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Ask HN: As an engineer what art forms should I learn

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11–20 of 20 posts

Re: Ask HN: As an engineer what art forms should I learn

#11
Why not give expressive dance a try?

Something like "Ausdruckstanz" would be interesting. You could fuse this with modern dance styles such as body popping. You could also fold in some programming references mid dance and shout stuff out like 'Null pointer!' , 'statically typed!'

Re: Ask HN: As an engineer what art forms should I learn

#14
I vote woodworking. It uses both your body and mind. It teaches you to quintuple check your work before cutting. In programming, mistakes are cheap. In woodworking, mistakes are best avoided. It also gets you on your feet handling large/heavy pieces of wood which does wonders for improving core strength and ...gracefulness. It also gives confidence and the ability to shape the world around you.

Some downsides are the learning curve, startup costs, time you will have to spend setting up your shop, and sharp spinning blades. No matter how good you get there's always a chance for a mistake. If I were rich I'd using nothing but sawstop or at the very least kregjig stuff.

Re: Ask HN: As an engineer what art forms should I learn

#16
Try a bunch of different art practices, and see which one sticks.

Painting, working with clay, and sculpture (wood, metal, found materials, etc) are what I enjoy.

You'll know you find what you enjoy when you hit the "flow state", which is very similar to hitting a stride programming.

Re: Ask HN: As an engineer what art forms should I learn

#18
I really enjoy baking as a creative outlet because:

- Projects are always short, ranging from ~30 minutes for really simple cookies to ~2 days when ingredients need to rest at an intermediate state for extended periods.

- You have to work within constraints (whatever you consider delicious), but you can incorporate basically anything edible into a project, so there's a lot of room for creative expression.

- Coworkers, neighbors, and casual acquaintances react really positively when you bake too much and give away the overage.

Re: Ask HN: As an engineer what art forms should I learn

#19
I've recently taken up weaving and it's a lot of fun. You can start simple with a frame loom and do more tapestry stuff. I picked up a rigid heddle loom and have done a few fun projects on it. Soon I'm going to build a 4 shaft loom.

Weaving has a lot of patterning and strikes, for me, the perfect balance between "I need to pay attention to what I'm doing" and hit a rhythm and zone out. Plus the Jacquard loom was had a lot of influnce on Babbage's Analytical Engine!

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