DeviantArt?

[Sandstone-Shadow]

Does anyone use DeviantArt? Would you recommend it?

I just started an account and have shared a couple of my okay pieces of art on it. Is there anything I should be aware of? Browsing through pieces, it seems fine to upload art of characters that don't belong to you. Should I be worried about any kind of copyright or theft issues if I upload art of my own original characters or pieces that I'm really proud of?

Also, is any medium of art accepted? I do a lot of sketches and Shrinky Dink artwork; are things like hemp bracelets and upcycled clothing also okay?

Probably silly questions, but someone here probably knows!

 

[ultraviolet]

I used to be on deviantART! I personally don't really like dA very much, but I do know that you can post basically whatever medium you want; last time i checked they had different categories for stuff. Fanart is also allowed and makes up a huge part of deviantART.
If you're worried about art theft, you can always opt to add a watermark when you submit stuff. submitting work to dA is actually a good way to have a kind of concrete place with the date of submission and copyright of a work (as opposed to tumblr, which can be a bit difficult to navigate). I personally have never had my artwork stolen, but I tend to be a bit sporadic with updates so I feel like I'm not that well-known enough.

edit: also I really hate their new logo, wowza. The old one was so simple! they could have totally rebranded without changing the logo. guh ok whatever

 

[Phoenixsong]

Speaking as someone who has had art stolen on a few occasions (and each time it was pretty hilarious for one reason or another, but I digress), it does happen, yes, although in my personal experience the staff were good about getting the stolen work taken down. I've also heard stories about situations where they basically jerked the original artist around instead of actually dealing with the theft, though, so your results may vary! I never bothered with the watermarks myself, but if it worries you, and especially if you're worried about your original things, then either using their watermark feature or just adding your own watermarks in Photoshop/GIMP/blah will definitely help.

Something else you may want to note is that it's not a super-great, or at least not super-consistent, place to get concrit if you want it. It can be good for exposure and sometimes even friends if you submit to the right groups (definitely join some groups! Members have created groups for everything under the sun, and I'm sure that good groups exist for Shrinky Dinks and your other hobbies!), but concrit... eh. If you are after getting some actual advice, you may have to do some digging for groups that encourage it or make a show of it. If you don't care about that, though, then there are plenty of people who'll just drop by to compliment or favorite your art. :)

I should also point that I haven't really been active there for a few years now, though less out of any dissatisfaction with it and more just because I sort of drifted off. I might start uploading some stuff there again soon, idk. They have (had?) a pretty big fakemon community, which is my kind of thing, and I'm curious about the state of it.

Oh, and grab an AdBlock browser extension, if you don't have one already. They might've tightened it up a bit recently, especially after the redesign, but in the past dA was pretty notorious for ads that dumped all sorts of crap on your computer. Personally I'd rather be safe than sorry!

(and yes, the new logo is awful.)

 

[Sandstone-Shadow]

(I was going to start a new thread, but seeing how this is still the third most recent thread in this subforum...)

So I've been using deviantArt for a while, and while I like certain aspects of it, I'm not completely satisfied. It feels a little overwhelming to navigate and cumbersome to post art, but the community is nice.

Does anyone have any alternative sites for sharing art? I know some people use tumblr, but I'm not sure that's what I'm looking for. I might use Twitter as a supplement, but not as a primary sharing thing. I've heard Instagram is good for art? Not sure how well it works for organizing albums and whatnot.

What I really like is something like Patreon's feed. It's simple, can handle posts with or without art, seems easy to tag, etc. However, I'm not ready to ask people for money to see my posts and I don't think you can subscribe to someone's Patreon without paying!

I also like how Youtube channels can be organized. Not that that's at all applicable here, but maybe someone knows of something similarly organized?!

Any suggestions?