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Well, I've never done anything digital, so I don't know how useful my experience might be to you.
But, personally, most of my projects start either with someone's request, or with curiosity.
For instance, visiting my cousin who has a piece of stained glass art, I started wondering how dissimilar stained glass and marquetry really are, when it comes to design principles. Obviously the actual craftsmanship process is different, but design-wise, they share a lot in common, right?
So I made a series of sketches and turned each piece in the series into a paired art, one in wood via marquetry and one in glass. (I live in a university town, so it's easy to access crafting and project workshops, fortunately)
(If you're curious, since I chose a style that only used natural wood without paints or stains, the marquetry and stained art turned out to be very different because the range of color options in the glass and the subtle nature of wood grain choices in the marquetry led to very different designs working better for each medium).
Oh, also, I don't do the camera thing (not really into digital stuff/tech stuff; going online to a forum like this is about as modern as I get), so whenever I travel I bring a sketchbook, and if I see something neat or interesting, instead of taking a picture, I sketch it.
So there's a fair bit of sketching from that.
I also use the sketchbook as a shield at social events; when there's a large crowd of people I often get overwhelmed and don't want to actually socialise.
But especially for family events, I can't just skip it.
So I'll bring a sketchbook, and if anyone sits down next to me and starts being mean enough to actually want to interact and talk to me.... I pull out the sketchbook and ask them to sit for me.
Works quite well. Sometimes you get more attention than you want, that way, and a little line forms, but they don't make you actually TALK, they just take turns sitting down and then leave with their portrait sketch, so... works out.
But mostly it's curiosity.
Another for instance: a neighbor got a hammock one year when the summer got unusually hot.
So of course, I wanted to see if I could learn macrame or another form of decorative knotting, and create a piece of artwork that was also a hammock.
I ended up spending two years on it, making quite a number of them, because of course when a hammock is in use or not, the way it folds up means you can't see designs well, so it took me a long time to figure out how to create designs that would look interesting and distinctive under those restrictions.
In the end, I started getting frustrated and just cheated by using the hammock style that has a flat length of wood on either end, which keeps the hammock more open and the design more visible.
I didn't really like any of them and sold them all away, but it kept me interested and creating for two years, so.... no regrets.
Or there's the time when I ended up creating a bunch of paper dolls because that was my way of creating Wild Knuffel.... the first stage is the base doll layer and further evolution stages were the dress up clothing you could successively add.
That was fun.
Never did figure out how to manage to transform them into a submittable format to actually create WK with here on the site, but hey, it was fun to make them.
Or someone I know will have some big event, and I don't want to go, so I feel guilty and come up with some type of art that is relevant to their life or interest or special event, and then make that and send it to them instead of going.
(When it's someone I'm not terribly close to, that usually just turns into some form of paper art that can be sent as a card... pop-up art or cut-out art or calligraphic nonsense or a foldout guide to local native plants with pressed flower art [to the place they just moved or for the place they just moved away from, depending on the person and who I know who can get me the vegetation], or something)
That turns into the curiosity of: what can I make that fits the parameters of their interest, is fast enough to finish by their event, and can be easily mailed?
It becomes a game of brainstorming.
And then you make it.
Or maybe it will be some family event that sparks it. A family elder dies and I get contacted by a cousin a few months later and they just found out they're pregnant and feeling weepy because their kid-to-be won't know the Elder and they're grieving.
So then I'll think about that Elder and the family stories I know, and I'll make a story-quilt. Embroider a symbol of stories about the Elder in each square, and since it's for a kid, add something of interest to the kid as filling... one square will have crinkly-sounding paper in it for them to scrunch up, another will have an herbal satchet for a soothing scent, another square will be a bunch of buttons from the Elder's favorite clothing, so the kid can fiddle with the buttons and my cousin can use it as a starting point to pass on the stories.... that kind of thing.
It becomes another form of art.
So.
Motivation: curiosity, wanting to get out of social obligations, wanting to fulfill social obligations, or as an alternative to photography. Or, if I need money, an actual paid commission. Those are more rare. It's easier to sell something else already made than to work with people. People are hard.
Inspirations: whatever is happening around me, or thinking about the person it's intended to honor, or the person it's intended for.
Oh. And whenever I travel, I pick up random things from wherever the destination was.
Then, later, that can be used in art.
So if I don't know what else to do, there's a trunk of materials that can be looked through for inspiration.
Like various jars of sands from different deserts and beaches can be turned into sand art for a friend who is retiring from teaching geology. Or a pretty stick -because I liked the wood grain- can be sanded down and carved and inset with tiny crystal eyes for the carved animals and given to a nephew who loves to pretend to be a warlock. (I know; in the age of Harry Potter, why not a wizard? But no. Warlock or nothing for this boyo).
Or a Ren Fair is coming up, so you go out and make a bunch of lavender wands to sell and then realize you don't want to actually TALK to anyone who might want to buy them, which means... you need to create a sign that says what you're selling and what price and that, thanks, you Don't Talk, it's not personal.
So you can spend a weekend and become a commercial artist by creating your own advertisement/sign.
Art can be anywhere around you, if you want.
Do you have a patient neighbor? Ask if you can paint their mailbox.
Is there a bus stop near you that's always covered with graffiti? Make a sketch of what kind of mural you would put there to cover it up.....
and then, if you're me...
turn it into a to-scale coordinating master copy and series of life-size paint-by-numbers spray-on stencil options, write out a cover letter, and mail the whole thing to the city council suggesting they take some of the "city beautification funds" that would cover the -listed and priced out- spray paints and then give permission to the art teacher at the public school as a method of getting kids "actively involved in their community so they can foster a sense of civic pride and belonging in these trying and divisive times"
.... anonymously. Of course.
Because I don't have the patience to talk to everyone that'd be needed to talk to before I could get permission to do it myself, and let's face it, illegal stuff is too stressful to contemplate doing it without permission.
Or go for it. If a city leaves graffiti up, it definitely won't bother to take down a mural that looks deliberate. You do you.
Anyhow.
Point is.
Lots of places for art. (estate sales, garage sales, and thrift stores often have very cheap glassware, especially if it's a singleton instead of a whole set. That's a fun way to start learning intaglio!)
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