Analyzing The 4 Steps In The Creative Process

Today we’re analyzing the 4 Steps of The Creative Process that the ‘experts’ say there is.

Sadly, I find more information on the creative process from people who don’t do a lot of art than those that do.

So we’re going to examine the very analytical take on the steps in the creative process by the researchers in the field.

A huge frustrating component to this were the articles I found on creativity and the creative process from these researchers.

They all sounded alike.

In fact, they sited the same 4 steps to the creative process. It became clear they all just copy and pasted an article from one site (run by researchers and not artists) and copied it into another site (run by researchers and not artists).

Below are the 4 steps the researchers say are part of the creative process;

Preparation

1 – Doing research, collect information and data. The Preparation phase is basically a research stage of collecting information or data. Reference here.

Incubation

2 – This phase involves your conscious and subconscious minds. They work on the idea simultaneously. Your brain is making new connections, asking what might work or not. It’s visualizing, separating out unnecessary thoughts, and searching for other ideas. Reference here.

Illumination

3 – The Illumination phase, is in essence, the “lightbulb” moment.

Which personally, I’m not sure what that means. In my experience, sometimes you get that moment and sometimes you don’t. The rest of the time you just chip away at it until it’s done. Reference here.

Verification

4 – Basically the verification stage is the testing of the idea to determine its validity. The art is then executed I suppose. It just doesn’t work that way all the time. Not for me anyway. Reference here.

Personally I find it very beneficial to get a fairly clear picture of what I want to do with a piece of art in my head first before I start working on it.

It doesn’t always turn out that way, but it helps. It gives me a direction.

Whenever I’ve tried to start an art project without a somewhat clear, fleshed out image in my head… it took forever! I would get stuck. I didn’t know what to do next. The process dragged on.

From what I have heard of other artists, they to tend to have an idea of what they want the piece to look like when finished. This would make sense. It’s how anything comes into manifestation.

A human being visualizes something, takes steps to turn that thought into a physical reality and it either becomes something physically or it doesn’t. The final outcome may not be what the initial idea was. Sometimes it’s better. Other times worse. Sometimes it’s about right.

Of course, things change along the way. However, in most cases, a strong piece of art starts with a clear internal image in an artists mind.

I will say I’m quite skeptical about the above 4 steps to the creative process as described by the researchers. Mostly because I think I experience them differently that what they describe.

The 3 Phases of The Creative Process

One concept I have heard many, many artists talk about is how they feel about their art.

It usually starts off where they are very excited about their idea. They start their piece of art (or story) and things start to roll along and all is good. It’s looking good. They’re feeling good.

THEN… about half way through, they decide it’s garbage. It’s terrible. What were they thinking? Yuck! Then they keep going.

Finally, they come to the end of it thinking, that’s alright. I like it.

These 3 phases of the creative process are what I’ve experience many, many times. THESE are the phases that are what I would consider ‘normal’ to the creative process and for any type of artist or creative person.

So if you’ve noticed yourself going through these phases then congratulations, you are really dealing with the creative process.

If you find you’re spending a lot of time researching, incubating, seeking that moment of illumination and ultimately trying to verify the idea, I would say there is a glitch in your creative process.

It certainly seems that way to me by the researchers’ definition.

So, I hope this article has given you some clarity or insight into your creative process or the creative process in general.