i just need to make something
i keep putting off making anything in part bc i can never decide what to focus on and in part bc i can never decide on what tools to use to make it.
i made a lot of stuff with fabric but right now i can't afford it and if i was going to spend money on fabric atm,,,,,i'd probably use it to make some more clothes bc i am running out of clothes that fit me and again i am skint.
and i keep thinking of something i want to work on, only to realise that i need something that involves more money or energy than i currently have. i started learning javascript bc i wanted to use it to make zines n learn p5.js n that and then i got really sidetracked by just like learning about tech stuff (see the aforementioned point about not being able to focus on owt)
i've been thinking a lot about like lifelong learning and creating syllabi. i started looking at making a zine or something following this along (the radical education workbook) or something similar but i ended up in a pdf archiving hell and now i am fairly certain i have the library of alexandria saved in my proton drive. i also haven't been totally feeling trying to make like capital A Art about it?
i've been reading a lot and listening to a lot of audiobooks and what is technically a podcast but in a way that's not like a podcast.
making zines,,,,in vscode??
so i started wanting to make zines, which made led me to paged.js and p5.js, which took me on a bit of a tech-tangent and now i am alas, a real nerd about it.
so i started wanting to redo my website but like make it myself rather than using one of those services that lets you build a website by dragging stuff about - all the ones i tried post-finding-out-that-wix-has-ties-to-israel didn't work quite the way i wanted. cargo was the closest but then also i got a bit skint and wasn't a student anymore so lost out on that discount rip
i feel like if ides n text editors n code editors n all that worked the same way starsigns do i would probably have some vim in my chart - one downside of my journey into learning about all this stuff instead of just like making a zine is that i ended up deep in the sort of youtube where people argue over which program is best to write code in - i feel like my vibe would be very vim but alas i have ended up as a vscode user
but ye basically tldr i realised i could just like make zines on my website and then we started getting into self-hosting and having a solar-powered website and the low-tech webring and all that and i think that's where i started maybe going a bit mad?
so i'd like to start working on getting my website all set up n i thought it would be cool to set it up a) all self-hosted with a little like solar-powered server coz that sounds proper cute if i'm honest and b) so i can write and make my zines on my website or at least some of them n then the zines are part of the website but they're also printable as books but they're also written in code (i know it's markdown shut up) and that as a general vibe feels v cute and cool and i am into it generally and this is clearly a great review of that concept
i've basically started a lil wishlist of the equipment recommended by https://solarprotocol.net/guides.html so hopefully one day my websites and zines and anything else i wanna make online can maybe be hosted via the solar protocol.
this is maybe more than i know how to explain at this point bc it is several hundreds of pounds so,,,,,i don't need to learn that yet but i am working on the assumption (adhd/gay audacity) that i will just be able to learn it lmao
the next thing or i guess the first thing? idk i'm doing this (as in i am writing these words in vscode atm) before doing all that self-hosting/solar-power stuff and this is maybe not the best way to order things but:
i'm at a point in my journey-to-bein-a-tech-bro where i,,,,kinda understand the paged.js documention - in that i can add it to my website in vscode and hopefully (assuming someone else is successfully reading this) use it to make zines :)
paged.js
Paged.js is a free and open source JavaScript library that paginates content in the browser to create PDF output from any HTML content. This means you can design works for print (eg. books) using HTML and CSS!
^ all that is from paged.js's documentation/about page :) basically it's a js library (so like a bit of code i can add to my website) that lets me make a zine by making a new html file n adding a media query in the css for a page (so like,,,,setting up how everything looks but using html/css rather than indesign)
i wanted to make this little zine in part as a test of a new way of making zines, but also bc it fits into a wider consideration or new direction i want to take my "art practice" in.
in what seems to be symptomatic of a pathological aversion to making decisions that would grant me financial security, all my fav ways of Making Art™ are either vvv spenny or do not pay yr bills.