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Now I'm not trying to attack the fanbase but really more making a commentary on just how much fanart there is floating about. It just seems to me that much if not most in an attempt to cash in on a show's popularity just to get more pageviews and watchers (I myself have done similar in the past). As artists we should strive to create our own ideas and creations.....that's what being an artist should be about.
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If there's one thing I've learned on dA, often a silly fanart doodle of any popular fandom will probably get more attention than painstaking original stuff that you poured hours into.
Frick, it's happening now over on dA with some of my own poni fanart, and I'm just sighing and accepting it as this is hardly anything new to dA behaviour. I've pissed and moaned to friends about it for years over several fandoms so...yeah.
(Yeah, I do fanart, and it's not on FA for a reason [uhm...pretty much this] but my only excuse is that I do love the show and the characters AND style have always been weak about DRAWING fanart...meh. I've just long accepted it as a Rule of the Internet that fanart gets more attention, and it actually does piss me off more than anything.)
Frick, it's happening now over on dA with some of my own poni fanart, and I'm just sighing and accepting it as this is hardly anything new to dA behaviour. I've pissed and moaned to friends about it for years over several fandoms so...yeah.
(Yeah, I do fanart, and it's not on FA for a reason [uhm...pretty much this] but my only excuse is that I do love the show and the characters AND style have always been weak about DRAWING fanart...meh. I've just long accepted it as a Rule of the Internet that fanart gets more attention, and it actually does piss me off more than anything.)
I have no real beef if a person does or doses draw fan art, and I know there are legitimate fans. You actually draw other things besides MLP so I'm really not including you in this commentary. However it's obvious that so many people are dedicating all they time on energy on doing fanart of it just to be notice.....however what they don't realize is that it's not their artistic abilities people are noticing....they are just noticing MLP fanart. I myself have been guilty of something similar years back with I different fandom......around the 2005 mark I regrettably used to be a Sonic artist for pretty much those same reasons.
Oh trust me, I know. As someone who has done fanart there just is another side to it- getting your original works totally ignored in favour of the fanart. I think I put all my old Lion King fanart in storage for a good couple years because I was so sick of it getting all the attention while my other stuff just sat ignored (that, and I was just tired of the TLK fandom and all its politics and in-fighting at that point and was ready to make a nice clean break. :P )
Of course, I suppose some reading this is wondering: "Then why not stop doing fanart?" but that's just really silly, if I still enjoy actually CREATING fanart, nuthin's gonna stop me. Frick, that's why I don't even go to fan forums or such anymore... more often or not the baggage that comes with a fandom can just turn me off something too easily.
Of course, I suppose some reading this is wondering: "Then why not stop doing fanart?" but that's just really silly, if I still enjoy actually CREATING fanart, nuthin's gonna stop me. Frick, that's why I don't even go to fan forums or such anymore... more often or not the baggage that comes with a fandom can just turn me off something too easily.
Ah! Gotchya. Sorry.
How did that little phrase go? "He learned a forumla for cartoon rabbits, this formula for drawing cartoon rabbits payed off, so in the end he couldnt change the tragic habits this cartoon rabbits formula made." Something like that, substitute "rabbits" with "ponies" in this situation. And honestly, same can go for a lot of other artists here stuck in Lion King/psuedo- Disney style, which...yeah, I'm guilty of. Pretty much part of why I stopped TLK fanart was because I have heard too many other artists who managed to move on say that the style is ridiculously addictive and hard to shake.
Honestly, I know I've had to change the proportions of the neck and the length of the body for some of my MLP fanart because it had more realistic proportions and they actually had a neck and midsection which just doesn't work in that style. (Honestly, I envy most cartoon artists like you who seem to know enough about real stuff to make really well stylized cartoons. I've often gone on lately about how cartooning and stylizing well is a lot harder than most people think it is, especially since I've been drawing humans- trying to get the essence of a person's face with the least lines possible...harder than one would think and not as appreciated when done well.)
Haphazardly bringing it all back, this all basically all this goes back to reliance on symbols- Disney style, anime, MLP ponies, Sonic, whatever...the problem is when you only know the symbols and don't understand what they actually represent. I just really hope a lot of the MLP fanartists are just hobbyists, because crap, if they do end up wanting to draw other stuff (yeah, I know, less pageviews, but it happened in the TLK fandom, and it basically happens all the time if a person gets bored of one fandom and gets interested in something else) they are gonna have a hard time. Looking at Lauren Faust's sketches and how they're constructed shows just how far it's all stylized...they're mostly just composed of three main circles for construction and of course the tube-y legs. (Wait that sounds like I described Mickey Mouse's head and arms...)
How did that little phrase go? "He learned a forumla for cartoon rabbits, this formula for drawing cartoon rabbits payed off, so in the end he couldnt change the tragic habits this cartoon rabbits formula made." Something like that, substitute "rabbits" with "ponies" in this situation. And honestly, same can go for a lot of other artists here stuck in Lion King/psuedo- Disney style, which...yeah, I'm guilty of. Pretty much part of why I stopped TLK fanart was because I have heard too many other artists who managed to move on say that the style is ridiculously addictive and hard to shake.
Honestly, I know I've had to change the proportions of the neck and the length of the body for some of my MLP fanart because it had more realistic proportions and they actually had a neck and midsection which just doesn't work in that style. (Honestly, I envy most cartoon artists like you who seem to know enough about real stuff to make really well stylized cartoons. I've often gone on lately about how cartooning and stylizing well is a lot harder than most people think it is, especially since I've been drawing humans- trying to get the essence of a person's face with the least lines possible...harder than one would think and not as appreciated when done well.)
Haphazardly bringing it all back, this all basically all this goes back to reliance on symbols- Disney style, anime, MLP ponies, Sonic, whatever...the problem is when you only know the symbols and don't understand what they actually represent. I just really hope a lot of the MLP fanartists are just hobbyists, because crap, if they do end up wanting to draw other stuff (yeah, I know, less pageviews, but it happened in the TLK fandom, and it basically happens all the time if a person gets bored of one fandom and gets interested in something else) they are gonna have a hard time. Looking at Lauren Faust's sketches and how they're constructed shows just how far it's all stylized...they're mostly just composed of three main circles for construction and of course the tube-y legs. (Wait that sounds like I described Mickey Mouse's head and arms...)
I can't say how any other artists developed their own style but I developed min by putting a large bunch if styles I like in a blender....as time went by and my work got better it developed into a style of it's own. I dunno if this is at all helpful to you or I'm I'm just babbling again
With this, sir, you are going to be so popular.
I personally agree with you about striving to create your own original stuff, but I understand the standpoint of the fan base as well. I mean, some times, it's like you just have to draw something to get it out of your system... Doesn't matter if it's original or not.
I personally agree with you about striving to create your own original stuff, but I understand the standpoint of the fan base as well. I mean, some times, it's like you just have to draw something to get it out of your system... Doesn't matter if it's original or not.
Well I understand it too and I'm not saying people should draw fanart.,.....having said that there are those (not the first fanbase to to thing bur currently the most common) that artists pretty much turn their gallery into a MLP shrine where it's exclusively all they draw, they do this because they wanna be noticed through drawing the fanart......what they don't realize is that it's the fanart people notice and not the artist who drew them. This is something I'm all too familiar with from the time I spent as a Sonic artist back in 2005, I fell into these pitfalls I'm talking about now......I learned my lesson the hard way.
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