Little historic

First of all when I was a child my artistic culture was based on cartoons like the Disney's but after that two cartoons wh
ich impressed me a lot because it was less childlike were “All dogs go to heaven” and “The Secret of NIMH” realised by Don Bluth.Then of course come the Pixar films with “Toy Story” and all my life I was attracted by 3D animation and special effects films.

Another big part in my education was the European comics, more specifically Belg ian and French. E.g.: “marsupilami”, “Gaston Lagaffe”, “Tintin”, “Les Schtroumpfs ( The Smurfs)”, “Asterix and Obelix”, “Quick et Flupke”, “Les Tuniques Bleues”, “Pierre Tombal”, …

All these books are really different from the American comics which use super heroes the most of the time.

Later I used to be interested in other comics like : “Blacksad”, “Lanfeust”, “Petit d'homme”... I liked the style of the “Soleil” Edition. About the Mangas my tastes were more dark for example “Hellsing” but also “Fullmetal alchemist”, “Evangelion”...

"BlackSad" is for me one of the biggest inspiration because of its dynamic (close to animation films and camera shots), the drawer plays with colours to give a special atmosphere to each kind of scene to be really different from one moment to another in the story. The character design is amazing too. The drawer is one of my favourite artist, he used to work for Disney and that is why he has a good feeling for de dynamics. The "Lanfeust" saga brought me tastes for the mix between Si-Fi and Heroic Fantasy using magic powers and quests. "Petit d'Homme" makes me love the post-apocalyptic art...

Little by little I was more interested in surrealism, fantastic and science fiction, probably because of the imaginary world that resulted. Then my tasted were oriented on the cinema (as much for animation as for live films) being more attracted by particular atmosphere like the Frank Miller adaptations (“Sin City” or “300”) and also by post-apocalyptic movies like the “Mad Max's” or “WaterWorld”... I like special dynamics and scenarios too. E.g.: “Fight club”, “Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas”, “Shutter Island” and “The Dark Knight”, Tarantino's films, “The Truman show”, Kubrik's films, “99 Francs”, …

Concerning fantasy and science-fiction, obviously there was The “Star Wars”, “The lord of the Rings”, “Irobot”, The “Matrix”, ... In 3D animation films, Pixar is of course my leader followed by DreamWorks and BlueSky, but also a bunch of short films made by independent studios or even schools. Pixar is my leader because I think they have the "magic" touch that makes their films almost perfect and their animatinos are perfectly studied. But DreamWorks and BlueSky realize funnier characters with other personalities and sometimes more adequate for adults.

Concerning the painting inspirations, there are not much classic painters I like but surrealists like Dali or Gyuri Lohmuller.

But currently there are a lot of digital painters or matte painters who give

good atmospheres and style to their paintings.

E.g. : Goro Fujita, Linda Bergkvist, Mathias Verhasselt, Olivier Ponsonnet, Yanick Dusseault, ...

What I like a lot in these digital paintings it is the originality, the story of the pictures and especially the imaginary that is more advanced that it used to be.

Another artistic branch I learned to like is the sculpture. For example Kent Melton who is a great artist working with Disney and Pixar.

Finally all these little things that create my universe inspire me in every work I want to do. Of course there are a lot of other films, comics, books, artists that inspire me but this is a good base to begin this sketchbook.