What People Compare Your Style To vs. What You Reference

[samuraiotaku]

This is My Comic Nitou-Ryu

I get told mine has a very classic anime look to it, or a heavy 90s influence.
I actually do take a lot of influence from the 90's . Slayers and Dragonball were some of my favorites. I also took a lot of influence from Type-Moon, Sekihiko Inui, Kenjirou Hata and Ken Akamatsu though. Also, I really admire Nobuhiro Watsuki.

[Kayke]

Your style is so cute! I'll admit that I don't know a lot about anime and manga, but there's definitely a retro anime feel to this.

[samuraiotaku]

I'm glad you like it (^^)

[Bii0]

Sure why not.

Haven't had many people associate my style with anyone yet, a couple people have said it looks like it has anime/manga influence, but what style of what Japanese comic/animation artist I have no idea. Also a reviewer once said my style reminded them of Mary Engelbreit's art, which was interesting, but that's pretty much it.

Not going to post anything finished or particularly standout-ish, but here's some linework for a panel of something I'm working on.

As far as my influence, I don't actually have any, at least on a conscious level. When I was in my late teens I did try to put some tiny aspects of Mucha's art in my stuff, though. Favourite artist aside from Salvador Dali, love that guys work!

[Vikiro_Hop]

@Kaykedrawsthings Jamie Hewlett was one of my earliest inspirations to draw. I can definitely see the influence, what first attracted me to creep was your cool character designs.

I've recently been trying to revamp my character design style, and it is a lot of trial and error. I'd be curious to see what others seem to think of these. The first style is my current sorta "comic style." I think the characters mostly just look like a more generic western style (not in a bad way, but ya know.) I literally just drew few characters in that style and decided I could make a comic with them easily enough.

This last one is what I eventually want to polish up and do a story driven comic with. Haven't had anyone coment on it specifically, I definitely take a lot of inspirations from Scott Pilgrim, Adventure Time, anime and finally an artist by the name of Pete Fowler.

[Kayke]

Thank you! I'm so glad you think my character designs are cool

Something about your work, especially the last image, reminds me of Meredith Gran

[Vikiro_Hop]

Oh god, now I have something to binge read...with a misanthropic main character. Welp there goes my weekend.

This is actually a really good topic, I agree that art style is a very personal thing, but I do think artists tend to get a bit touchy about it. In the end you have to be self aware and just accept that no artist is 100% original. I have a huge amount of respect for artists who both admit to blatantly stealing certain style aspects, but are still making there own original take.
Whether or not you intentionally took inspiration, I feel like people should be happy to compared to good artists. (if ya don't like that artist well...that can be bad.)

I could prattle on but I've got a lot of this comic to read thanks for sharing it!

[martharpearson]

I've had my artwork compared to Disney.

Then it had a major overhaul from some of its Kathy Coop influence well actually a lot of overhaul. I grew up watching a lot of action cartoons and a few of the american animators who have influenced me have been William Hannah, Joseph Barbara, Tex Avery, and Chuck Jones. Going back to basic figure drawing helped clean up a lot of my boxy figures.

I found it helped to find inspiration in referencing several art styles and ask myself why do I like this cartoon? How can I reflect something like that in what I do? What can I do in my work to make it stick out from the rest?

It's just a thought. I'm always learning something new even when I pick up a magazine from National Geographic or dusting shelves at the import store in front of the Vietnamese ceramic ware.

[eseona]

My refenrences are web comics with "mainstream web-comic style", if I could call it like this (my favorit is Starfighter). But I also read a lot of manga (I use it mostly for exprecions) and I study paneling from every comic I can.
I think that my style is ordinary web comic. But most of people who doesnt read comics see it as manga. But the only similarity for me is that it is black and white (°--°) It always drives me crazy! Because these people see comics just like Marvel or manga - like no other styles exist. And because they think I draw manga and I am not Asian, lot of people like this tell me that I should draw differently and how wrong my style is... But I am happy that I finaly managed to have "my style"... Oh glob...

[alakotila]

It's kinda hard to say what artists inspired my current style because it's been building for so long! I got really inspired by Dragon Age, the Elder Scrolls games, Radiata Stories, and Valkyria Chronicles. People usually tell me Dragon Age or Skyrim, so I guess I was on target. Just a more ... cartoonish version of them, I suppose. My color palette is the result of weird experiments. I'll bore you with details if you want, but skipping it otherwise.

My earliest comic influences were Archie comics. I'd be surprised if you can't tell. At least a little! The next authors that really hit me were Takahashi Rumiko, Ueda Miwa, and Yazawa Ai. I've been picking up bits and pieces from artists that really hit me, including other indie comic artists and webcomickers, as I go.

I don't get the 'anime' thing often. Only from those who don't really watch anime.

Once I got One Piece. That's cool, but I don't see it!

[VermillionWorks]

What People Say: I've stated more than once that Daniel himself is compared to Levi from Attack On Titan quite a bit. Also I've heard the game Corpse Party and the anime Tokyo Ghoul brought up more than once as well. I don't know why, I haven't watched/played either of them.

.....is it the red eye and the vest suit?

My Influences: Mainly just various horror films (including vampire ones) from throughout the years, noir and early European vampire folklore. When it comes to anime influence, there were quite a few from the 80s and 90s I watched that have had some stylistic influence on me, but no particular one, and it's purely style influence, not story influence.

[efdvorsky]

I think the most common relation people have called Cosmic Fish is Pokemon and then go "Oh I'm sorry, I meant Digimon" which confused me to no end but all right???

Someone also once said it looked like something out of dreamworks because of the large expressive eyes.

But it really depends on the style and the mood I want to do. I personally enjoy large eyes because they're expressive and very animated (also I have expressive and rounded eyes IRL so it's just familiar to me)

But then there's also these non-Cosmic Fish related works like

Where inspirations for it come from different things.

Like obviously, Goodfellas is for the latter whereas I can sometimes go "yeah I can see why you'd think about Digimon in the first one" or a lot of 90's anime or Miyazaki's works. Which were indeed big parts of my childhood.

And for the latter it's a whole different story.

[toonsfera]

My style is a mutant! Aways change, normally when I'm reading some kind of manga or watching some anime, sometimes this influences in my style. When I started Scarlet Black, I was somewhat influenced by Terra Formars and latter by Jojo's Bizzarre Adventure, but some people said that the main protagonist resembles to Bleach, not that is any resemblance at all, but ok. Then when I did Rearth, I got the influence of Berserk because of the hatches, but nothing like Berserk at all, but some people said that the history have a vibe of Death Note. So, I notice that my style is getting a form that only the story resembles in something to any reference.

[stefminnie00]

Manga-influenced and that's what people usually think as well when they see my art. I won't deny that I was heavily influenced by Japanese manga and anime growing up, and that's the style I've practiced drawing, mainly for aesthetic purposes. But, I've also been influenced by artists from different parts of the world as well. ^^

[PocketFloral]

What People Say: I've heard mostly Steven Universe from young people and anime from older people, but nothing else besides that.
My Influences: Steven Universe (lol) Though I didn't specifically seek out to emulate that style I definitely love the look of the show. On the other hand I feel like I've been more so influenced by Frida Khalo, Miyazaki, Zetsubou Sensei OPs/Inu Curry, Junji Ito (plus lots of other horror manga artists) and Emily Carrol.

[heterodont]

What People Say: I remember while I was showing my comic to someone, they said it reminded them of Scott Pilgrim? That's the only definitive 'comparison' I've heard beyond the all-too-often vague comparison of 'It looks like anime!' Not that it bothers me or anything! I can definitely see where they get the idea from lol - it's just more of me being like okay, but WHAT anime?? A few friends of mine have also linked me to other artists they feel seem similar to my style (one i remember is this artist) but most of the time they're...usually way off the mark.

My Influences: Definitely Phobs & Haldrauve. I wasn't really out to emulate their styles completely, but I really like the way they stylize things (to be completely vague HAHA) 'Painting' wise - loish, polararts, and fayren to name a few. Digimon also had a major influence on me when I was young, seeing as that was all I ever watched

[phen]

What People Say | When I first started posting around on forums and deviantart, I got comparisons to Tim Burton A LOT. Which really confused me because most of his work isn't illustrative. It's puppetry and models. At least for me, I think of Beetlejuice, Corpse Bride, and Nightmare Before Christmas. It's obvious the comparison comes from the long, skinny limbs and bulgy eyes, though. For the past couple of years, though, I haven't gotten a lot of feedback on my work so I'm not sure! I do get the 'anime' thing, though, (or due to my living area "oriental", aaaa) which is understandable. Japanese art styles are everywhere, hard not to be compared to them!

My Influences | I'm most influenced by Danny Antonucci (specifically Ed, Edd 'n Eddy), Joe Murray (Rocko's Modern Life), and a variety of anime that I don't follow. I love picking things out in what I see, whatever pops in my visual field and is attractive. Ancient Byzantine art, like the nameless scribes that worked on psalters, also hugely influence my stylistic leanings. (man, I spelled a lot of things wrong and had to re-edit this!)

[joannekwan]

I didn't even think of Tim Burton when I first saw your work, lol. Jhonen Vasquez' Johnny the Homicidal Maniac was what crossed my mind.

[phen]

!!

I completely forgot to mention Vasquez as an inspiration, heck yes. Maybe the stuff I've been drawing lately is too far removed? But nooo, you see it! Ah, rock on. And you know, your style is so well-crafted and finely tuned that it's nearly impossible to bring anything specific to mind (which is the lamest, gushiest thing to say, but bro, I ain't ashamed).

I scrolled back through the middle of August to see your post and yeah, the Groening tube arms did not stain you, haha! It's much a hybrid of formal figure work and pretty personal observations you've made on your own. HOW?!

Also, thinking on this, the backgrounds and stuff in Beavis and Butthead influenced me (my parents were brave enough to let me watch that when I was 8!). Wiggly, wonky lines, ohoho~

[joannekwan]

It's much a hybrid of formal figure work and pretty personal observations you've made on your own. HOW?!

Aha, you flatter me.
I started off very cartoony and was inspired by early to mid 2000's cartoons and the comics in the Sunday morning paper. I wanted to draw more realistic figures so I looked to anime and manga (because everyone else was doing it, lol). I went through a whole phase in high school where I drew that sort of stuff, but I totally sucked at it xD
Accepting defeat, I decided to craft my own style. I wanted to stand out from the other teens who were all about anime/manga. And I never really looked at tutorials for how to draw because I feel they are always skewed towards whoever was presenting. I just decided to draw for myself. Sure I picked up some tricks from my favorite artists (JC Leyendecker's strong jawlines, some nice noses from Polararts, etc.) but for the most part I wanted my art to reflect myself. The biggest turnaround for me was when I took life drawing (a requirement for my major thankfully) and I finally felt my style was settling in.