Art How do you get your ideas?

When drawing, how/where do you get your ideas for: clothing, faces, charecters, weapons etc. ?? Cuz i always run out of ideas, my drawings always end up lookin the same. . >.< and so i would like to know where others get their inspiration.

 

One way is to find other character designs you like and improve upon them. Or you can use characters from dreams(Really-this works better if the people in your dreams aren't poorly drawn scribbles).
I thoguht of several new weapons in my dreams (Axe Hammer Sword!)
_
I'm not crazy.

 

Sometimes I get bombarded by ideas throughout the day, just that I forget about them when I start drawing. For example, if you see a person on the street dressed up in a certain way, you remind yourself that you could use that in a drawing. To help you remember, try inventing a character in your head right on the spot, giving the character a name, etc. I also get drawing ideas from simply making things up on the spot as I draw, depending on how I end up positioning a person's body, etc. I don't have many full picture drawings though, so I don't do it much. One girl I drew, I decided to try having her legs look like they were dangling as she sat, so I got ideas of having her sitting on a seaside pier with her feet in the water.

 

Sometimes dreams..when i wake up i quickly do a pitiful looking sketch of what was in the dream so i wont forget it and then after waking up completely, start figuring out if it can be drawn to something worth the effort.
Once had a really small dragon that layed on my shoulder in a dream. was kind of cool so i drew it...sadly the poor sketch is still there. Someday i'll start making it.

Other one is just imagination, i might get an image of something on my mind and start drawing it. Latest was a girl sitting on the edge of a cliff high above the ground watching the sea below with a smile. far far away there is a city with skyscrapers and such.

I don't know where these comes from but anyway...u asked ^^

 

To create new things is always difficult but a good imagination I think goes a long way. I remember reading on a site that someone had drawn this character sketch out of a dream they had had, and said to myself, I wish I had dreams like that. Luckily I was stressed out one night wondering what to do for my current art project and a vision hit me in my sleep. If it's good I may scan it and share it, but it's still in my head. So dreams are really inspiring. Rambling... huh?

Also I take inspiration from the world around me, take characteristics from others and develop them. I even drew an anime style version of a girl I know. But yeah this may help... it may not.

 

I'll recommend a really simple, yet effective (for me) source of inspiration. Find some music that you really like, fits the general catagory you are thinking about and make sure it gets your blood flowing. Then pick up a pen and scratch away. When I draw my characters and battle scenes, I throw on some Gun slinger sounding Rock and Roll and just visualize the action and pick out some good scenes to put on paper.

Clothing is a tough one, One picture of mine is incomplete because I cannot think of a suitable facemask for the character class.

Oh, building on what Tetsuo brought up [dreams] this might prove to be handy. If you want some scary/interesting dreams, try eating some peanut butter before going to bed. It works moderatly well. Heck, last time I did that my dream had some lady narrate a horror story to me. Good blood and gore effects.

 

I llook in magazines, (specially those fashion ones, like vogue b/c they have gorgeous clothing and poses.) I also like to go down to the mall or while im on break from work ill sit on a big cumfy couch and i will draw the people around me. thats fun.

 

mmmm.....i guess i have a general idea of what i want before i start, then everything kind of pops out, dunno, check my wip thread n_nU