Roderick T. Macdonald
This might sound funny, but it's true: I wake up.
I dream very vividly a lot of the time, and have tons of great ideas in the strange margin between sleep and waking, as my mind begins to spin up to waking speed, but still has the lassitude and freedom of random sleeping thoughts. I dream stories too, or at least strange things that try to have a narrative structure, however out there they can get!
I slowly wake and realise I've been chewing over an idea in my mind, or having an imaginary conversation, and it takes firmer shape. As I become more awake I sometimes fashion it into a concrete narrative idea, just for the fun of it, and because I don't know what else to do with it! I have to write down these ideas before I do much else in the day, or they are gone, more often than not - though some that I really chew the cud on, are with me all day as I continue to work at them.
Other than random inspiration striking that way, I get inspired by reading histories, taking walks, watching TV, playing games, talking with my friends and especially my wife. I like to experience the art and see the clever artifice of other creative people, and bounce my ideas and impressions off what I am exposed to, and see what happens. Most of the time it is silliness or nonsense, but sometimes really good ideas, characters, dramatic moments can leap into being, if I can just capture them fast enough before they fade away!
Travelling is a huge inspiration for me - whenever we go on holiday I am looking for old sites, historical landmarks, museums and collections of the art and artifacts of people from different times and cultures - that is huge as it helps me put myself into worlds inspired by those things, but with the twist of magic being present. Though to be honest I spend a lot of time just imagining life in 16th century Italy, or 14th century Scotland, or in the lost Kingdom of Aksum in parts of what is now Ethiopia in the time between the fading of Rome and the rise of Islam. I am a sucker for churches, castles, graveyards, catacombs. Simply cannot get enough. Palaces (and houses!) with pictures, tapestries and period furnishings are also like catnip for me. The Georgian House and Gladstone's Land in Edinburgh were early exposures to places frozen in time, and Edinburgh itself is a living history that you can walk through and marvel at, with so many places to fire the imagination. And it does not have to be the deep past - the artifacts of the mid 20th century can now look like they are from another world!
That is a lot of blather right there. The key, I think, is this: I try to remain curious about most things I see. Natural, or man-made. I read a lot on random subjects (hello days lost on the internet!), and I look to history, other cultures, and other artists for inspiration.
In sum: I stay curious, I sleep, I read, I talk, I travel, and I enjoy the things that other people have made, from soap operas to art house movies, from cartoons to the old masters to the waves of modern art, and all of that goes into the chemical soup of my brain, and out, sometimes, pop some ideas that delight me enough to write down. If I remember them long enough!
I dream very vividly a lot of the time, and have tons of great ideas in the strange margin between sleep and waking, as my mind begins to spin up to waking speed, but still has the lassitude and freedom of random sleeping thoughts. I dream stories too, or at least strange things that try to have a narrative structure, however out there they can get!
I slowly wake and realise I've been chewing over an idea in my mind, or having an imaginary conversation, and it takes firmer shape. As I become more awake I sometimes fashion it into a concrete narrative idea, just for the fun of it, and because I don't know what else to do with it! I have to write down these ideas before I do much else in the day, or they are gone, more often than not - though some that I really chew the cud on, are with me all day as I continue to work at them.
Other than random inspiration striking that way, I get inspired by reading histories, taking walks, watching TV, playing games, talking with my friends and especially my wife. I like to experience the art and see the clever artifice of other creative people, and bounce my ideas and impressions off what I am exposed to, and see what happens. Most of the time it is silliness or nonsense, but sometimes really good ideas, characters, dramatic moments can leap into being, if I can just capture them fast enough before they fade away!
Travelling is a huge inspiration for me - whenever we go on holiday I am looking for old sites, historical landmarks, museums and collections of the art and artifacts of people from different times and cultures - that is huge as it helps me put myself into worlds inspired by those things, but with the twist of magic being present. Though to be honest I spend a lot of time just imagining life in 16th century Italy, or 14th century Scotland, or in the lost Kingdom of Aksum in parts of what is now Ethiopia in the time between the fading of Rome and the rise of Islam. I am a sucker for churches, castles, graveyards, catacombs. Simply cannot get enough. Palaces (and houses!) with pictures, tapestries and period furnishings are also like catnip for me. The Georgian House and Gladstone's Land in Edinburgh were early exposures to places frozen in time, and Edinburgh itself is a living history that you can walk through and marvel at, with so many places to fire the imagination. And it does not have to be the deep past - the artifacts of the mid 20th century can now look like they are from another world!
That is a lot of blather right there. The key, I think, is this: I try to remain curious about most things I see. Natural, or man-made. I read a lot on random subjects (hello days lost on the internet!), and I look to history, other cultures, and other artists for inspiration.
In sum: I stay curious, I sleep, I read, I talk, I travel, and I enjoy the things that other people have made, from soap operas to art house movies, from cartoons to the old masters to the waves of modern art, and all of that goes into the chemical soup of my brain, and out, sometimes, pop some ideas that delight me enough to write down. If I remember them long enough!
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