ITT: Your experiences being an amateur/professional Sup Forums artist

This thread is dedicated to all of us Sup Forums artists that roam in the shadows of anonymity lurking in this board.
Expose your inner demons, your frustrations or pleasing experiences with being an artist.

Bonus points if you draw porn

Getting real sick of drawing furry shit for cash, but I like money so I accept, which only makes the furry commissions keep coming in. It's a vicious cycle.

Oddly enough, none of it was pornographic, even though I can and have drawn porn before. I guess I should count my blessings.

>tfw you ask for requests and pretty much all of them are equally shit, but you feel inclined to do at least one since you'd feel bad if you didn't

>Be me
>Both SFW and NSFW artist
>Use the same pen name for both types of content since people would recognize my work by my shitty style anyway
>My psedonym is completely distant from my real self
>Draw something cute
>Send it to my crush
>She likes it
>Forgot to crop out the signature from the pic
>She looks up my pen name
>Finds whole porn stash
>Realize her account started following my page
>Starts liking posts
>Say nothing about it until weeks later
>Contact her casually
>She admits to actually enjoy what I draw

Is she a keeper, anons?

do you do cumflation?

depends on what your nsfw is

Macro-disproportionate women (huge tiddies), and other size related porn. Nothing too off the charts but nothing too tame either

If we're talking about a woman's belly slightly increasing in size, I wouldn't be against it. But if it's some over-the-top fetish art, then no. I try to keep my porn on a vanilla-ish level.

>tfw draw and animate shit and make sure to never show anyone

>That one time a client sent nudes as photo references for a self insert character in a porn scenario

then you are of no use to me. begone thot

Were they hot?

Link?

>Expecting me to uncover myself
No thanks, but you will find my drawins laying around /aco/ threads, so you might catch me there.

I draw cum-inflation BE, not sure if it counts

Any tips for getting clients?

belly expansion? that's what cumflation means amigo
show me ya goods

So, is it just the furry art itself or is it the cringey donut steels that they want you to make?

Nigger I just want to jack off to your shit

totally amateur non-digital artist. feel unappreciated at times, but like the relative anonymity (and lack of drama). but i do like views. sigh.

>draw porn
>not really into it, it pays sometimes and I honestly thought it was great practice, it really did help alot
>draw more SFW content than NSFW content
>intend to make a comic and wrote up a script for it and everything, then started doing designs
>see that some people recognize my work even though I dont have a website or gallery, yet people can still point out that its my stuff
>it dawns on me that if I made anything SFW with my name attached to it it will undoubtedly be linked to my NSFW content
>now torn between continuing with the porn that pays and gives me recognition, or drop it and focus on the SFW content I always wanted to make
Youll say "do both" but not when youve drawn loli content, you dont get away with that.

Just do bo-
>loli
fuck you, you deserve nothing

I had that same dilema, but I eventually just accepted my fate and used the same pen-name for all my content wether it was NSFW or not.
Also, not everything has to be posted online you know?

I feel your pain, I needed cash so I accepted to draw one stupid OC.

The furry community is so tightly knitted that they spread your page to all their corners and suddenly you have 40 requests each one more autistic than the last and yet similar enough that you could face swap the wolves/dragons and no one would bat an eye.

I havn't given in to porn but sweet mother of mercy furfags do have income and are desperate to get porn of very specific stuff.

Sometimes I just want to bury my tablet for good and to never look back.

>Not deleting your account and changing pen name
A good ol' Deus Ex Machina can save you a lot of pain

Pull a Fred Perry and stop giving a shit.

I get your dilemma. Usually you hear about industry artists drawing questionable NSFW stuff, but it's only a very few drawings of it.

But if you're leaning towards wanting to create just SFW content then do it. If you don't want to quit drawing NSFW entirely then you can still draw it, but only share it with a small group of friends you're positive that won't post it elsewhere. But the issue is your style. Are you planning on changing it, or hoping it changes a lot over time with more practice?

You kinda can, that dude who made guro loli comics, I think his name was scribblekid is making some pretty vanilla stuff these days. He isn't raking in the bucks but he has a decent number of customers and people donating on patreon.

Second time I did, they recognize your art.

I even tried to do more eastern stuff and they still got to me, it gets creepy how they know your drawings better than yourself.

>Da fag for 4 years
>amateur traditional pen and pencil user
>2 years in start commissions for a dollar
>in my 4 years never gain a single favorite comment,follow,or commission,also did free request slots.
>give up and nuke account on year 5
I havnt drawn in 3 years,despite the fact I was following a hundred other profiles,was in at least 40 groups,nobody gave a shit.

does anyone have a guide that'd give me tips on what to do when starting commissions for the first time

Ungrateful. The furry community is god's gift to artists. You can crank out a $40 commission once a day and never run out of work or clients, and use the rest of your time to do whatever the hell other projects you want.

I hate the idea of people not separating the NSFW content though, its completely unrelated.

Theres the bullshit. May aswell just continue to make loli porn since noone will look past it.

I dont even care for loli and would just scrub it all if I could, I like the particular character designs and would only draw certain characters. People seem to be able to make alot of money doing this stuff though, maybe its time to set up a patreon.

Eh, artists are a very fickle bunch and for some they feel dirty and cheap after doing work like that. I also like to think that it has to do with the stigma about furries in general but this isn't 2006 and people have mostly moved on from that shit.

Honestly I really want to make steampunk and high fantasy stuff with robots and bio-mechs.

I really want to be remembered for that, I even took anatomy classes yo make my drawings look more feasible and I trained myself to draw decent backgrounds, however my name has been linked to scalie and furry stuff for almost a decade and I can't move past it even after going ground zero twice.

I made my money with furshit in college but now it is just haunting me, it wasn't fun back then and it isn't even ironically funny right now, it is just sad.

>"uncover"

Uncover what? That someone who draws degenerate furry art also browses big scary Sup Forums? You all fucking do. Just give us the link.

I'm a pretty decent artist how do I get in on these furry big bucks

I like how it looks and so do other people apparently who go out of the way to seek me out, like I said, people recognize me and come looking for me for commissions even when Im not advertising. I suppose I would have to change the style which I came to really like drawing if I was to get by.

I could drop doing NSFW content altogether, I never got anything out of it but money really.

Ive seen examples of this several times with Japs, Im honestly surprised how theyre getting away with that, unless people DO bring it up and judge their SFW content because of it.

Hop on the latest bandwagon flavor of the month. Do fanart of a character made by an actual artist and not a guy with too much money's donut steel. You do a donut steel for free and people will come sniffing around for free art. Also never agree to do any work on the basis of getting exposure, be polite when you decline that sort of thing though. That and churn out some fanart work like Peg Pete or Mrs. Katswell or something.

Here are my few things I'd like to have known as an amateur
>Start doing commissions when people ask for them
>Don't devalue your work, altho start a bit low
>Don't stress, people who commission you have 0 artistic talent, they will be hapopy with whatever content you put out normally
>Charge after the sketch and before the finished product, a scam really gets you mad and it's easy to avoid by chjarging before getting into the real work
>Keep communication clear with your client, if you haven't done any progress and they ask for some, reply to the e-mail and don't be ashamed to not deliver anything. If they pull off and decide not to commission you. No worries, take your time instead of rushing.
>Don't fear to experiment with your work even if it is a commission, you never know when you can hit jackpot when doing a commission

KEEP LEARNING, don't go stale, your art will evolve beside you as yopu progress

Look up "crapfish" on e-hentai
Seriously tho it's nothing amusing.

>Ive seen examples of this several times with Japs, Im honestly surprised how theyre getting away with that, unless people DO bring it up and judge their SFW content because of it.

Because it is OK for them they care about the skill and they get a following even with pen names.

Look at Pochi and Meth, they are now doing legit stuff and people are buying it because of their names. There are even bigger examples for non echi stuff but let's try to focus on the kind that still do stuff that is lewd but legit and printed on official magazines.

This is kinda related to the LN and WN boom pushed by Kadokawa were people buy these pieces of crap solely because of the cover, so finding a good artist is half the battle for this kind of titles.

It's alright, at least there's some Mei stuff. Tbh not sure why I asked cuz I only jack it to Japanese shit.

Make a furaffinity account. Start posting some pinups for free, and link every single image back to your commission prices. You'll have more commissions than you know what to do with in a week.

My backgrounds are cash but my bodies are terrible so I can't monetize that yet...

I like your tiddies

Thanks

I really don't like how nobody really takes notice of my work, much less even remember the name.

>Put my heart and soul into a picture
>nobody cares unless its following a new trend or something
>decide to open up commissions
>no takers, just one guy that i think is either a bot or some chucklefuck and random people looking for free art.
>one of them didn't even want the free art I drew for him.
>Try applying for various animation related jobs since thats what I went to a fucking 4 year art school for
>Nobody wants to hire me, not even for small jobs.
>any connections I tried to make have forgotten about me or flat out ignore my stuff in favor for my more talented artfriends.
>decide to work on a webcomic for an idea that I've had since middle school in hopes I can eventually achieve my dream of having my own cartoon and a video game based off that cartoon.
>If not that, maybe i'll get relatively famous and live off patreon money.
>Already getting burnt out because i'm probably doing too much for my current level, and I realistically wont be able to commit to a regular schedule seeing how long it takes me to finish one page accounting for distractions and pursuing other interests besides drawing.
>Slowly but surely lose my love for art and drawing in general
>posts slow to a crawl.
>Occasionally lurk Sup Forums drawthreads for stuff to draw.
>atleast some of you guys are happy with stuff I make for you, makes it somewhat worth it.

The dreams dying my boys. Losing motivation and running on fumes here.

God bless you user

I rarely feel better than that moment when I fulfill a commission or a request, and the commissioner or requester really likes the product.

Requesters can just take the picture and run. They don't have to say anything, especially if they're anonymous. Commissioners can keep quiet too, if they want. THEY paid ME, they don't have to be overly gracious with me, their money was their thanks enough. It's just business, right? So, when either of these take the time to express gratitude for the picture, whether it's a simple "I like it! Thanks!" or something longer and more gracious, it just feels so nice. Like I made their day just a little bit brighter. I like that.

Amateur. Can't complain. I draw for the fun of it.
I mostly lurk Sup Forums, StarVs threads atop. Draw for the drawthreads when possible, though i don't use my name all the time.
As for NSFW, i've only delivered one Claire pic for the /trash/ drawthread and another for the Scalie Schoolie threads here, which apparently is on rule34 last time i checked.
Heh. I remember this time when i was doing some Dominator request for /aco/. It was almost finished when there were like 4 cakes delievered. I couldn't believe my luck. So ended up dropping it.
I plan to drop some furry stuff, safe and not-safe, over the /ctg/ thread this saturday.
I'm trying to get better everytime, just because i want to be better.
And that's pretty much it. Cheers to all the artist tonight.

In my experience being an artists and popping in different threads and generals I'v managed to gain more attention from other artists then the anons I draw for.

I just like this alternative better because I have managed to make good friends with other artists and even gained some insight on how the art community online works and I'v realized that a lot of it is connected through each artists knowing another artists friend

While most people don't really notice my work I don't mind this too much because I'v managed to make friends with really good artists who like my work and another artists opinions a lot more comforting then that of an user

>Draw nsfw thing
>Not very happy with it, feel I could have done better
>Post anyway
>1000 notes on it within a day
>Work my ass off on a sfw piece
>Extremely satisfied with it and feel like I pushed my skills to the limit
>300 notes maximum
Where are my suffering bros at

Pitched a show to a french studio, hoping for the best. They make some wild stuff, so I sent them an idea for something really weird and experimental and two teasers for other pitches if they'd pass on that and would rather go with something else closer to what they suggested.

Honestly, making a pitch document is probably the easiest way to make a compelling synopsis of your plot if you haven't made an overall series outline yet. It helped enough that even if they pass I'd like to make it independently anyway.

>Shit nsfw drawing gets 1/100 than my well done sfw drawings

Why not think of an nsfw situation you can put your heart and soul into and get the best of both worlds?

>Working at small studios within industry (web series, advertising, etc)
>Get told repeatedly I'm pretty good and I should have no problem getting work in TV studios
>Apply to them
>Get tests from a handful
>They pass on all of them
>Ask other industry artists for advice
>"I think your portfolio is fine enough as it is! Just keep working and good luck!"

I guess I should be lucky I have a half-consistent job at all. It would just be nice after a couple of years to start getting work that is longer than one or two weeks and that I'm enthusiastic about.

Just think of it as not having to deal with the same asshole boss and co-workers day in and day out.

I go through the five stages of grief every commission, it's exhausting.
I also made really great (now professional) friends from drawthreads. Met a lot of really scary people too.

I'm fucking lucky to get 300 notes max on my sfw stuff.

Fuck, getting 60 notes on a sfw piece that isn't fanart is a fucking confidence booster because of how infrequently and randomly it happens.

protip: notes don't matter. 1000 randos reblogging your art actively does nothing for you unless one of them happens to be a person who's willing to get you something, like a comission, or even a job. That's why popularity is useful, it isn't for all the bunch of people who like your stuff, it just makes it more likely that the right people at the right time will see your stuff.

Pay attention to who's actually following you, cause if you get at least one or two from actual companies, that means they're a fly on the wall checking out if you've got potential.

>notes don't matter.
Not that user, but while true, it is a nice ego booster for people like me who have no job, no gf, AND no followers. At least if I had something as easy to acquire as followers on art that I myself was also proud of, I would feel like I have something to look forward to (Drawing for my followers).

As it stands now, it feels like I'm quite literally drawing only for myself on a deserted island. It's hard to stay motivated with just yourself.

“insider” info: today is most likely going to be a real hoot for Sup Forums.

shut up dana

Go to bed, Alex.

What about Spongebob?

>Sup Forums

You'll get no sympathy from me you swine!

>tfw an user digitizes your pencil sketch

It's happened a couple times and I keep those in a folder and look at them when I've had a bad day. I also save reposts of my art, rare as they are, and keep them in the same folder.
It helps keep me going, sometimes.

Once in a rare while, I've seen my art posted on /aco/ or some show-specific Sup Forums threads. It really does feel good to know at least a few people out like something of mine enough that they saved it to their hard drive.

I've been practicing that stupid "Welcome back Kotter" theme song all week because some dude on the vocaroo thread requested it. It's not the same thing as the lewd quagmire of lolis yall got going on but it's still artistic I guess.
it's almost like the song is talking about us
"Welcome back, your dreams were your ticket out
Welcome back, to the place that you used to laugh about."

>get commission
>have to draw OC and the genderbend version of a character I like in various women's clothes and different poses with varying backgrounds
>have to learn how to draw attractive young men without them looking effeminate but also have them wear women's clothes
>reuse all the backgrounds I have drawn thus far because fuck that shit making new backgrounds.
>in the mean time, the commissioner often asks me to redraw/revise things over and over again. Also, I had to draw the OC himself off vague descriptions because he has never drawn it himself.
>In my good nature, I don't charge him for designing his own shitty OC
>this takes fucking weeks
>when the time to pay comes up he doesn't reply, note I only show off a sketch of the art before proceeding
>asks him several times for the payment if he wants his damn commissioned art (I've gotten sick of this shit at this point)
>he explains he can't pay me because HIS MOM has the credit card/money and he doesn't want her to know he commissioned art off the internet
>then why the fuck would you commission me if you didn't have the ability to pay at all?
>he never sees the full artwork and I stopped expecting payment altogether, still have the artwork that I now hate
>wasted weeks of my time and probably pissed off my other commissioners for taking theirs so long
>later turn down all requests/commissions for OC and genderbent artwork

Now every time someone asks me to revise my sketches again and again, I have a bad feeling it won't turn out well for me again. Children on the internet was a mistake.

I've had similar stuff happen to me once. It stopped once I started establishing a max number of free revisions, and an extra charge for drawing characters from descriptions and no refs

Treat ””her”” to some pasta (^-^)

>when a client apologizes for his weird fetish requests
>he does this all the time even after I've drawn for him a few times already.

Porn draws in more people on the internet, that's a fact. Happened to me too in pixiv, easily ranked at the top 100, easy bookmarks, and easy comments.

Yeah, draw.

I'm not an artist, but whenever I commission someone I'm terribly afraid of offending or bothering them in any way through poor descriptions of what I want or fucking up in some other way, so I always act very apologetic and a bit overbearing (did you get what I said? You can ask away if I haven't been clear enough...)
I'm also afraid to ask for a redesign if I don't like the way the sketch looks, so aside from daring to ask to chance minor details I've told them to go ahead coloring I was unsure whether I truly liked or not.
I once fucked up a payment by sending the artist money to a PayPal account that didn't exist by mistake and thus it took a few weeks to get a refund from PayPal so I could give him his money. I felt like such as ass for making him wait.

I have a Twitter where I post my weird horny art. A friend of mine's wife found it and followed me. Not a huge deal, but still felt pretty embarrassed about it.

Rip your dreams man

>tfw 90% of artists are legit autistic SJWs
>5% are legit mental
>other 5% are cool, but too shy to talk
Working on video game production is even worse.

>isn't even ironically funny right now, it is just sad.
You fell for the furrie meme, that community is nothing but cancer and the mebersbof it should be gunned down.

It hurts even more when you see worst artists, skill wise, getting like 100k followers because they just draw normie shit or follow trends

Do you enjoy drawing enormous cocks and tits? Or does it bother you sometimes.

You COULD follow trends too and just draw _popular show_ all day for easy followers if you wanted.

Sure, it would still hurt because the instant you post original work your follower activity decreased by 95%, but it would be a different kind of pain at least.

I feel for you user. You followed your dreams but, you should of became a engineer and did art as a hobby.

I started as a drawfriend when moot was still around, but left Sup Forums when Sup Forums started leaking into other boards. Don't really know why I came back, but I'm here, so... I guess I can vent a bit.

I've wanted to make a comic for some time now, but I find myself giving up immediately due to both the difficulty of things I haven't practiced very much (perspective, backgrounds) and me putting my own ideas on a pedastle. Like I'm so worried I'll ruin these stories I've invested so much time into making that I can't bring myself to start working on them. I've got several fully completed scripts that I've been sitting on for YEARS that I haven't drawn more than 5 thumbnails for, for fuck's sake.

And there's no fucking excuse for it. I've worked on art long enough that I'm decently skilled, I'm at an okay level of internet popularity from drawing nsfw & sfw anthro art sketches of videogame, fantasy and cartoon characters so if I were to draw something, it'd probably get around just fine, and people I've shown the scripts to like them a lot, but... I can't do it. I'm getting increasingly frustrated with myself since I'm such a babby I can't bring myself to take a leap of faith, I'm the machinator of my own goddamn misery .

Christ, I WANT to make a webcomic, and eventually hopefully even sell graphic novels, and not be known as that guy who does those fucking generic-ass furry pinup doodles. But the latter comes so much more easily, so even if it's making me unhappy I just keep at it.

>only $40 a day

I can get $150 working 6 hours. If anything, you could get MORE than that per day wringing out the furries.

You gotta do some normie shit first.

Supply and demand. Basic capitalism. If people don't want what you're drawing, they wont buy it. Rope the normies in with generic stuff, THEN once the cash flow is in, you start doing your own style of stuff.

Man, maybe I need to look into this....

For those of you who want to make it art wise with a large audience.

Communicate.

Have a DA to post your work or in porn case a HF gallery. And use your twitter/tumblr to interact with your audience.

For reference my followbase increased almost 200% when I started interacting with my audience. They start seeing you as someone to look up to and want to interact and become attached to your work. And I'm saying this as someone who doesn't draw fanart.

Skill is important, but it's more important to be enjoyable to be around with.

>Christ, I WANT to make a webcomic
>This is the same as Michelle's story
Woops.

I'm in the same boat as you and one thing that helped me was doing very short pieces with my characters first.

Like, try using your characters in something equivalent of Nedroid for awhile: A single page of just a setup and joke or just a single action (Them getting into bed, character drinking all night and leaving bar).

Try to do many very, very short sequences like that. After awhile, you'll be able to look back and go, "Holy shit, I did 60 pages of just random shit? If I did 60 pages once before, I can do it now but with a fleshed out story."

The reason I never tackle my own story is because it feels so overwhelming, so I tried that method for storyboards and after the span of a couple of weeks, looked back and saw I had done over 150+ boards. Individually when I did them, they were only a couple of boards with a single punchline, but in my head, it felt "easier" to do because the stakes and scale was smaller. I was not invested time into one giant thing that I would hate later, I was investing a day or two onto individual things that eventually piled up and made me go, "Oh shit, I CAN do this."

Can i jack off to your work, user?

Not a graphic artist, but a company pretty much made their own version of one of my sculptures and is selling that now, so that sucks.

I contacted them about it and their response was essentially fuck off or we'll sue you for slandering us etc etc.

Fledgling professional artist. I don’t know how I got where I am (I’m still a no-name but I’ve worked with a few different publishers) but I’m happy to be here. Drawing comics is cool, getting paid for art and having your name on stuff in stores is fun. Just gotta learn how to manage my time better so I can take on more work. Comics don’t pay very well.

>Pieces I spend tons of time on sell like shit
>Pieces where I'm super lazy sell like crazy.

I'll take it, but it's always going to bug me. The lazier I got the better I did.

But I hate talking to people.

>being mad artists actually know how to play the game
Git gud.

Sue them first.

*tonguefucks your futa mother's prolapsed anus*

Yeah, they are like 30 million x my resources and that'd just turn into an expensive drawn out shitfest that eats time.