Just like the title asks; from where do you draw your inspirations? Is it from a marathon of the show, something that you saw in a movie, read in a book, or gained from real life?

Tell us where you get the goods.

I look to scenery for inspiration. Anything from quaint and calm gardens to complex and architectural structures. Places and locations should have a certain personality behind them, a certain way of thinking. I feel the same should go for writing.

I plead insanity. Seriously, have you seen some of my friends? Those guys are bonkers!

I get ideas from various sources, honestly. Sometimes from conversations with friends, sometimes I just get a "what if" moment that turns into something fun, and occasionally I'll set forth intending to write a specific concept and just grow a story from that.

Once the idea is there, it's just a matter of playing out scenarios in my head until I find one I like, then I simply let words flow organically into something worth editing into a story.

Driving and showers. Seriously, somehow that's where my best brainstorming always seems to happen. Other than that I mainly focus on what shouldn't be and how it can be. No IRL inspirations other than in-depth character study of the actual shows.

My best practices on writing were understand how the characters think or would think in any given situation - not just how they act in the show, connect as many links as possible to actual show connections without being blatantly unoriginal, and research - IN DEPTH - everything. I currently have an idea for something involving Fluttershy. I have a document describing every single detail I could find in her house, from furniture to room placement to outdoor scenery. Make it real to the reader!

I draw my inspiration from any and everything; and before anyone goes, ooh, or ahh "That's brilliant!" I have to say that it's not so great of a thing. It's very limiting in that I have almost inspiration overload at times. Creativity is a nasty word for me. While I agree that creativity leads to great things, it's likewise the ability to follow the creative process from start to finish that always grinds my wheels to a screeching halt at some point along the way.

For example; I am writing on a cheap "Logitech" keyboard. I choose to do so because I like the keys to be flat, and some of the most expensive keyboards out there are uncomfortable for me. Doesn't matter that they can range in price from sixty to a hundred and sixty dollars is irrelevant. If I am not comfortable with the keys it might as well be junk. As I write on this well used keyboard, I imagine a scenario where my keyboard is evil. My keyboard is possessed by the Devil himself, and whenever I write something, it always comes out differently than what I have in my head.

My imagination is such, that I could create a whole story about just my keyboard. So suppose that my keyboard is evil, and one day I sat down to type, and no matter what buttons I press, words appear on my screen in the form of sentences from the beyond. Horrible terrifying things that scratch and claw at the inner recesses of my psyche, and haunt and disturb me. Suppose that my keyboard wants these things written, and that once I've started I am now doomed to type the words of the damned for all eternity. Driven by fear, curiosity and an insatiable thirst for the unknown.

Maybe instead of a keyboard, I write about my pants. Maybe it's a comedy, and my pants were once upon a time, hanging in a clothing store and were worn by a person in a fitting room, right before this person died, and the person's spirit clings to the last physical thing he came into contact with before passing. Then every time I wear the pants, I am compelled to do things, go places, and eventually the compulsion is so strong that I no longer have control over my actions, and end up on this poor lost soul's last spree at life.

For me I have a terrible ability to draw inspiration from almost anything; strangers making faces in their car as they drive on the freeway. A misshapen bagel, or a song on the radio. I could even write a story where a Brony is abducted and ordered to stand trial in Equestria for the crime of being a Brony, and has to defend the actions of all the fandom, including the nasty stuff.

Maybe I suffer from a form of hypergraphia, and am compelled to just write. One day, I'll write my lifelong masterpiece; assuming I can tame the creature living under the "H" of my keyboard, and it stops writing the words; "Here how harrowing hallow hills, hear harmful hurting hearts, humming hasty heathen heroes, heatedly hanging hollowly hung."

In my opinion...let your triggers be your inspiration. the topic is everlasting and random in its self. Not only that, from everyone's great opinions and unique ways of actually stirring one's brain fluids into productivity one must find the source of their essence and interest in order to actually birth their creations onto the page or canvas. Whenever I think of a subject, time, place, era, attitudes, atmosphere's, vividity, life in general and just the sake the topic that one tries to actually comprehend in a whole. It takes alot to make a story but on the plus side it doesn't take much to craft a tale in it's self. See where I'm getting at? Focus on the main aspect of what you're crafting and go and see it through. Lace those blows and never hold back. And, if you really want to get into certain themes. Another special strategy for a more broader horizon in one mind's eye is to go outside the box. Things range from the bizarre, to the surreal and can go into more deeper territory ... But, I believe you get the concept now, eh? I hope on my part I clarified a few things in as well. Everyone else were just as intriguing to read in inspirational thought as my own amusingly!

I can draw inspiration from just about anything. Childhood memories, songs, inside jokes, headcanon; you name it.

I actually have a bit of a funny story. Before I started writing Wonderbolts Under Fire, I knew that I wanted to write a Spitfire story, but I couldn't decide what it would be about. Then I saw Linkara's review of the Dragnet comic strip on That Guy with the Glasses, and then it hit me: Make it a My Little Investigations-style mystery. To date, I think that's the most bizarre place I've ever gotten inspiration from (though Deserts and Dragons being inspired by that one scene in An American Tale: Fievel Goes West featuring the Blues Brothers song Rawhide is a close second. ).

I get my inspiration from stories. Like, I always say, 'wouldn't it be cool if the story did this' and it never does, so I write those plot lines that the author didn't do.

I used to think that I get my inspiration from the show. Looking at the themes of the stories that were written by me, I'm starting to doubt it. Perhaps my inspiration comes from within. However, if that is true, then is that who I really am? I didn't notice those aspects of me before. I need to write more stories to explore this deeper.