I have a cheap coffee grinder specifically for (and labelled) grinding up dry curry spices.
I toast them whole in the vessel I'll be cooking in - generally cumin, coriander, clove, cinnamon, dried chili, mustard, fenugreek and black pepper, but whatever goes goes, you knows?
I pop them into the (metal) grinder and let them cool down a bit while I get the base meat and veg going.
If I'm making a dark curry, I oil the pan and lightly caramelize some sugar in it... lightly because there are still things to cook, and it will continue to darken.
From there, it gets a bit Hungarian:
If there's meat, that goes into the hot, oiled (and possibly caramel filled) pan first to brown, then the base veggies (onion, potato, hot pepper, maybe some carrot and mustard stalk), if I'm adding bay and garlic, they go in now too.
Once I'm happy with the browning/sauteeing of everything, I add my ground spices, enough water to cover everything, scrape the bottom of the pan, and let it reduce back to a paste, then I add my sauce base - tomato paste, mashed spinach, coconut, carrot or pumpkin puree, whatever. If it needs water to cook for half an hour or so, I add it.
About 5-10 mins before it's done, I'll add any finishing touches like cream, ghee, anise root, more chilies, salt, pepper, that kind of thing.