Too much influence?

So another Christmas has gone by and I was lucky enough to receive some fantastic art books for Xmas presents. I been interested in the d'artiste books for a while and not being able to get a proper look inside them has always intrigued me. I've now got the chance and am the happy owner of a few.

Heres the link to them - http://www.ballisticmedia.net/books/dartiste/character_modeling_3/

They really are fantastic art books with some stunning work inside! I've got masses of other art books as well, ranging from instructional drawing books to video game art book books and I really enjoy looking at them all but I wonder if its all abit much.

I love looking at other people's work and admire it greatly but theres so much of it around and its all so fantastic. I find it both motivates and depresses at the same time. I can't help but think "Oh that's so amazing and kick ass....I can't do that" but on the other hand get a surge of "I'm gonna work hard and become that good!", but its not easy. We're surrounded by places to see stunning artwork like http://www.deviantart.com/, http://www.conceptart.org/ or magazines like http://www.imaginefx.com/ and I find it a bit overwhelming.



Everyone will have favourite artists or preferred styles and we'll all draw inspiration and ideas from different places but when theres too much of it floating around I feel it impacts me negatively. If you look around enough you'll probably find something similar to what ever it is you've tried to do, and chances are, it will be better. I don't like that.




Scott Robertson Vehicle Design


This has become more apparent to me while doing the vehicle project. I'm struggling with it quite alot and not just because vehicles aren't really my thing. Looking around other artwork for ideas and inspiration tends to lead to finding something awesome already and trying to change or use parts would just lead to something worse. I'd compare anything I came up with, with something very similar I found elsewhere, and mine was always worse. Its not surprising the artwork I was comparing myself with was done by people who have been doing it along time, get paid to it and are very good at it. So its not really a fair comparison I guess but I cant help it.I find looking extensively at other people's work for ideas is just going to result in wanting to steal them, because they already look awesome! I don't want to draw something that, to me, is just a worsened version of something that has already been designed. Which just leads to a total creative dry-up, not good.

So what if I just stop looking at other peoples artwork? I could do my best to design what ever it is I'm doing, yes it might be very like something else that has already been drawn but if I don't know about it, I cant copy or compare. If I want to design something I should look to things that already exist for reference and ideas. To design a vehicle I could look at current; cars, helicopters, tanks, trains, bikes, buses, planes, boats, submarines etc for ideas and not other artwork. In guess I still run the same risk of drawing something that already exists but its alot less likely. I think it would be easier to mix and match bits of vehicles that already exist rather than trying to do that with design drawings.

Car Mood board

Long story short, I really enjoy art books but, for me personally, they can do more damage than good. I think too much influence from other people's work can hinder our own creative exploration and development. While its fantastic to view others work its important to not let it overwhelm and steer us.