Deviantart etc.

[Aged P]

Hi Guys,

I notice that some of you are registered with the DeviantArt site.
Apart from its, to me, offputting name, it looks like a well run sales outlet.

Has anybody actually sold anything?

Their categories don't quite fit ArtRage, because it's Digital Art that looks exactly like Painting. What group do you go for?

Any further info that might be useful?

Phil

[thesleepless]

hi phil, i've been using deviantart for years now and despite the name it's a great place for everyone, whatever your level of deviousness may be.

i don't use it for sales as i'm not interested in selling my work, but i know a few people who make a mint from it, and a lot who don't sell much.

while you might not make any money from it, you'll definatly encounter some amazing work and useful feedback on your own and see some very inspiring stuff, and hopefully meet some lovely people.

i put my artrage stuff into digital art -> painting and airbrushing

my username is ftsf, feel free to add me to your watch and i'll do the same ^_^

[sweeneymini]

I'm tempted by deviantArt.

I'm thinking of signing up to Illustration Friday as well and all the artists there seem to use eBlogger instead :?

[Aged P]

Hi thesleepless,

I had a long look at the Deviantart site, I think they just got stuck with a theme and name when they were young, dynamic and impressionable, like Matt and Dave and Andy Rage are now.

All the Deviant, Devious stuff doesn't quite gel with what is a superb site.

I didn't make it through all the 23.000,000 pictures :lol: , but the section you mentioned is somewhere I might well feel at home. It's a beautiful painting gallery.

Something else that happened was that I developed PS fatigue. The pictures created were breathtaking and wonderful. But they were all breathtaking and wonderful in the same very distinctive way.
I expect that a 1000 ArtRage pics would show up a similarity, but it made me value the vast range of possibilities thar ArtRage provides.

[emremeydan]

Phil, if you're interested in selling prints etc, take a look at these two sites, which focus on the "sales" part:

http://www.zazzle.com
http://www.cafepress.com

Sweeneymini, there's no "signing-up" process for IF, and you don't necessarily need a blogger account either. You just upload your illustration to a site (it can be your own site, or pic hosting sites, or a blogger account etc) and then submit the link to your illustration using the "enter your link" button on IF. The good thing about using blogger/flickr etc is that people can leave comments if they want to.

...
emre

[sweeneymini]

Thanks emre. I knew there had to be some reason to it.

I'm not sure whether to go with eblogger or deviant :? Deviant looks better and its specialised in art, but having no comments is a bit of a downer.

[thesleepless]

sweeneymini, deviantart has comments,

you can select for each artwork you upload whether you'd like any comments, constructive criticism, no criticism, or disable comments on it.

the whole site is pretty much based on commenting on people's work

[justG]

What do you all think about DA's licence agreement? By uploading a deviation, one basically gives them the right to use it however they please in connection with the marketing and promotion of the site.

eblogger.com is down. There's an ODBC error; they've run out of disk space. What I *do* know is that *that* makes me very nervous. =) I have never seen established sites like DA or Renderosity or any of the others down for more than a few seconds, not since those communities first started and experienced some growing pains. I actually hadn't even heard of eblogger 'til just now. That might help some of you make your choice.

.g

[thesleepless]

i generally don't pay attention to any legal things because i tend to not care what people do with my art, but here's a quote from wikipedia...


Historically there has been sporadic unease regarding deviantART's potential usage of uploaded art. Posting requires assent to dA's Submission Agreement (http://about.deviantart.com/policy/submission/) , which grants deviantART the legal permissions to re-use and even modify any artwork posted on deviantART (see in particular Section 3. License), as well as the right to sublicense any of that artwork to a third party at dA's sole discretion.

Critics have argued that those usage rights are too broad and far-reaching, that the legal language is unnecessarily complex and weighed in dA's favor, and that the difficulty of terminating the agreement means that "dA effectively owns your art." Defenders assert that deviantART needs the rights to legally offer its basic services, and to enable future services and business relationships that may become desirable. (See also the official Help Desk response (http://help.deviantart.com/226/) to questions and criticism.)

On March 1, 2006, deviantART's administration issued the most dramatic revision to date in response to months of community initiative. The far-reaching usage rights remain intact, but matters of termination have been clarified, improved, and made more accessible, so that artists can reclaim their usage rights simply by removing their works from dA as they please. Though some remain concerned about the basic arrangement, many now feel reassured by the new "freedom to leave."

but make your own choice, would hate for anything bad to happen to your art, so far i don't know of anyone who's had their rights abused, but theoretically it seems possible should the deviantart administration decide to be evil. although if they did, people would leave them in droves

[sweeneymini]

Well I've signed up to deviant. I haven't put anything on it yet but I've added thesleepless to my watchlist :)

I'm not too phased by the licence agreement. Its probably just there so that deviant can provide the service and they might use it to promote itself, just like how artwork thats showcased on the Ambients website is. Like sleepless says, if they exploited the artists, it'd soon kill off the deviant site.

[thesleepless]

i've just created an artrage group on deviantart for anyone who's using artrage, http://artrage-artists.deviantart.com/ just add it to your watch, and if you'd like your work to appear there just send a note to it with a link to your artwork.

also if someone at ambient design is reading this, i'd like to ask if we can use a 50x50pixel version of the artrage logo (the little drunken artist =) for the avatar?

[AndyRage]

Yup, you're definitely welcome to use the icon. Do you need anything else from us?
That's a very cool idea, TheSleepless.

[thesleepless]

thanks Andy, can't think of anything else we'd need, but if i think of anything i'll let you know =)

[sweeneymini]

Erm, Nubbie question:

When you get a comment are you supposed to reply on your own deviant page or the comment writers deviant page?

I guessed maybe on your own? :?

[thesleepless]

hehe sweenymini, i'm not sure actually, either is acceptable. if you reply by clicking the reply button they'll get a message telling them about it, if you go and post one on their page they'll only see it next time they view their page.. so take a pick, it doesn't really matter.

[sweeneymini]

Cool. If they get notification message I think I'll stick with replying on my deviant page then. It keeps them all together :)

[justG]

My experience with web-based communities is this:

Galleries in a forum environment, like this one. There is a conversation in progress. People participate in a conversation.

Galleries outside the forum environment, like dA, Renderosity, etc. People browse, comment, leave. They don't (necessarily) read others' comments, nor do they return to read replies.

It's like the difference between a museum and a reading group. I have found that the best way to respond to individual comments in the latter type of environment is by responding directly to the individual (most communities offer members the ability to privately message each other).

I still find dA's EULA unnecessarily off-putting, but *shrug*, I guess it's okay.

.g

[sweeneymini]

My experience with web-based communities is this:
Galleries outside the forum environment, like dA, Renderosity, etc. People browse, comment, leave. They don't (necessarily) read others' comments, nor do they return to read replies.

.g

I like a good friendly community forum like this one where you feel amongst friends, but when it comes to strangers I can sometimes be shy :oops: so the disconnected sort of feedback on sites like dA is nice and panic free :roll:

[thesleepless]

My experience with web-based communities is this:

Galleries in a forum environment, like this one. There is a conversation in progress. People participate in a conversation.

Galleries outside the forum environment, like dA, Renderosity, etc. People browse, comment, leave. They don't (necessarily) read others' comments, nor do they return to read replies.

It's like the difference between a museum and a reading group. I have found that the best way to respond to individual comments in the latter type of environment is by responding directly to the individual (most communities offer members the ability to privately message each other).

I still find dA's EULA unnecessarily off-putting, but *shrug*, I guess it's okay.
.g

yes this forum is quite a lovely community, and very different from dA, it has it's own unique charm and is very tightly knit, unlike dA which is huge and spans many mediums.

from my experience of dA though, people will browse, leave comments, leave, and then you reply and then go and check out their work and commen t on something of theirs,
they'll get notified of your reply, and have another look, and perhaps continue the conversation if anything remains to be said.

you get a lot of comments such as 'that's nice' etc, to which not much can be said but a simple thank you, but occasionally you'll get a nice in depth comment, pointing out things you didn't already see in your own work.

it's also a good way to expose yourself to a lot of new art that you wouldn't see otherwise, exploring other people's favourites.

both have their importance i think, i feel more comfortable sharing my work in progress here than i do on deviantart, but finished work is open to a much wider audience on dA, it's like putting something on dA is putting something out for exhibition and hanging around listening at the opening, and here is like having people around at your place for a cup of tea and chat about what you've been working on ^_^

and yes dA's submission policy is a worry, i hope they fix that up soon.

[jacktar51]

Sweenymini.......... I had a look at Deviant Art........The members may be OK ... but I didnt like their CONTRACT-----Terms of use at ALL!!!!!!
Watch out you are signing your copyright away as soon as you agree to those terms......Jack.

[Jules]

Nobody has used the artrage deviantart site yet? Hasn't anyone been interested?

http://artrage-artists.deviantart.com/

[sweeneymini]

I'm happy for any of my stuff to go on there :D