Open questions to DeviantArt users

For anyone who has signed up for and uses DA:

What exactly is the premium service? What does it give you that the free account doesn't, in concrete terms? I just spent the better part of a half hour trying to get that info from their website. It wasn't overly helpful. :|

Do you need to be contributing to DA to get a membership? I'd feel kind of funny/weird about signing up for it and then not contributing something, but I'm not exactly as regular as the tides with getting my stuff done, let alone posting it.

Does DA actually host the stuff on their site?

Has anyone ever actually sold anything through DA? More importantly, has anyone had their stuff ripped off by others? How often/widespread is that problem?

I ask because I'm thinking of getting back into poetry and brushing up on my neglected drawing skills, but as y'all know, my creations are my babies whether they're beautiful (there's the occasional gem) or ugly deformed freaks (though sometimes that's intentional, too) and I want to make sure they have a good home. Plus I need an outlet for my stress and I'm kind of limited in my options these days for doing that.

the main things, it lets you look at more thumbnails at a time, and it gets rid of ads, and gives a discount on buying other stuff.

the other features only matter if you are running an art business through DA

There are some small benefits like the ones mentioned. It certainly makes some aspects of DA less annoying, but it's not such a big deal.

Occasionally, DA gives away a free day of premium to give you a taste of what it is like. I've gotten two already (along with the rest of the DA community I think) and it's... okay I guess. Nothing to prioritize if you don't have money though.

About ripping offs. I've heard some stories, but DA allows you to put watermarks on your art (and I guess something similar for text or flash) and there is some protection for your work. You could also put your stuff under creative commons if that's what you want.

People sell stuff on DA all the time. Some people live off of that. So, yes, you can sell your stuff if that's what you want. But unless you have a market (AKA watchers or people who share your stuff), you won't be making a lot at first. You might not make anything at first, in fact. So, you kinda need a public (and quality).

I've only recently signed up, so I don't have all that much experience.

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Originally Posted by Winter_Wolf

Do you need to be contributing to DA to get a membership? I'd feel kind of funny/weird about signing up for it and then not contributing something, but I'm not exactly as regular as the tides with getting my stuff done, let alone posting it.

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Nope. I had my membership a couple of months before I uploaded anything. I know of people who use their account solely to keep updated on artists they like.

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Originally Posted by Winter_Wolf

Does DA actually host the stuff on their site?

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Yes.

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Originally Posted by Winter_Wolf

Has anyone ever actually sold anything through DA? More importantly, has anyone had their stuff ripped off by others? How often/widespread is that problem?

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I know that some people have had their stuff ripped off, but that happens any time you post something to the internet. I don't believe it's incredibly widespread, but that would depend on whether you're producing things that people want to rip off. Since it will be obvious you uploaded the art first, I wouldn't worry too much about it.

Be warned, the controls aren't the clearest, and it can be occasionally frustrating trying to figure out how to do something the first time. Other than that, I like it.

Lots of good info, thanks all. Still not real clear on the benefits of premium, or rather why people would go that route, but it's mostly a matter of curiosity at this point.

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Originally Posted by Thormag

People sell stuff on DA all the time. Some people live off of that. So, yes, you can sell your stuff if that's what you want. But unless you have a market (AKA watchers or people who share your stuff), you won't be making a lot at first. You might not make anything at first, in fact. So, you kinda need a public (and quality).

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I'm not overly concerned about making money with it, it's just a nice boost to get a few bucks here and there to keep my art supplies up. If nothing sells, so be it. At any rate I make my art for me first, and if others like it that's fantastic. Plus hopefully once in a blue moon someone comes along and validates my artistic choices. :smalltongue: And quite frankly the (constructive) opinions of complete strangers mean a bit more to me than family and friends, because the strangers have no incentive to pull punches to be nice.

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Originally Posted by Winter_Wolf

I'm not overly concerned about making money with it, it's just a nice boost to get a few bucks here and there to keep my art supplies up. If nothing sells, so be it. At any rate I make my art for me first, and if others like it that's fantastic. Plus hopefully once in a blue moon someone comes along and validates my artistic choices. :smalltongue: And quite frankly the (constructive) opinions of complete strangers mean a bit more to me than family and friends, because the strangers have no incentive to pull punches to be nice.

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I was not trying to imply that you were aiming for monetary gain, sorry if I came out that way. Anyways, you could try hosting some of your work, something that you won't miss too much (or put a watermark on something you would miss if ripped off) and see if you like it. I've personally used DA for... 4 years? Wow, that's a lot. Anyways, I've been a member for that long and I can't really complain about something specific that has bugged me too much from the top of my head.

Theres been a lot of flack over over-watermarking lately, too, a lot of bigger online artists and content providers against it, because you want someone to see the whole picture. Honestly, if you REALLY want to rip something off, it's pretty easy to erase a watermark.

Yeah, I mean I think it's a really weird concept frankly.

Kind of like, "I made this picture, here, see? Also I've daubed ugly graffiti all over it. So you can't steal it. It looks great underneath it, trust me!"

Edit - But it's not really someone I'll ever have to worry about, it's vanishingly rare that anyone even sees my deviations, let alone is inspired enough to try and steal anything.

I just sign mine. That way if someone wants to steal it, they still have to do some work to remove the signature, but it doesn't interfere with people looking at it.

Okay, another question because this is kind of driving me nuts. Is there a way to filter the galleries to just show the work by one artist? For example, I want to see the original works done by humon. And I get all kinds of "homages", fanart, some other stuff that's remotely related.

Or is this a "feature" of DA that can't be toggled to make sure that we all get some exposure to other artists?

No, I have not signed up yet, I don't feel right about it until I can actually put a few things of my own up that I'm not horribly embarrassed by (which are all currently WIP).

Uh, you just click their username and then the gallery button.
You'll end up somewhere like Here.

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Originally Posted by Tiki Snakes

Uh, you just click their username and then the gallery button.
You'll end up somewhere like Here.

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Oh ho! Yeah I guess just using the "search" feature and typing in the artist's name didn't filter out the others who for whatever reason had humon as a tag.

Now for my next probably oh so obvious why can't I see it question: is there a way to just go directly to the artist's profile page? The aforementioned search function doesn't just spit out a username/profile, I had to preview the art, then open a humon image, then click on her username. I'm sure there's an easier way that I'm just not seeing.

There is. Kind of.
I got to the artists page via google. Searching for Username plus Deviantart seems to work better than doing it the long way on Deviantart. I'm not a heavy Deviantart user though, so there might be an easier way.

There's no direct way in dA itself. You can only find artists through their work. If you want to be able to quickly go back to someone you can follow them though.

If you already know the artists name on deviantART, then all you have to do is type their name in a search bar and add .deviantart.com

For example, my dA name is Shiovra and all you would have to do is type shiovra.deviantart.com in the top search bar. Once you find people you like, you can watch them and you'll always see their updates. You can even edit what updates you see, whether it be deviations, journals, scraps and whatnot. :smallsmile:

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Originally Posted by Sha'uri

If you already know the artists name on deviantART, then all you have to do is type their name in a search bar and add .deviantart.com

For example, my dA name is Shiovra and all you would have to do is type shiovra.deviantart.com in the top search bar. Once you find people you like, you can watch them and you'll always see their updates. You can even edit what updates you see, whether it be deviations, journals, scraps and whatnot. :smallsmile:

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Ooh, shiny! Thanks for the tip. You'd think it was the kind of thing DA would put in a FAQ or something. Or maybe they did but they buried it under a bunch of other stuff.