Picking my four factions.

Looking back to the Art Test brief it says ...

I want my factions to be very distinct, as if they have all come together because of a shared interest, but they are all very different. I think I will use Religion or some form of Religious belief that draws these four groups of people in even though they are all very different there is a common interest that keeps them all social enough to share a citadel together.

My first choice I found was through a random google search where I found this skull, this lead me on to find a race of people called Mixtec. I had never heard of them before so as with most things I went to Wikipedia

"The Mixtec /ˈmiːʃtɛk/, or Mixtecos, are indigenous Mesoamerican peoples inhabiting the region known as La Mixteca, which covers parts of the Mexican states of Oaxaca, Guerrero and Puebla. The Mixtec region and the Mixtec peoples are traditionally divided into highland Mixtecs or mixteca alta in northeast Guerrero and western Oaxaca, and Lowland Mixtecs or mixteca baja northwest Oaxaca and southwest Puebla and Coastal Mixtecs inhabiting the pacific slope of southern Oaxaca and Guerrero. The Mixtecan languages form a major branch of the Otomanguean language family. In precolumbian times, a number of Mixtecan city states competed with each other and with the Zapotec kingdoms. The major Mixtec polity was Tututepec which rose to prominence in the 11th century under the leadership of Eight Deer Jaguar Claw - the only Mixtec king to ever unite the Highland and Lowland polities into a single state. Like the rest of the indigenous peoples of Mexico, the Mixtec were conquered by the Spanish invaders and their indigenous allies in the 16th century. Pre-Columbia their numbered 1.5 million Mixtecs. Today there are approximately 800,000 Mixtec people in Mexico, and there are also large populations in the United States

The term Mixtec (Mixteco in Spanish) comes from the Nahuatl word mixtecah [miʃˈtekaʔ], "cloud people" . There are many names that the Mixtecs use for naming themselves: ñuù savi, nayívi savi, ñuù davi, nayivi davi etc. This all denominations can be translated as 'people of the rain'."  Wikipedia, (2015). Mixtec. [online] Available at: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mixtec [Accessed 7 Jan. 2015].

To me I would love to use the skulls as some form of helmet, the name of the people translating to 'Cloud People' makes me want to have them as some form of mountain living people, as if they decended from the clouds due to some Religious reason. The Mesoamerican art style is very unique to its continent and could present a challenge adapting it to the Fable art style.The jewellery and clothing that comes from these people could be something that could be traded to the other factions in the marketplace and created at a forge.

I want to pick cultures that are very different. I would love to have peoples from various hot and cold climates, with the Mesoamerican culture its in a hot climate so naturally my instinct is to now head up to where it is cold and I instantly think of Inuit culture. I think of them travelling down to find some giant God and meeting with the other people.

"Inuit describes the various groups of indigenous peoples who live throughout Inuit Nunangat, that is the Inuvialuit Settlement Region of the Northwest Territories and Nunavut of Northern Canada, Nunavik in Quebec and Nunatsiavut in Labrador, as well as in Greenland. The term culture of the Inuit, therefore, refers primarily to these areas; however, parallels to other Eskimo groups can also be drawn.
The traditional lifestyle of the Inuit is adapted to extreme climatic conditions; their essential skills for survival are hunting and trapping. Agriculture was never possible in the millions of square kilometres of tundra and icy coasts from Siberia to Northern America and Greenland. Therefore, hunting became the core of the culture and cultural history of the Inuit. Thus, the everyday life in modern Inuit settlements, established only some decades ago, still reflects the 5,000-year-long history of a typical hunting culture which allowed the Inuit peoples and their ancestors to achieve one of the most remarkable human accomplishments, the population of the Arctic." Wikipedia, (2015). Inuit culture. [online] Available at: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Inuit_culture [Accessed 7 Jan. 2015].

Back to warmer climates again, I had an idea about doing an Arabian style culture, mainly because of this image, it's a little cliche but I've always enjoyed this style of costume due to over exposure to Aladdin at a young age (I blame the parents).

There are so many aspects to the culture of the Middle East that I will have to have a think about which one I pin down. There are cultures in Fable Three that live in the desert so I will have to be careful about using a style that is already prevalent. For now I will just do general research on the Middle East before I chose what culture I want to choose.

"Arab culture refers to the culture in the countries in which the official language is Arabic (although the Arabic language in some of them is the language of minority), and the west officials and scholars used to call them "Arab countries" of Western Asia and North Africa, from Morocco to the Arabian Sea. Language, literature, gastronomy, art, architecture, music, spirituality, philosophy, mysticism (etc.) are all part of the cultural heritage of the pan-Arab world.
The Arab world is sometimes divided into separate regions including Nile Valley (consisting of Egypt and Sudan), Al-Maghrib Al-Arabi (consisting of Libya, Tunisia, Algeria, Morocco, and Mauritania), Fertile Crescent (consisting of Iraq, Kuwait, Lebanon, Syria, Palestine and Jordan) and the Arabian Peninsula (consisting of Iraq, Jordan, Kuwait, Bahrain, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, Oman and the UAE) and the Arabian Peninsula's Al-Janoub Al-Arabi (consisting of Yemen and Oman).
The Arab Culture is divided into three main parts, the Urban Culture (Al-Mudun), the Rural Culture (Ar-Reef), and the Nomad Culture (Al-Badow). Typically, most of the Gulf countries along with parts of Jordan and Iraq are considered Badow (Bedouins). Other countries' countrysides such as Palestine, Syria, Lebanon, Algeria and Tunisia are considered Rural Cultures. Their cities are considered to be Urban Cultures. In fact, most of the Arab Major Cities are recognized with Urban Cultures, like Jaffa (pre-Israel), Cairo, Jerusalem, Beirut, Rabat, Baghdad, Alexandria, Damascus, Marrakech, etc... The Levant, particularly Palestine, Lebanon, Syria as well as Egypt are known to have a long Urban Culture history."

This means I could choose from Egypt as an option, the use of several Gods in their ancient Religion could help me if I wanted to use Religion as a way of drawing these people in together.

My final culture I would like to feature some kind of swampy environment, people used to living in a swampy land. First people that come to my mind are the people of Louisiana, Cajuns. The temperature would be muggy and people would adapt to it. I found it very difficult to find information about old timey Cajun clothing and living so I will have to change this faction for something different. I will change it for something like China, it has a style that is very different than the others so it will blend in nicely.

"The history of China goes back to the ancient civilization – one of the world's earliest – that flourished in the fertile basin of the Yellow River in the North China Plain. For millennia, China's political system was based on hereditary monarchies, known as dynasties, beginning with the semi-mythological Xia of the Yellow River basin (c. 2000 BCE). Since 221 BCE, when the Qin Dynasty first conquered several states to form a Chinese empire, the country has expanded, fractured and been reformed numerous times. The Republic of China (ROC) overthrew the last dynasty in 1911, and ruled the Chinese mainland until 1949. After the defeat of the Empire of Japan in World War II, the Communist Party defeated the nationalist Kuomintang in mainland China and established the People's Republic of China in Beijing on 1 October 1949, while the Kuomintang relocated the ROC government to its present capital of Taipei.
China had the largest and most complex economy in the world for most of the past two thousand years, during which it has seen cycles of prosperity and decline. Since the introduction of economic reforms in 1978, China has become one of the world's fastest-growing major economies. As of 2013, it is the world's second-largest economy by both nominal total GDP and purchasing power parity (PPP), and is also the world's largest exporter and importer of goods. China is a recognized nuclear weapons state and has the world's largest standing army, with the second-largest defence budget. The PRC has been a United Nations member since 1971, when it replaced the ROC as a permanent member of the U.N. Security Council." Wikipedia, (2015). China. [online] Available at: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/China [Accessed 9 Jan. 2015]

I'm not sure how I will get all these cultures to work but with further research I will make it work. Next step is to gather images for mood boards, and do a bit more research into these cultures, will probably make a post about each of them after I have finished gathering images.