Don't Let Inspiration Go To Waste

Sorry for the lack of posting the past week, I was in Chicago and Ann Arbor visiting some friends. Anyways... In a tutorial written by Alex Beltechi about one of his Japanese style illustrations, he wrote a nice introduction about inspiration that might help you get more out of this site. I quoted below the main portion of the writing discussion inspiration. Visit GoMediaZine for the full tutorial that talks a little more about inspiration, as well as step by step details about his technique for the completed illustion at the end of this post.

"Blogs posts on design inspiration are very popular, and I too love to see bits and pieces of what people are creating without having to scour the web looking for art. But often, inspiration is lost soon after closing the page, because it’s not put into practice, or properly harnessed.Think of it this way: you find a piece done by some designer that you really like. You’d love to be able to create something as cool his work, so you either choose to imitate his technique and style or adapt it to your own concept, and / or style. You’re facing two problems.

One, the other guy spent hours, days, month perhaps even years developing a technique and style for himself that you are only now trying to achieve in a matter of hours. Your design will be inferior because it lacks experience.

But there’s another problem. Chances are that the design you were inspired by was born out of many sources of inspiration, and is a result of personal research. Though he may have used a wide knowledge to put together his design, you base your entire inspiration on a single source: his piece.

While this is not at all a magic formula, it’s a method that has served me well so far: I suggest you bookmark your sources of inspiration and analyze them. Find things you like, dislike; think of possible improvements and write your ideas down. They’ll soon be gone otherwise."