago (in 2019), and I would not describe my progress as steady at all. It comes in spurts. There have been several months-long periods where I haven't worked on it at all, either because I was too busy or because, frankly, I was creatively burnt out. Working on a project this big, and for so long, is really, really hard.
It's difficult, I think, when your main job happens to also be doing something creative. Don't get me wrong, it's great! But I'm not in a situation where I sit around a boring job all day and then come home and do what I'm truly passionate about. I love composing music for films, games, podcasts, etc. a whole lot.* So I pour my whole heart into it, and I find that means I often don't have much energy left for Divinuet.
There's also the more practical matter of having bills to pay. So even if I hypothetically was working on a paid composing project that I didn't like, it would still be my first priority. I owe that to my clients, my bank account, and future Megan's professional reputation.
All that being said, I've been out of work for about a month and a half, which has sucked for a lot of reasons**. But it also means I've been able to fully throw myself into working on Divinuet. And that's been really nice, honestly!
I've made so much more progress than I thought was possible in such a short amount of time. The to-do list has shortened considerably. It's because I have a lot of free time, sure. But I think it's also because my creative energy isn't being used for any other things, so I'm working a lot more quickly than I usually do on Divinuet. It's been very cool! Reaching so many milestones feels really, really great.
But would I do this full-time if I could? I think probably not. I couldn't just stop composing for other people's projects indefinitely. That would make me sad.
But if I could take 6 months off to finish up Divinuet, knowing I'd have guaranteed work waiting for me when I was done? That'd be amazing! I actually like that idea a lot generally: mostly composing for other people's films/games/podcasts, and taking several months off once every few years to work on a personal project when the inspiration strikes.
But alas, that's not how life under capitalism works. So instead I have to work on Divinuet when I have time away from my actual work and hope it lines up with me feeling inspired to work on it.
It's not a perfect system, but it works.
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*Honestly I love it even more than I love working on Divinuet, if I were forced to rank them.
**Anyone want to hire me? I compose music for media, do audio implementation (I'm well-versed in both Wwise and FMOD), and I do arrangement/production for musicians. I also have a lot of experience with admin assistant type work, and I'm definitely open to doing that kind of work part-time as well (either remotely or in Chicago!)