Ha! Inspiration! I had a cool daydream set in a parallel version of the late 1990s and I just had to turn it into a digitally-edited painting 🙂 And, yes, astute viewers will notice that the game on the computer screen is the fictitious one from my “Survival Horror 2002” art series (yes, an anachronism, I know. But the idea seemed too fun not to include).
As usual, this painting is released under a Creative Commons BY-NC-ND licence.
“Parallel 1998 (A Daydream)” by C. A. Brown
This “mid-1990s” style digitally-edited painting was a total failure, which I was only barely able to salvage with a lot of digital effects.
As usual, this painting is released under a Creative Commons BY-NC-ND licence.
“Party Window 1996” by C. A. Brown
Although this was a quick ten-minute piece of digital art that I made (using GIMP) when I was feeling unenthusiastic, I actually ended up writing a blog article about the creative process behind it.
As usual, this picture is released under a Creative Commons BY-NC-ND licence.
“Lazy Morning (Ten Minutes)” by C. A. Brown
Well, since I couldn’t think of a better idea for an article, I thought that I’d offer a fun sci-fi metaphor for your art style. And, yes, this is another “Star Wars”-themed article. Anyway, if – like me – you have a vague passing knowledge of the mythology of this classic sci-fi series, then you’ll probably know that each of the series’ “Jedi” characters has their own unique lightsaber.
For those who have been living under a rock for the past forty-seven years or so, a “Jedi” is a benevolent interplanetary knight errant who can wield magical powers (called “The Force”) and who – famously – carries a glowing retractable laser sword called a “lightsaber”. And each of their lightsabers looks at least slightly different. The shape of the hilt might be different or the “blade” colour might be different, or they might even use a different configuration (eg: two shorter lightsabers, a double-bladed lightsaber etc...).
Part of the series mythology is that each “Jedi” has to build their own lightsaber. They have to meditate upon an energy crystal until it reflects some aspect of them or something like that. In the “Star Wars” universe, you can’t just go into a shop and buy a lightsaber. You have to make it yourself. And you have to train with it.
On a side-note: It’s very telling that one of the themes in the “Star Wars” series is that the villains are a lot more “standardised”. Whether it is the identical armour and identical laser guns used by the Imperial Stormtroopers or whether it is how the “Sith” (an evil version of the Jedi) literally ALL have red lightsabers. These days and in this context, it’s difficult not to see this as a metaphor for “A.I. art” or for chasing “popular” art styles, rather than finding your own.
And this idea is hardly unique to “Star Wars”. In fact, before “Star Wars” was even a thing – the long-running sci-fi TV series “Doctor Who” has a famous thing where, whenever the actor who plays The Doctor (a time-travelling alien) changed, then the character would “regenerate” into a different person. One interesting side-effect of this was that other stuff often changes too. Not only does the interior design of their time machine (“TARDIS”) change, but the design of their multi-functional “Sonic screwdriver” gadget also changes too.
Anyway, the point is one about uniqueness, time and practice. For an art style to really mean something to you, you have to build it yourself. Even if you start with one or more pre-existing styles or inspirations, then enough practice will mean that more of yourself will start to seep into it. Even if you stick to the pre-made style on the surface, things like what you choose to paint/draw will be shaped by your own sensibilities and imagination (unless you’re just “chasing clout” on social media...).
If you make enough art often enough, then it will shape itself to you. Even if you start out with a “standardised” style. Even if you try out lots of different stuff – in fact, trying out different things is how your style develops (because you’ll find something you like and, consciously or not, incorporate it into other art you make).
And, if you make art, you probably know all of this already. But, still, finding a silly way to liken yourself to a Jedi can certainly be a fun motivational thing to do 🙂
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May the force be with you 🙂
This “1970s folk horror” style digitally-edited painting was a lot of fun to make, and you can read more about the creative process behind it in this old article.
As usual, this painting is released under a Creative Commons BY-NC-ND licence.
“Luminous Loft 1971” by C. A. Brown
If I remember rightly, this digitally-edited painting was originally supposed to be a coldly metallic “Y2K era” style sci-fi painting. But I messed this up and had to do a lot of digital editing, which eventually resulted in an even cooler psychedelic painting 🙂 Yes, it’s probably more “mid 1990s” in style, but I ended up keeping the original title (with “1998” in it) regardless.
As usual, this painting is released under a Creative Commons BY-NC-ND licence.
“Space Station 1998” by C. A. Brown
Since I post these paintings quite a while after I make them, I can’t remember the exact mood/detail of this daydream I had last year, but it was obviously fun enough to turn into a digitally-edited painting.
As usual, this painting is released under a Creative Commons BY-NC-ND licence.
“Reclining Room (Daydream)” by C. A. Brown
I wasn’t feeling very inspired, so I decided to make a digitally-edited still life painting of the pens on my desk and it turned out way better than I’d expected 🙂
As usual, this painting is released under a Creative Commons BY-NC-ND licence.
“Tools Of The Trade (Still Life)” by C. A. Brown
Well, I thought that I’d talk briefly about the problems which can happen if you only have one or two inspirations. This was something I ended up thinking about in mid-late November last year. I realised that it had been a while since I had made any fan art based on movies, so I planned to make yet another piece of fan art based on my favourite horror movie – Dario Argento’s “Suspiria” (1977).
Still, whilst looking at screenshots of the film to refresh my memory, something wonderful happened. I suddenly had the inspiration to make some original semi-digital art inspired by the film. I wanted to play around with the aesthetic – psychedelic colours (especially a vivid shade of red ) and art deco, paired with a suspenseful “dark fairytale” mood. I also felt compelled to experiment with perspective too.
And, at first, the original painting seemed to be going well. When I was thinking of a character design, I decided to go in a more gothic direction than the film. I’d originally also planned to take inspiration from classic survival horror videogames – and the “camera angle” took some inspiration from these – and draw the character holding a pistol. But, whilst working out the pose for this, I stumbled across a different pose – without a gun – which worked better. It made the picture look more like gothic/horror media than action genre media.
Still, when it came to the background – it wasn’t long before I ran into a problem. Yes, it was technically different but – with very limited inspirations – it was almost a “rip-off” of two locations from the film – the hotel near the beginning and the psychedelic room near the end. Yes, there were subtle differences – and a more varied palette – but it still looked a bit too much like “Suspiria” (1977) for me to be comfortable with calling it an original painting.
Fortunately, since I make semi-digital paintings, I could try to make a scan of the painting a bit more original with image editing software (an open-source program called “GIMP”). And, at first, everything was a failure. Adding lots of “bloom” and smoke effects with digital airbrushes just made it look like someone had tried to make a PS3 game based on the film. Likewise, I thought about just turning the entire background red but – without the slightly varied palette – this actually made it look more like the film.
So, I switched the background’s palette to more of a dark pink, added a glowing light source or two and some extra shading. This made the lighting look mildly more “realistic” and “diegetic” and less like the stylised lighting in the film. Also, the areas which were originally light blue in the painting turned white, which added an extra difference to the lighting style used in the film. I also desaturated the character a bit, as well as adding a palette more consistent with the lighting. Even so, it still almost felt too similar.
Suddenly, I remembered that the program I was using has a “circular motion blur” effect. Adding this to the background completely changed the mood of the picture. It was less like “A psychedelic 1970s Dario Argento movie” and more like “A low-budget late 1990s- late 2000s horror movie DVD cover“. I could live with this. Especially since, given how I’d messed up the perspective slightly, the blurring made the background look more like a mysterious underground tunnel or temple than a high-ceilinged room as well.
Here’s a full-size preview of the semi-digital painting:
This semi-digital painting should “officially” be posted here in mid-March next year.
Yes, it isn’t the best semi-digital painting in the world but at least the look and feel of it was different enough to “Suspiria” (1977) for it to be an “inspired by” painting, rather than a lazy rip-off.
And this is one of the problems with having just one or two inspirations. The fewer inspirations you have, the more chance there will be that you’ll just end up making a lazy rip-off rather than anything original. Originality comes from having lots of inspirations and combining them in interesting ways.
In other words, if you have lots of inspirations, then the creative process is more like a fun and organic “Maybe a hint of this, but paired with that and that” type thing. If you only have one or two inspirations, it’s often a much more frantic and panicked “No, this looks too similar! What can I change?” type thing. Needless to say, one of these two things results in better and more enjoyable art than the other…
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Anyway, I hope that this was interesting 🙂
If I remember rightly, I wanted to focus on detail with this digitally-edited painting but, I was feeling a bit uninspired and ended up using more digital effects than I’d expected. Still, although it didn’t turn out as well as I’d hoped, it was still reasonably atmospheric 🙂
As usual, this painting is released under a Creative Commons BY-NC-ND licence.
“Phone 2002” by C. A. Brown
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