Influence Meme
filled in Sep 30, ’10
(662)
Okay, I saw this on the True Magic art blog and had to fill it in.
L-R, top-bottom, in no particular order of influence:
True Magic itself. It is a lovely, lovely webcomic, and was one of the first to introduce me to the concept of webcomic. Its self-proclaimed ABC’s (Adventure, Bishounen, Comedy) was a perfect combo and Gauth (pictured) is for me the quintessential Man of Mystery.
Norouet: a French-Canadian traditional band. I love listening to their music and it is hugely inspiring, whether it’s of images of wild, unearthly elven dancing, or just to get me the energy to write and draw.
Fire Emblem: how I learned to draw anime was by tracing these guys. A long, long time ago. Also the story of FE7 is really fantastic; it was like nothing I’d ever read or played before. It was deep. …Back then.
Winter Harp: my favourite music for writing. Very medieval sounding, with harps! Perfect for the majority of my writing projects.
Music, particularly Organs: MUSIC IS MY LIFE. In case you didn’t get that already. It’s where about 75% of my inspiration comes from, for characters, events, plots, cultures, anything you can think of.
Star Wars: Heehee. Heroes and villains!
British Columbia, Canada: Gorgeous scenery. It underlies all the Adhemlenei, even though it’s probably subconscious still at this point.
Miyazaki: anime, but not over the top, with deep stories and occasionally very pretty guys. ^_^
LinT: the second webcomic I ever read. I love Colby’s style, which is an odd blend of other stuff, but it comes across very well. Also her story is both funny and dramatic.
Awkward Zombie: hilarious expressions. Nuff said.
Legend of Zelda: elves! Quests! Sacred swords and objects and things! Quests! Elves!
Professor Tolkien: of course he gets the 3×3. His amazing world both broad and deep and filled with characters and races and quests and swords and light and dark is, of course, the inspiration for modern fantasy everywhere. As opposed to archaic fantasy, which is legends and myths. But legends and myths… just aren’t the same as when you put it all together in a whole world. It’s breathtaking what this one man did.
There’s all kinds of things I’ve left out, like my Dad’s big influence, some of my friends, Bruce Lee, my piano teachers… I might have said it before, but actually EVERYTHING is an influence on my world, if not my art. Everything can be taken and integrated somehow. My art… kind of grew on its own, really. But if I kept to the literal influences on my visual art, I don’t think this chart would be so interesting. So you get some tenuous connections. But I think it’s worth it.
