Well my trusty friend, a Soft blue Pilot Color Eno mechanical pencil, finally gave up the ghost the other day. Stopped being able to hold lead in it, and even when it did, caused it to break and crumble for some odd reason. So I was pencil-less most of the day which was highly annoying. So today I hiked down to the Bookstore on campus at my lunch and picked up a new Soft Blue Pilot Color Eno Mechanical Pencil ( the last one!) and all was once again well with the world.

An amusing and slightly depressing observation of the day, art related of course, is that it seems when I do something that I consider a peice of crap I get way more attention/feedback than when I actually do something I consider an accomplishment. I'm not sure why this is. I spend hours and hours on a work of art, or something amazing happens to make it turn out so amazing I'm actually proud of it, and like.. no one notices. Yet, I post some stupid 5 min sketch and tons of people crawl out of the woodwork to praise me for it. So I'm left here going "WTF?"

What is this telling me? Are my sketches better than my finished works? Are people just more appreciative of sketches than finished works? Are finished works held up to some unknown higher standard that I'm unaware of? As an artist and also as a psudo-marketing aware individual ( I work in a marketing enviroment)it always interests me as to why people notice what they notice. Is there rhyme or reason? Or is it just hit and miss? Is there a formula? Is there a pattern? Why do some people seem to suffer extreme popularity with minimal effort and yet those perhaps more deserving of attention from a professional/technical standpoint get buried or forgotten, their artist voice having to constantly struggle for attention despite magnificent art they produce.

Some artists get exactly what they deserve based on their skill level, others it seems totally skewed. The more heavily skewed usually seems to involve subject matter. For example, a pure anthro artist who is semi competent can achieve a fair notoriety if they produce and display within sufficient view of the anthro communities. However, put their work in a fantasy community context and they become completely obscure. And vice versa. This seems to happen with anime artists, furry artists, were artists, fantasy artist, sci-fi artists, etc. Put them in the midst of their respective audience and there is attention, however it seems to take something super extra special to start crossing boundries. You see sometimes people who are big in say furry art try to cross over into professional illustration and its like they suddenly hit a wall, despite having a great deal of talent and skill.

Admittedly, in the digital age, artists have enjoyed a great deal more exposure, freedom, and value to display their work and get feedback than in any age previous. People online often have a favorite artist they can name and admire. Be it their favorite webcartoonist, deviantartist, or illustrator. On the web, art defines identity. Everyone wants an avatar, for that we need pictures. For pictures, we need artists, and people who find an artist they like are more likely to remember who they are. This is pretty amazing since offline, most people couldn't tell you who their favorite artists (say traditional) are, at least by name.

things to think about.

It doesn't seem to matter how hard you try, how much you know, or nice you are. People really don't seem to give a rats ass about how much you've given or how hard you worked on something, they have to kick you in the crotch when you think you aren't looking. And the stupid thing is, on the internet, everyone's looking, so its bound to find its way to the ears of the person you badmouthed eventually. Either from a friend or a referer, or maybe just a random search.

Should I care? Probably not. But do I care? Yeah, sorta. It gets under my skin enough to make me ranty. Some find it funny, but its usually a one way trip to depression because it opens up other cans of worms that get me thinking about things I probably shouldn't.

If I wasn't such an information whore, I probably wouldn't find all this crap and be a happier person. But I am. I'm always curious to know what people are saying, and I find it. I find it in the strangest places, and what I usually find isn't very spirtually uplifting.

I said in the shifters LJ how nice it was to hear positive feedback. it takes like 7 positives to outweight a negative in the human mind, and it was really nice. I could have just said 'fuck you all' and left things the way they were. My boyfriend would have been happier. He has to put up with the results of the stress, and its hard on him too. But I have this stupid notion I should finish what I started. But its hard. Its really hard when people have to keep kicking you in the face. What is REALLY annoying to me is that its not even MY work they knock, unless its strictly art. For the 12 issues of shifters after the first two, I didn't even write them. It was James Strocel. So when people accuse the story of wobbling all over the place, it has NOTHING to do with me. I just drew the comic at that point. Its only recently I've been able to finally pull it all back together. Believe me, it would have been a lot easier to just go back and restart, but it would have taken a whole lot of time to re and re over 400 pages. Although, I'm still considering it.

But it seems, as I've started producing again, everyone has shut up. More people visit the site, yet less people talk. I've got to redo the website. Maybe then we'll see some improvement. More crap on my plate.

In someways, I'd like to leave shifters and work on brymstone for a while. Just brymstone. Its a lot easier because I have such a deep love for abusing Darshe. Its a simple story, its not as deep or complicated as shifters, so its less demanding. Its also a lot more light and humorous in a kind of way I can write. At least there, when people say " hey, did you base it of *blank*" I can say Why yes! yes I did!, instead of constantly being accused of it when I didn't. People seem to like it better too. I don't get nearly as much flack. I don't hear a lot about it, and its kind of nice. ( probably because people don't know, but sometimes silence is better than pointless bashing.)

I'm not someone who can't take negative critisim. What pisses me off is when its totally unfounded or unsupported.

it sucks to have your work from the past haunt you. People wonder why artists take down old art. It really is a handicap. People judge you so badly on it. You can never climb out of its shadow so long as its there.

“ You suck.”

It’s not something that we, as artists, want to hear. Hell, no one likes to hear they suck. Generally that’s why we consider it as an insult. But in the world of the creative professional (read artists who work professionally), the negative comments can often be far more useful that the positive. Obviously, there are qualifications, but in general the negative critique is actually as good or better than the positive.

You might be scratching your head going, “Buh?”, but here is how it works.

Firstly, most artists, be they young, old, professional or amateur, generally want to improve their work. We all want to do better, be more than we are. But the only way we can do that is to see where we are falling down so we can focus on picking that up. Most artists are their own worst enemies when it comes to critiques, but there are some primadonna types that think they are god’s gift to art. So the negative critique serves as second pair of eyes, helping the artist pick out

The reality is, if you cannot ‘take’ a negative review, you aren’t going to get far in the world of art, so its best to learn to embrace good critiques, positive and negative equally and separate a good critique from a bad one.

What makes a good negative Critique?
Obviously, not every negative comment is going to be useful. There are idiots out there that just have to put down other people to feel better about themselves. The ‘you suck’ comment from above is a very good example of ‘fluff’, as I like to call it. A comment without substance that serves no real purpose other than to try and get under your skin or annoy you. I’ve developed a very good fluff filter, and stuff like this doesn’t even phase me anymore. There will always be idiots, jealousy, and petty people, but this isn’t the type of comment we are concerned with. If you get these, your best bet is to ignore them, or ask them if they want to back that statement up with something intelligent. Here is an example of a “you suck” comment with substance:

“ You suck. Your muscular anatomy on the arms is wayyy off. People don’t have muscles like that! And your composition is too boring, everything is the same size, and I can’t read your type.”

Okay, this is a negative comment we can work with. This comment tells you several things. 1) Your anatomy is really off in this picture. 2) your composition is boring. 3) and your type is unreadable.

Most artist’s kneejerk reaction is get angry at seeing a comment like this. “OMG, I worked for hours on this picture!” or “You criticize my art, you criticize me!” The first thing is, you have to separate yourself from the image. A picture is a picture. Just because someone doesn’t like one of your pictures right now, doesn’t mean they won’t in the future. And just because someone doesn’t like your picture, doesn’t mean they hate you or were talking about you. Get over yourself. Secondly, that frustration of the creation of the image can spill out very easily when we see something negative popup, but what this fellow has given you is a very honest reaction and put up some redflags. It might seem mean, but this guy is doing you a bigger favor than the hoards of “ You R0x0rz!” comments that may flood your gallery pages. A good comment of “you rock!” is just as useless as “ you suck”, remember that. A truly good comment will pick out particular points of your picture that worked or didn’t. If you ask or leave open for comments, be sure that you are ready to accept the good and the bad.

Another kneejerk reaction is to respond to negative comments right away. DON’T.
We, as artists, tend to be a rather sensitive bunch. We often get all hissy and pissy about something that trounces on our latest work of art, especially if we aren’t very confident about what we are doing yet. But it is very important not to start freaking out on people who leave negative comments, especially useful negative comments. So before you freak out, consider the following:
1) Did the comment point out specific areas that could use improvement?
2) Did the commenter offer suggestions for improvement?
3) Have I heard the same type of negative comment before?

If there are answers to the above conditions, any of them, the comment is useful. We should not chastise or yell at the people who give us useful feedback. Its hard to accept, yes, we might have screwed up, but this is how we improve. If a negative comment has no redeeming qualities, put it on fluff filter and ignore it. It’s just fluff after all. But don’t sit there and get yourself all bent out of shape over it. Its not worth the time, efforts or digital pixels that make up that lovely bit of typography.

The value of ‘gut reactions’
One of the things we were taught in design school was to listen to the gut reaction. Your initial reaction to a piece is usually the strongest and most honest. If someone reacts to a piece different than you had intended, you have to ask yourself ‘why?’, because if you get one strong wrong reaction, you will probably get more. You have to do a little work and determine what it is in your picture that ‘isn’t working’ and is giving the wrong message. If someone makes what seems to be a very passionate, negative gut reaction, even if it doesn’t necessarily say anything specific about your work, you can still use it as a sort of barometer that can gauge how successful a given piece is. The key here is not taking the reaction to an emotional level. You have to look at it academically. If you take it emotionally, you won’t be able to figure out what went wrong and fix it for your next work.

Look ahead, don’t look back
The art world is a very fickle thing. When we get a piece with a particularly bad reaction, or at least one not as successful as we might have hoped, sometimes we are tempted to take it to heart. Don’t. We also get tempted to go back and try to fix a work. Don’t. Move on. Take all the information you’ve gathered and try to improve for your next work. There isn’t a lot of point in going backward, you are trying to move forward to bigger and better things. Don’t let yourself get stuck in the past trying to fix a ‘bad’ piece. If you really like it, wait a while, work on your weaknesses, then try to reinvent it and see if you get a more successful version. But going back without taking the time to move forward in your skill level only means you’ll keep repeating your mistakes.


The power of laughter
A trick to getting over negative reactions, is to laugh about it. No, I’m serious. Just sit there and giggle. Giggle until you start laughing like a villain. The fact you got a reaction is triumph enough. Look upon it as a personal victory. Start a collection. Do anything to turn it upside down and make what might seem like a failure into triumph. Some artists do things JUST for that reason, to piss people off. Revel in it a little that someone was so moved by your art in any direction they felt they had to comment. Often times, bad comments or critiques become like an artists battlescars. And remember, chicks did the scars and guys are jealous they don’t have any. Make sure you have a good laugh about any bad comments before you respond to them. In retrospect, they won’t seem so bad.

Don’t take it personally
The worst thing you can do with a negative comment is to take it personally. You must learn to separate yourself from your work. Especially if you ever intend to work professionally in art, because frankly, employers don’t care about your feelings. If your picture doesn’t work for them, it doesn’t work for them. You have to be able to look at your work as an object that is a part of you, but apart from you. People who criticize and artwork, even if if they say ‘you suck’, they don’t mean it. They mean the artwork sucks. Its important to make that distinction. You have to be able to look at negative comments as tools for improvement, not as a personal attack. Its hard to do, but if you want to ever make a ‘name’ for yourself, its something you have to learn. You might thing ‘well when I’m popular, I’ll only get good comments’, I hate to break it to you, but it doesn’t get better as you get more popular, its gets worse. Why? Because opinions are like assholes. Everyone has one. And there are a hell of a lot of assholes out there. As your work gets seen by more and more people, you’ll encounter those assholes… in spades.

In closing, a thought to consider. Your ability to turn a frown upside down, turn it around, spit it back out again and keep on trucking will determine your fate in the art world. Its not for the faint of heart, it is highly competitive, and you have to be able to take your knocks and get back up again. People who freak out at one little bad comment are not going to be the Next Big Thing™ and will not have the staying power to make themselves a name. Success might come to a select few overnight, but chances are, you aren’t one of them. And to those that do, well lets just say they can’t always take the fires of success, and very quickly find themselves burned right out.

A though for the artists.