Though I did little personal art in February, the art that I did create had clear inspirations. A trend you'll be sure to notice in the coming months will likely be the reoccurrence of video games as an inspiration. February was no exception to this inevitable trend. Having gotten a Nintendo Switch in January, the colourful games Nintendo produces are, of course, going to impact my art.
About half way through February, a new Pokémon game was announced, and with the announcement came inspiration for me to revisit my favourite Pokémon in the form of a gouache painting (left), as well as Perler beads, which I hadn't so much as touched since 2015. While not much of a traditional art, I found beading to be more relaxing than I remembered, and I took some artistic liberty with some of the patterns, adjusting them to my liking. The process of the gouache piece was recorded for my YouTube channel and can be found there. Another source of inspiration for me in February was Corrin (right), a character from the Fire Emblem series who also appears in Super Smash Bros Ultimate, a fighting game including over seventy-five iconic video game characters. Every day at lunch since late January, I've taken to the grade twelve corridor to play this game with friends, so with my regular use of Corrin as a fighter, I was itching to draw her constantly all month. Aside from all my constant homework doodles of her, I also did a drawing in Photoshop for the first time, in which she was the subject. The background for this piece was also inspired by Spider-Man: Into the Spider Verse, using some of the same ideas as from last month's pieces. The same goes for a traditional sketchbook drawing I did of Corrin, which I posted on my Instagram.
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Something that I've neglected to really talk about on this blog is what inspires me. In the deepest sense, I could say a lot about the people and life experiences that have affected me as an artist in some way, but I'm not talking about that deepest sense here. That's simply a blog post for another day. This is a series in which I want to take some time to write about the media and artists that have influenced my work or that I thoroughly enjoyed the previous month. You can read my last blog post to see in detail why I think this series is important, but to sum it up, I believe that art of any kind is always shaped by the things around us and that it's important to recognize and document what those things are.
In January, the first movie of the year I watched in theatres was Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse. Having already been deeply inspired by the art in the Spider-Gwen comics, I knew at least Gwen's on-screen depiction would inspire me. However, the whole movie was filled to the brim with gorgeous and unique art. Every character was uniquely designed and even had their own art styles in their respective worlds, and all of this came together to make a colourful, jam-packed movie, as seen in the gif above. Based on this movie, I made a small series of character portraits, including the portrait of Gwen below, with backgrounds inspired by the bold colours and shapes seen throughout the movie. Not only did this new style of background carry through the series, I also used it in the other drawing below, and in a couple of drawings I've done so far this month (which I'll touch on in next month's post). Another big inspiration for me in January was ARMS, a Nintendo original game about boxers with different kinds of extendable arms. Being my personal favourite fighter, I drew Ribbon Girl, pictured on the left below. The game is filled with bright, bold colours and incredibly unique character design. The concept of the fighters having extendable arms itself is totally original, and inspires me to not fear even the craziest ideas when it comes to character design. The impact that these pieces of media have had on my art is something which I believe will continue to carry on throughout the months to come. I'm deeply enjoying doing the new style of background, and it's something I will definitely continue to use if there's any one thing I take away from January's inspirations. I will continue to document my monthly inspirations and how they've impacted my art, highlighting the importance of having inspirations, as well as the undoubtable improvement that will come along the way! |
About this blogOn this blog page I'll be posting about my progress in achieving art goals, and how I'm learning new things and improving as an artist. Archives
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AuthorLeah is an eighteen-year-old aspiring Canadian artist who enjoys drawing, painting, and photography. |