Even Amundsen on Reinventing Elements of Fantasy

Hmm, that’s a questions that defies a “good” answer, as it was more of a thing that I happened upon, and then it grew into something more cohesive after a while, and it kept building up until I figured a year would be a good amount of time to go for, and a leap year at that. Making larger stories and little arcs was something that came along once the project had been going on for a while, and from the many smaller stories grew more complex ideas, and they demanded a world!

The world that the stories play out in is kind of a mystery so far, as much for the audience as it is for me at the moment. I spend a lot of time doing world-building, feeding a lot off of ancient history, so the setting will be influenced by that, both in terms of cultures and characters, but also magic and the kinds of stories and monsters and races that might live there. So while some of the classical elements of fantasy are still there, I want to try and avoid the more cliched ones.

Maybe even reinvent them in some way.

I’m pretty excited about the story I’m cooking up at the moment. After I finished the year, I took it easy for a little while, focusing on freelance, so getting back to the stories and characters and trying to figure out this world is awesome! It’s incredibly fun to see other people getting a kick out of the world-building as well, especially when they find little design clues in the pieces I put out. In terms of the project getting to a point where it could be a sustainable full time thing, it’s a pretty strong start!

Yeah, I activated the real life cheat code called Spiro, or Spiridon Giannakis if you wanna be fancy. My essential idea for the publishing end of the project was to compile a PDF and give it out if people wanted it, and Spiridon damn near ripped my head off, screaming maniacally about the art of printing and the varied qualities of paper. So it was more based on a need for self-preservation than anything else.

I began working on that one when I was sitting together with my best friend, who is a tattoo artist. I was watching him work and we were chatting about old tattoo techniques, and it got me thinking about how tattoos are the very hallmark of barbarians in fantasy. So, I decided that I would try to break that tired old model of barbarians that you see so often, while still retaining the appealing elements of it.

Now, The Varangian Guard, vikings in service to the byzantine emperors was a fitting backdrop to refer to, and I began to imagine a similar set of warriors in imperial hire, engaging master tattooists from the east to chronicle their exploits in their flesh, and then how this would manifest over the generations. I imagine that the tradition would grow ever-more expressive as their fortunes rose, with colors and piercings and other decorations to substantiate their personal legends, and how to make this into a visual hierarchy, and so on, though I had to kinda start it somewhere.

Yeah, so, the best idea I think I can try and spread around goes something like this: Illustration is a language more than anything else, so it’s all about communicating ideas. How well we do this is determined by what we say, and how we say it, and these can be massively influenced by how well we know the subject matter and its context. Therefore, getting to know all of the things that move around the thing you want to say can be extremely useful.

Oh hell yeah! It should be coming at the end of this year.