Ideas

[Thecadian]

Hi,

just a quick weird question how do you guys come up with your ideas for your models?? I feel like i can usually paint models in a way that i envision them to turn out. however i find it difficult to come up with new origional ideas for minis and diormas/duels. So just wondering how or where do you get your inspiration from for your models??

James

 

[Dragonsreach]

Dreams, TV, Books, sitting in traffic jams.
No one thing is ever the trigger, James.

 

[Hinton]

Like DR, there isn\'t any one \"trigger\" for me; it just comes to me. I know I should probably look more into color theory and how colors work together, but as it is, I just paint things the colors that I want to see them in; what looks good to me.

Once in a while when I\'m planning on painting a mini, I\'ll look around and see how others may have painted it and then try to think of something different. That might lead to some inspiration.

 

[lizcam]

Depends. Sometimes it\'s the mini itself that gives me the idea. I can\'t tell you how many times I\'ve had 2 totally un-related minis on the table for different reasons and they \"spoke\" to me.

Then there are competitions. The Ebay group WAMP has been wonderful for this. Every month a different theme. You have to come up with something to fit that theme. Go check it out. It\'s lots of fun. There\'s a link in my sig.

Sometimes it\'s me working out my personal crap. I\'m having a mini sculpted right now for that. Anger, pain, happiness, frustration, joy. All these things can be great sources for a person.

 

[Ritual]

For quite some time I\'ve been looking at what historical miniature painters do, and I often get ideas from that, which I then tweak to fit whatever mini I end up using it for. For instance, on my latest mini I was inspired by some WWI trench-like battle ground. I\'m not sure why I got the idea to use it for this particular mini, but once I got the idea it kind of stuck and I thought it would work.

It is often like that... I look at lots of stuff to get inspiration (other fantasy painting, of course, historical painting, art, films, architecture... whatever, really). Then, while painting a specific mini some idea comes to the surface and gets stuck in my mind and I use it for that mini. It can be colour schemes or base work.

Sometimes the idea comes to mind when I first see the mini and decide to buy it.

 

[Jike Ichi]

You can get ideas everywhere. Books, movies, music, everyday life, work,...You just have to learn how to see, recognize and capture the inspiration.

I read one book about ninjutsu some years ago. There were training lessons such as these:

Concentrate all your energy on your nose for one week:
What do you smell? Is it good? Is it bad (don\'t close your nose down on bad smells!)? What does it remember you? How does it make you feel?
Next week concentrate on your ears:
What do you hear? How does the voices of people sound? What noise surrounds you? What sounds stick out? How do they make you feel?
Then comes skin/body: How you stand/walk? Where is your weight when standing or going,sitting, riding a bike,...? How do other things feel (surfaces, clothes, other people\'s skin) ?
Then eyes: This is the most difficult one, cause we are so concentrated on what we see. But you have to \"destroy\" all you see in colours and shapes and then put it together again. Also look at areas you don\'t look normaly. And also its important how it makes you feel?
And at last you try to feel with all senses at once.

I didn\'t make that whole training, but I tried it one week one sense every day. Now I sometimes try one sense for some days and then change to an other one or make a pause. Never could handle to do one sense a whole week. Afterwards you really are amazed how many things you realize only when you concentrate. And all of those things influence you and for my opinion can also be a good inspiration.
Most of all you are influenced from your eyes of course. But you have to learn with other senses too, only then you can learn how to \"see\" with your eyes (thats the reason why it was the last sense they trained!).
Perhaps this sounds all funny, but it really improved my inspiration...and it sure was fun to try it out

Hmm colour theory and books on art are one thing for me. They are so f...ing boring. I would say: Just try it! Be honest to yourself with the result. And make sketches, try colours on paper and see if they work. A good way for me to improve my compositions (on canvas, street art) was to reduce colours on only red, white and black for half a year...

Perhaps this is not really for painting minis, but it helps inspiration in generel.

 

[Ritual]

One thing I forgot to mention is that quite often the idea for one mini starts with chosing one colour. When I have that colour I decide what other colours to use to match, or contrast, the first colour. Sometimes this single colour will also influence what I do for the base.

 

[freakinacage]

literally everywhere

 

[evil tendencies]

My inspiration usually comes in two ways. The first is that I see a mini and the dynamics of the sculpture capture my eye. With this model, I try to paint it in such a way as to emphasize those salient elements.

The second way is that I get an idea of colors or techniques that I want to try, and I go looking for a figure that will allow me to do that.

There is a third method, but it\'s more utilitarian. I\'m a wargamer, so when I see an army I like, I come up with a color scheme that will be clean and recognizable, but fast to execute when you have 100+ figures to paint.

 

[Talonicus]

Steal ideas off other people, it works for me.

 

[BarstoolProphet]

I haven\'t actually finished any dioramas, but I can say where my ideas come from . . .

Usually, I\'ll be looking at a miniature, at its pose, and thinking to myself, \'What brought this character to this point?\' Are they mid-fight? About to fight? Just finished fighting? Being sneaky?

Once I answer these sorts of questions to myself, I think about what they\'re up against, and see if I have a miniature that fits the idea.

From there, the idea completes itself, and I try to go with it.

 

[Shawn R. L.]

EPIPHANY:idea:

 

[demonherald]

all over the place but I have to say one of my iggest things is stories and decriptions...

also depends what the model is for ..

my usual approach to demons for example is to narrow down to a race or type I like , I then nosy through all the books and online stuff I can lay my hands on...
next I look at what other people have painted and what I like / don\'t like .. with this in mind I set myself up a list of wants and want not\'s..
then I look at what has been done before and try to avoid using a common theme and put my own twist on an idea...

just about anything can inspire the initial thought process though and I mean anything..

 

[lahatiel]

Like everyone else said, inspiration can stirke from anywhere. I\'m always jotting notes into the notepad app on my smartphone whenever a thought strikes, so I can be sure I won\'t lose it. (Or you could just use the low-tech paper and pencil method, too! ) I might look back at it later, consider it for a while, think long and hard on it, and end up saying to myself, \"Nah... that idea\'s crap!\" But at least I didn\'t lose it before I could give it some proper thought.

As far as specific places to seek inspiration, one place that recently gave me a fairly high \"notes taken vs. time spent\" ratio was a museum -- an art museum, in my particular case, but a history museumwould be sure to work just as well. Looking at the paintings and then reading the descriptions of what the subjects\' poses represented, the symbolic elements of background details, etc. gave me a lot of ideas for displays and dioramas.

 

[Dragonsreach]

Originally posted by Shawn R. L.
EPIPHANY:idea:

Isn\'t she the sister of TRACEY and BETHANY ?

 

[darklord]

Originally posted by Talonicus
Steal ideas off other people, it works for me.

me too, a lot of my ideas come from mini\'s i see on here, and either \'copy\' or take it as a basis for something more.
doing iron painter i just tried to do like a word association sort of thing, take the theme then see what it makes me think of.

 

[Undave]

The Thought Bats bring me my ideas on the wings of night. They stuff them into my head with their little pink crowbars all the while singing bad Queen covers....


Er... I honestly have no clue how I come up with any of my ideas. They just seem to pop Pratchetesque into my head, fully formed and begging to be realised. The trouble is I come up with so many that by the time I get round to implementing them I\'ve come up with half a dozen new ones that I want to do more. Occasionally I see them through to fruition like with the Napoleonic Ork Freebooterz or the Mordheim pirate gang.


I\'m not above pinching them off other people and adapting them though like I did with the Barrell Boyz