Pick a small topic for your creative project

Whenever I work on a creative project (often), I first remember Gunpei's advice:

枯れた技術の水平思考

or

"Lateral thinking with withered technology"

Build something unique and innovative using widely available, likely outdated, but understood technology to surprise and delight.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gunpei_Yokoi

Work with the medium.

Back when I started programming, I wanted graphics modes that didn't exist, higher res, more colors, more cpu power. What I didn't realize was that I was creating problems that were largely out of my control. I should have worked with the existing medium and embraced what was possible.

If you have a big project in mind, you can get started by creating a small project focused on an aspect of your bigger project. Since examples were missing from the op's article, lets make one up. Suppose you want to create a site about presidents of the United States. Start with a smaller project that focuses on one president or on a group of presidents. For instance, the first three presidents. Or, if you prefer a technical example, suppose you want to create site on networking. Begin by creating a site on HTTP.

I like the topic/contribution volume animation, and I think the idea is an important one.

When I told her I was starting a PhD, Linda Rising said to remember that "You don't have to drain the swamp, you just have to kill one alligator." I keep the quote on my wall.

Why do we even need to finish it? Finishing a project is in itself a choice. I mean, like the article says, you might end at a ton of research and you might not get far on your new OS per se, but if that's what you want to work on, the more power to you. Never underestimate your ability to learn when you're trying to actually build something.

If there is a deadline, or if there are other requirements, then let size be determined by those. Just sounds like the author is frustrated with his unfinished projects. Personally, I wouldn't be. I've got a ton.

Best example on why this advice is useful is probably Mushroom Kingdom Fusion. The fan game was designed to be the 'ultimate' video game. Hundreds of levels, about 30 playable characters, tens of power ups, tons of different graphics, hundreds of enemies and bosses and a soundtrack to rival Super Smash Bros.

Eventually it crashed and burned hard, because the codebase because almost impossible to debug and the game ridiculously unbalanced because it tried to be everything to everyone.

I also think this game (Tobias and the Dark Sceptre) is a good example to bring up in regards to giant topics and insane levels of ambition. It finally got finished, but it did spent 13 years in development because of it:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2b0tSu0QDQ0

That said (and I'm probably going to be seen as insane for saying this)... I'd prefer more people followed their dreams and tried to be ambitious than that we got a bunch of 'safe' projects in every area. It may take time. It may sometimes literally take decades. But whether it's research, article writing, game development, programming or business, I still have a lot of admiration for the people willing to put everything into a ridiculously overambitious and unlikely project on the off chance it might work out.

Nice visuals, and probably a good suggestion from the article. But it really lacks an example, because it's not clear at all what does author mean by "creative project" here.

Consider a project that is small, based on idea that's big.

Projects often end up being bigger than you plan, and you don't want to end up in a big project based on a small idea.

I'd love to build a creative project that can identify superfluous animated gifs and hide them.

I gave up on reading the article. The gifs are too distracting and annoying.