Pet Peeves about Other Artist/Art Websites/Webcomics

[youngaustin]

What annoys you about some other artists, or art websites? Something you feel like you see over and over again and it really just grinds your gears.

Such as, It really irritates me when people post selfies on art websites. Like Deviant Art is crawling with teenage selfies.

[aran150]

Joke webcomics. As in, deliberately bad ones. I could name 10 offhand, they're all made in MS paint, and rely on deliberate misspelling, deliberately atrocious artwork, the unexpected and nonsensical, and just the plain silly for humour. They're lacking in talent, taste and originality, and they're just taking up server space. And then the creators are usually douches on the forums too. You know the kind of comic and creator I'm talking about.

I often feel like calling them out when they're being ignorant or obnoxious, and suggesting they come back when they have a real comic, but that's uncalled for mostly. Personal insults are fine, but comics are sacred to their creators. That's why I haven't named examples here

[eleoza]

Oh yes, I highly agree with the selfies on DA. A photo can be art of course! I love some good photography. But selfies of girls posing sexy with duckfaces...not so much .-. You don't post those on art sites.
Other than that, I can't think of something. I personally think that every art style should be respected especially if there's clear effort showing. There's something beautiful in every style.

[indagold]

Vent art. There's like a billion drawings of someone crying and "i'm sad :'C" in the description. It feels like attention seeking and it's so annoying, sappy and corny. Reminds me too much of the emo art back in the 2000s.

Also weirdly sexual scenes where it doesn't fit in comics or any media really. Like a scene where a character is just sitting there posing erotically and it's at someone's funeral? You know those scenes, weird fanservice at every corner even if it's out of place. I like to imagine the water is spiked with ecstasy in these worlds and this is just normal every day stuff.

[spadesart]

comics with romanticized abuse (rape, pedophilia, etc) and everyone in the comments just going with it and talking about how cute and romantic and funny it is

[Tieback]

I guess, poor quality artwork.... but that's more of a preference thing. It's really hard for me to get into a story is the art is poor, even if it's a really good story. On the flip side a story with amazing artwork, but a horrible story is even worse! I don't have a comic example for this, but there is an anime that comes to mind: Diabolic Lovers. The art is gorgeous, but the story is vial, flat and repetitive.... A bad story can ruin good artwork, it's such a waste! It makes me cry inside!

[spooktacularprize]

The art is gorgeous, but the story is vial, flat and repetitive

I'm really curious as to what you mean when you say the story is vile, but I'm also somewhat afraid.

There's certain tropes I don't like but it's probably a matter of taste; a pet peeve of mine that is relatively harmless could be someone else's favorite.

Have to agree with what stnmaren said though, there's something slimy about especially romance stories that use unhealthy relationships as a foundation for what a perfect couple should be.

[hushicho]

@spooktacularprize , if you dislike romance stories that use unhealthy relationships as a foundation, you will likely hate Diabolik Lovers. It's so overtly unhealthy and over-the-top that it almost reads as a comedy; no one is remotely sympathetic, and it's impossible to really like anyone, even the supposed protagonist.

I think one of my biggest pet peeves is mainly with websites. I hate it when sites have terms that aren't really thought out, that are pretty patently just copy-pasted from other sites, and have no real reasoning behind what they do. I find this especially infuriating with regards to things that aren't "kid-friendly" -- the dumbing-down of sites is an epidemic we can usually trace back to nothing more complicated than laziness.

On that same note, I just have a serious dislike for censorship. I'm glad at least Tapastic allows some adult content, but to be honest, I feel that artists need to be able to express themselves in whatever way necessary to convey their expression. Among other things, art is supposed not only to give shape to culture, it's also supposed to help that same culture advance and, in that, help society to advance and become greater.

People also need to learn to distinguish the difference between reality and fiction. Too many people are getting too worked up over make-believe. You can't apply real-world laws to fiction without locking up every mystery writer for murder. When you reach that point, it's long beyond ridiculous.

[jurinova]

Personally one of my biggest pet peeves is when comics are divided into two groups: manga and american comics. Like what? Did the rest of the world just disappear? Do comics only exist in USA and Japan?

@hushicho I agree with you on censorship. I can understand that websites try to create an environment friendly for everyone but it does restrict artists too much. Especially since the definition of "adult content" is very different from person to person. Not to mention cultural differences. Art galleries rarely censor art. Nudity, sex and violence can be seen in many forms in art museums, so why should online art galleries be any different. Many cities have nude statues in parks and buildings and nobody bats an eye at them but on the internet art with nudity gets censored. The more I think about it the more ridiculous it all seems.

[hushicho]

Honestly, much of it is just snobbery and an obvious preference for certain styles and media of artistic expression. It's the same shoddy way of thinking responsible for "obscenity", which is basically just another way of saying "we made a law so we can get rid of anything we don't like and don't have to have a real reason for doing it." It's nothing but discrimination in a way that shows very clearly that the people doing it don't understand art or artistic expression, and don't care.

Trying to please everyone all the time only leads to pleasing no one most of the time. Honestly, I don't see any problem with whatever, as long as it's labeled. Nobody is forcing anyone to look at anything they don't want to. One of the most insufferable features of the modern sociocultural landscape is irresponsible parenting coupled with taking advantage of children as a concept -- as in, "think of the children!" -- to try and convince people of every inane idea under the sun. Adults are constantly restricted, whether or not they have children, and people in a magical age range are treated like objects and only allowed the spotlight when someone else wants to use them to convince someone to support their politicking.

It all really is a ridiculous state of things, I agree completely. There are double standards everywhere, and so much of it is just for frivolous or ridiculous reasons. So many holdovers from history, pseudoreligious influence on politics, and things people never examine for what they are. I'm hopeful at seeing people starting to point these things out and change them for the better. It would be especially nice to be able to express oneself without having to endure being treated essentially like a barge of medical waste when that expression shows something arbitrarily chosen as "controversial" or "too adult" or something like that.

[Kura]

Google sketch up used BADLY. (or similar programs)

Don't get me wrong, it looks great when it's done right, and I completely understand the need to use it (most of us are independent with these projects and need the shortcuts) but when it's done horribly or lazily it's just... aggravating. Completely immersion breaking, my eyes immediately go to the 3-D object that's been thrown in there, even worse when characters are interacting with the objects, like holding a 3-D cup. Would it REALLY have been that hard to draw or even trace over? It's just really irritating when artists make absolutely no attempt to blend it in with their drawings so it doesn't look like it doesn't belong by standing out so awkwardly.

[VexinglyYours]

GIANT WORD BALLOONS.... i feel like a lot of the time, people use massive word balloons to hide something/take up the rest of the panel to keep from having to draw an environment. just draw it! learn to do environments! it'll help you out in the long run so much. i know it's hard and intimidating.

[edmourabarbosa]

I really hate the culture of the Pro Artists in the traditional comics industry. Most of them really think that art > story. You see many times some famous penciller complaining how people care more about who's writing than who's drawing. I've seen some of them say that if you don't care about the art, why aren't you reading a book instead of a comic? It's so dumb and pathetic. They are so blind to what the readers really want from their comics. I mean, it's not difficult to notice how sucessfull the manga industry is, how some manga have horrid artwork and still are best sellers (Hello Attack on Titan!).

[Down_the_Rabbithole]

Walls of text. Comics are a visual medium and I personally like to use more pictures than words. When I see a long scrawl of text going down a panel, my brain tunes out. Like, jeez! Can't you break this up somehow?

[dojo]

My biggest one is also the censorship issue @hushicho and @jurinova discussed. It strikes me as ridiculously hypocritical at times and so much of it comes across as "It doesn't fit under MY tastes therefore it shouldn't EXIST". I keep getting too rambly about it because it hits a little close to home, and I feel like it's also been pretty thoroughly discussed, so I won't get into the deets. (I was friends with someone for awhile who was super abusive about how they dealt with stuff like that, using a lot of guilt tactics to try and make you feel as rotten as possible about what you liked, and then turning around and getting others to gang up on you so you'ld feel even worse, so it's something I can get pretty passionate about).

And now for my kinda snooty peeve....

I don't like reading comics that were written by English speakers, for English speakers, that use the "right to left" format. I realize a lot of these people are just used to that because of manga, and are probably only trying to reach manga lovers in the first place, but if I stumble on someone's comic and this is very clearly the case, I won't read it. But this is purely just snoot for me, because it actually feels more natural for me to go from right to left because I'm deaf in my left ear, so looking right first and turning my neck left is what I do every day. My neck actually gets really sore if I look left too much. SO YEAH, pure snoot. The tiny gentlemen with his monocle and cup of tea inside of me gets his feathers right ruffled at the sight.

[Down_the_Rabbithole]

I agree with you there! Or when someone demands representation of a certain kind of person when a story doesn't need it, or when you do have a character that's technically part of that group, you're immediately writing them wrong when you try giving them flaws and more traits than what they are. God forbid if you make a "marginalized person" a villain character because they'll jump down your throat with assumptions! These people are irritating as hell!

Also, I whole-heartedly agree with the manga-style of reading order for English speakers. If someone doesn't read manga, they'll get confused because everything is all out of order to them.

[shaneoid77]

The webcomic scene just seems saturated with gag and Manga comics, which I like now and then but they're pretty ubiquitous and not only that, it feels like they're pushing other comics to the sidelines.

[J.Lovelace]

I think my biggest pet peeve about other artists is when the beginners try too hard.
And by that I mean a very long list of threads on the forum that are always about the same thing:

Artist A, the fresh baked cookie in the webcomic world posted 3 pages of their first comic ever. Yay! That's great, welcome on board. Then, right away, they go to the forum and already ask for critiques. Well okay. There's nothing much to critique tho. A week or two later Artist A is disapponted, that they have only 10 subscribers so far and they think something went wrong within their 6 pages of comic. A month later they burn out, because the subscriber count is stuck at 12.

And I'm not trying to be mean or start a war with the above statement. But I think the beginners have too high expectations, and their idea of creating webcomics is just about an easy peasy way to get popular. Why else would we have multiple threads about "hey hey how do I attract moar peeps to read my awesome stuffs???" and such. It all boils down to attracting as much audience as possible and bathe in attention, which is measured in pageviews, likes and subscribes.
It would be nice if they realized it's a lot of hard work to get where they want to be, and stop the rat race to glory.

And to avoid people twisting my words into something that wasn't my intention, I want to say this: I'm not trying to say that Artist A is a bad person, or stupid or anything for the things described above. I just want people to know that webcomics shouldn't be about forcing yourself to please the audience's tastes, and selling your soul to webcomic gods to get over 9000!!! subs in one night.
I think it should be more about finding people who enjoy your comic just as much as you enjoy creating it.

I hope nobody will maul me for this, I just wanted to get it off my chest...

[Aspie_Gamer]

Trying to please everyone all the time only leads to pleasing no one most of the time. Honestly, I don't see any problem with whatever, as long as it's labeled. Nobody is forcing anyone to look at anything they don't want to. One of the most insufferable features of the modern sociocultural landscape is irresponsible parenting coupled with taking advantage of children as a concept -- as in, "think of the children!" -- to try and convince people of every inane idea under the sun. Adults are constantly restricted, whether or not they have children, and people in a magical age range are treated like objects and only allowed the spotlight when someone else wants to use them to convince someone to support their politicking.

Like others have said, the whole censorship thing is ridiculous. Yeah, if a work is not child friendly, it should definitely be labeled as such, but on the other hand, even in kids cartoons, god forbid an ultra conservative parent sees a naked butt on little Johnny's favorite stupid show for all of a few seconds. What's that saying about kids being able to handle anything you throw at them? Yeah...I think that would apply here. Little Johnny is more likely to laugh at a naked cartoon ass than he is to be repulsed by it.

I really hate the culture of the Pro Artists in the traditional comics industry. Most of them really think that art > story. You see many times some famous penciller complaining how people care more about who's writing than who's drawing. I've seen some of them say that if you don't care about the art, why aren't you reading a book instead of a comic? It's so dumb and pathetic. They are so blind to what the readers really want from their comics. I mean, it's not difficult to notice how successful the manga industry is, how some manga have horrid artwork and still are best sellers (Hello Attack on Titan!).

^ THIS

Amazing art is amazing art. Make no mistake about that. However, pretty art can't save a shitty story while oddly enough, a strong story can otherwise make up for lackluster art. Funny how that works huh? In fact, one of the first comics I subbed to, (and my first guilty pleasure here lol) a NSFW Super Mario Bros comic called Gangster Mama, had what some would call bad art. Nowadays you wouldn't notice it that much given how much the author has improved her art style within the past year. Had I turned my nose at the comic back when it first started, I would've missed out on a hilarious story involving everyone's favorite butt monkey Bowser, but more importantly, I would've missed out on an invaluable friend had I not taken a personal interest in GM.

Relating this back to me for a minute, in my comic Life of an Aspie, there is a world of difference between the first chapter and the current chapter. Personally speaking, though my art is far from the best, I like to think that with each passing chapter, my skills improve as a whole as I challenge myself to draw new poses I've never drawn and as I try to think outside of the box in regards to panel layouts. Especially now that I've gotten into a comfortable thrice updated updating schedule for LoaA.

[Down_the_Rabbithole]

As a beginner comic writer, I almost fell into this trap. It's a hard thing to climb out of when you put a lot of hard work and passion into a project. I've since accepted that I won't get much attention until I get into the meat of the story. Though, I am glad I asked for criticism early on. I think it's really helping me now.