Before you start...Tips for "Writer looking for Artist"

[PapaDom]

Well, if they do, I hope they give me a reward. Like... I don't know... a paper crown.

[Kelheor]

Btw, this is a very interesting question. @victoria1 can the forum send automatic DMs to newcomers? So it will just immediately send the Collaboration guidelines (and just Guidelines, why not) directly to new people when they sign up.

[ar-ninetysix]

You know how we get pop-ups for not having enough characters or for making similar topics?? I wanna have the collab guidelines pop-up for newcomers making collab threads

and maybe something else in regards to sub4sub bc it's just counter-productive in the long run

[Azifri]

Can someone pin this thread forever?

[chestnutriceeee]

Really doubt that's gonna help. Especially since they are right up here when you join!

It has all the info a newcomer would need including the collab guidelines. People still don't read it /_ \

[Kelheor]

@chestnutriceeee I do agree with @ar-ninetysix and something more persistent will be better, but pinned topic also dissapears when you finish it and there are no separate Collaboration guidelines pinned, they are just located in General guidelines (so of course no one reads them). I am actually all for just deleting all the collab posts that are not meeting those points

[drawnbyyannan]

I think Tapas should hire someone to make the forum rules into a vertical scroll comic and maybe more people would read it.

[TAMAnnoying]

Just gonna book mark this for later

[Azifri]

I don't know why the mods don't use the "global pin" option for their guidelines. They have globally pinned topics before so the platform has the option. Dunno...

[chestnutriceeee]

Deleting them would be great. It might lead to more threads like this one.https://forums.tapas.io/t/interrobang-why-my-last-two-post-is-disappeared-interrobang-it-could-happen-to-you-too/61218
But only in the short term.

[surenlicious]

Let me add one more, please be a "good" writer. By which I mean you don't have to be god tier or anything, but at least something that makes me go "hey, they know what they're doing!".

I am not kidding with how many writers on here want to work with artists but then you see their own skill could um...use some love. I can forgive any comic or graphic novel for art of any skill level, but I can NOT read through poor writing. I cannot.

Love, someone who is both artist and writer

[skicoak]

Nice post @PapaDom!

Hope it's allowed to the job it's meant to.

[Mallory]

A similar discussion was happening on the comicbookcollabs subreddit recently, and one of the things that came out of it was that a lot of people felt that NOT having guidelines enforced on to collab posts actually made it way easier for the artists to discern whether a writer was worth their effort. I.e. if they're someone who intuitively decided to present their pitch as a business proposal, with all the details figured out and readily available, then that meant they were probably ready for a serious collaboration. The vague/low-detail ones could just be ignored since this signaled that this writer was not mature/serious enough to be considered. If the not-serious ones were given a template to fill out and/or forced to read guidelines, it becomes a lot harder to discern whether someone is actually worth an artist's time. And I can see the merit in this argument.

Not that having guidelines is BAD, but I do think that they're already obvious enough, and if a writer can't be bothered to do minimal research then it's kind of a nice way to weed them out.

[sorible]

This is such a good thread, and honestly, the same could be said for a few artists! Mosts "Artist looking for writer" posts get more offers and replies than writers do, but some of them are just so vague and don't even give examples of their art. I saw a post less than a month ago where OP (artist) seemed really rude and unpleasant to work with in general. If you're looking to work with other people, you should try to come off as friendly as possible, or at least someone easy to work with.

Another thing to add is not to constantly create new collaboration posts about the same project while expecting replies (both writers and artists). I'm sure more than half the people on tapas forums aren't looking for free job offers, so making more posts won't really go anywhere.

[DokiDokiTsuna]

As an artist who actually goes into these threads looking for potential collabs (and is usually disappointed...) I'd like to add some suggestions:

• Offer to start small, with a one-shot comic or some other brief illustration project. To me that shows that you're mature and you're willing to test the waters and work on a potential artist-writer relationship, rather than just grabbing the first artist who says 'ok' and throwing them headlong into a 3,000-page saga.
  Think of it like online dating: it's the same process of talking to complete strangers and trying to convince them to give you a chance to be part of their lives. And when you get a match, you don't immediately start planning the wedding...you usually invite them for a date first, so the two of you can get to know each other and get a feel for how you might become partners.

• Give a sample of your writing, PLEASE. Besides a blurb/synopsis of what your story is about, it'd be nice to have just a tiny little taste of how you actually write (especially the dialogue, since that's a comic artist's lifeblood).
  In my experience, it's pretty rare to come across even a decent amateur writer, let alone a good one. People always say it'd be easier for an artist to find a writer because there are more of them...well, more doesn't mean better.
  I was one of those artists, and although I did get a couple bites, not one of them had the skills to pull off the kind of story I was pitching (it was just a comedy strip, btw). The scripts I wrote and threw out were better than some of the auditions I got...
  TL; DR, you aren't getting the benefit of the doubt. ^^; At some point, you're gonna have to prove that you have quality content for someone to illustrate.

[PapaDom]

Achoo!!

[jensrichard77]

If you found your artist...Hold them tight in your arms. Kiss their forehead. And whisper in their ear: "You're the best thing that happened to me. Please don't leave me." You should feel grateful having finally found someone who wants to work on your series and with you. Treat them nice and good things will happen to both of you.

@nathanKmcwilliams @Chita @euphisa
You are everything to me, without your great talent and wonderful friendship there would not be any reason for me to continue. Thank you for your time and your belief in me.

Also my greatest gratitude to @Grheonsh and @yondoloki @frostey and the remaining of the team from "Dungeon Fail" I'm still very happy for the great work we all did and I hope that someday it will continue when the right lead artist shows up.
Hold on? @DokiDokiTsuna are you looking for something to do? Could you be the one to bring back Dungeon Fail?
(Ya I know, I just skipped the whole deal about this thread, but some of us in this forum already know what kind of work we do and what we stand for.)

[DokiDokiTsuna]

Hold on? @DokiDokiTsuna are you looking for something to do? Could you be the one to bring back Dungeon Fail?

^^; I don't know...to be honest, I'm just open to join a project that sounds interesting to me. I've passed on plenty of solid-looking projects simply because they weren't my thing...but if you want to make a pitch, you can always DM me.

[Kuma]

You deserve an award for this post. Can somebody pin it to the top?

[kwestlake99]

Thanks for post thing. A lot of the these guidelines are very handy. I would not only split the revenue with any artist I work with, but share the credit for the creating the comic too.