Inspiration & Influences

Anyone who works in any form of creative medium will tell you the importance of research, inspiration and the influences for their work. From the people who inspire us, to the things we search for ourselves, to the little things that come to us every day.

So what influences me?

When I was young, anime had just been brought over to the west for kids' TV. Shows like Pokemon, Digimon, Sailor Moon and several others were the highlight of many kids' evenings. Mine included. But it wasn't until near the end of Digimon's series one run time that I actually started drawing. At the time I wanted to draw a favourite Digimon of mine, Puppetmon. My sister was the best artist in our family, along with her friend Liz, but they didn't want to do things for me, so they taught me the basics of how to draw in a somewhat Asian-themed style. Through most of primary school I drew like that.

This didn't change until I joined a homework club in secondary school, where I was introduced to webcomics by an older student. The first two webcomics I was introduced to were The Wotch and El Goonish Shive, which started me on my comic book binge. I started to read more and more comics, which got me the idea in my head that I should perhaps make my own webcomic. Years followed of me switching styles to a more Western-looking one and many failed attempts at stupid ideas for a comic.

In later years, I started teaching myself to improve, for while I was gradually getting better through sheer force of will and noticing things around me, I didn't actually consider how I could use references and tutorials to teach myself how to be better at comics. This is where I started looking at How to books and tutorials, as well as trying to copy some of the artistic stylings of comics like Comedity.

A few years later leads me to where I am now, learning to inspire myself by not just one or two things, but everything around me. I'm always teaching myself hopefully helpful new techniques and methods to improve my art, as well as asking advice of seasoned artists and friends about my work. I've learned that the greatest asset to an artist or any creative person is critiques and one should not be afraid to try new or different methods to improve oneself.

But this leads to a question that is commonly asked of me...

What inspires me?

To be frank, no one thing in particular. I find that for someone to grow creatively you need to take inspiration from everything, not just something you 'like'. If you're only recreating and replicating from the things you like, then your work will become very bland, stale and VERY predictable. This is why it's good introduce yourself to anything and everything; to experiment.

Even consider things that have been universally panned, because even things that are bad can be done well. It's your job as a creative mind to take what is good and what is bad and to dissect them. What makes it good? What makes it bad? If you removed certain elements would it still be good or bad? Could you make it better?

One thing you should absolutely do is question everything and always think about the things you are introduced to. Does that mean you can't like anything? You must observe it from a critical mind only? Yes and no, just because you're observing something critically does not mean you can't enjoy it, and just because you enjoy something, doesn't mean you shouldn't observe it critically.

You can actually find new appreciation for both good and bad things when observing them from a new aspect, for example, many people will agree the films done by Ed Wood are TERRIBLE, but new appreciation is found in those films, when you learn of his nothing but pure passion for cinema as an art!