What I'm Working On
Last week a tragedy occurred. Someone I knew from college was killed. She was 22 years old, full of life, with the world ahead of her. And now she's gone. It's an absolute tragedy. No family should have to lose a daughter like that, and I'm trying to find some sort of positivity in the situation. What I found is a reminder that life is short. It can be ended at any moment, so if there is something you were planning on doing, you better do it now.
I try to write to get my thoughts out and articulate them better, but I've never shared them with the world too frequently. Now I'm going to start. If my blog gets popular, that's great, but the really important thing is for me to be able to formulate, and articulate my ideas better. Ideas are always great in your head, but as soon as you but the pen to paper, or say it out loud, or write that first line of code, things become a little more shaky. At first I was afraid of putting my ideas out there. I figured I could garner a mystique, where I only posted now and then, making the reader or viewer think I was high brow and doing better things. That was naive, and I'm now trying to get as much out there as possible. Every Kanye songs isn't great, in fact there are some duds, but he needed to make a whole bunch of songs to make a hit. That's my philosophy write now. Get my ideas out there, get some collaboration, and try to uncover something great.
What I'm working on now. During the day I'm an iOS developer at a company called Ladder. We're building a platform to transform the health and wellness industry through digital coaching. It's great, and gives me great experience working at a startup. What I'm really passionate about is AR. I'm currently building an AR app called Escape The Room, which as you've probably guessed, an Escape Room that takes place in your room. I've been working on it on nights and weekends since early September 2017, and there is so much to learn. From AR, to 3D modeling and texturing, to game development, marketing, and social media. Its been an awesome experience so far and I love coming home and being able to build something I'm really passionate about. I hope to launch the app in the coming months, and I'm adding a whole new aspect to my development approach.
From what I've researched, and my interactions with folks on Twitter, the hardest part about making a hit game isn't actually making it, it's selling it. How do you make something a hit? It's definitely a little bit of luck, but I think that we're able to put luck on our side. Marketing is huge, and in this digital age we have so many platforms to promote on. How to stand out? Right now I tweet, and post on Instagram and Facebook. My social media following is small, around 100 people at the time of writing this. How to grow this? What I'm going to do is start posting videos of my development process. What I'm working on, the 3D models I'm making, and any other bits of dev advice that people might find useful.
I'm not sure that anyone else out there has done something like this, and I know its a resource that I would have liked to see as I began this development process. For some organizations, secrecy is part of their brand (Apple, Valve, even Radiohead), but for someone starting out, secrecy can be your worst enemy. Just like with writing this blog, the worst thing isn't that what you're making stinks, its that no-one hears about it. I'll be posting my videos to YouTube, so be sure to follow me on Twitter so you can stay up to date!