DeviantArt/Headscratchers

• How come only Fan Art and "Anime" is "Copying"? Isn't more or less every genre of art copying something?
  • It always bugged this troper as well to some degree. When something like anime gets extremely popular, all the artists that detest fan art or anime consider people drawing them to be just stupid fanboys that only draw something that is popular and can't make anything from their own imagination. Of course there will always be a rip off of something in a medium (intentional or not), but naturally, Fridge Logic is how the haters work.
  • Well, when someone draws fan art, they're literally copying someone else's characters, anime-characters tend to look alike, so it comes off like you're copying a generic anime artist. As for the other genres of art, some copy as well but to a much smaller extent, while most is completely original since the artist came up with the character appearance and clothing themselves.
    • But realistic people look alike too...isn't that just copying?
    • 'Anime characters tend to look alike?' I won't go off on a tangent here, but basic art style aside, anime comes in a variety of shapes and sizes (if you do it right, at least). But on a broader subject, anime seems to attract a fair share of hatred from people ranging from those who have a good reason to dislike it to flat-out Hate Dumb. I don't see how drawing in anime/manga style is "copying" someone else's work, any more than post-grunge rock is ripping off Nirvana.
  • No, literally copying something would be plagiarism. Using existing elements in your own work is a very different beast... and the exact same thing as, say, creating works based on mythology, historical figures, or classic tales like Sherlock, yet nobody calls that copying. Go figure.
  • Copying is not the same as simply drawing a character that belongs to someone else. Copying is basically recreating an image without making any real changes to it. It's not the same as referencing, which is necessary for creating fan art, because referencing is only done to get the details (such as clothing/hair/eye color, etc.) right. Copying is pretty much the same as tracing, but instead of tracing over the lines of the original, the person is freehand drawing the original exactly as it is. This is a guide someone made to distinguish between referencing and what is considered copying: http://diikae.deviantart.com/art/Tracing-vs-Referencing-207873512?offset=40 So the artwork is only against dA's rules if it is actually copied from something and not just using the same popular character.

• What's with everyone and their dog putting large "DO NOT RIP" watermarks on everything? I've noticed this especially on sources like tutorials and stocks, it's bad enough that there are 3000 tutorials on how to make an absolute generic signature, but do the authors really think that everyone is out to rip those of?
  • Yes, they do. It's sad, really, but watermarking is one of the few anti-theft options.
  • DA is infamous for art-theft, you can't really blame people for taking security precautions. Better safe than sorry.
  • What I can't figure out is why too many of the people who are overly obsessive about anti-theft are frequently either fanartists (so they apparently haven't cottoned on that they have no real rights over their work to begin with), or people where, to be kind of blunt, nobody would want to steal their work to begin with because it's terrible.
    • I've seen a lot of fanart theft, it's not really about "rights", it's the creepiness of someone taking something YOU drew and passing it off as theirs. As for the terrible art... Beauty is in the eye of the beholder?
    • I can understand being annoyed by the theft, it's the sheer obsessiveness and overreaction about it that gets me. For instance, I had one guy I watched who would absolutely flip out and threaten to leave every time someone used his pixel arts without permission (which only rarely happened), had "DO NOT USE" signs all over his profile, and now all of his works are in storage because he had to take a break from DA and thus "can't monitor for instances of theft". It's like, for the love of humanity dude, get a life and stop overreacting to this.
      As far as I'm concerned, all I ask is that you give me credit, so I can get some nice exposure out of the deal. Otherwise, I don't have copyrights over my fanworks anyway, so who am I to disallow distribution?

• The categorizing system bugs me, especially in relation to the distinction between traditional and digital artwork. Why can't they create a category that encompasses both? Mixed media is for different medias within these categories, like mixing acrylics and watercolours, or Photoshop and something else. I remember reading an admin saying that it was up to the artist's "honesty" whether he should categorize it as traditional or digital work. So an artist that draws and inks traditionally, but paints digitally (like me) will inevitably be dishonest and misleading about her work, as viewers will either assume that a) she does the lineart digitally; or b) she paints traditionally. And all of this could be resolved by simply creating a category for works done in BOTH medias!!
  • I have a similar problem, I use traditional inking and digital colours but still the category must be set in "full digital".

• "Sorry, deviantART does not serve more than 1000 results for any query."
  • The site explained this in one news announcement, apparently it speeds up the search. If more that a 1000 results were shown the search command would slow down immensely.
    • Not that it had any impact on the shitload of errors that show up half of the time.

• I don't get the trend of users having a link to http://me.deviantart.com with something like THIS PERSON IS A CYBERBULLYor Feel free to bitch on my profile Can someone explain this?
  • Pretty much just a lame joke based off the fact that that URL always redirects you to your own profile when you're logged in, leading people who are naive and don't realize that to think the joker was insulting them specifically in their signature.
  • It's also a form of passive lulz. Since a decent contingent of people on dA use their free time to go around calling out art thieves, tracers and the like, their signature often shows up right under a post calling someone a thief or otherwise. The accused party clicks the link, sees that it goes to their page and assume the person telling them to not trace has launched a smear campaign already. Hilarity often ensues.

• Why don't the dAdmins ever do their dAmn job?
  • Because you won't DIE!

• Why does everyone refuse to use the "Mature Content" thing for nude pictures lately? It's true that DA is not a kids's website and adults are the ones responsible for keeping tabs on what their children do online. But recently the front page is averaging one nude deviation a day- and don't get me wrong, all the ones I've seen on the front page have been beautiful and tasteful works of art- but why does that make people think the artwork doesn't require the mature label? Those are the rules. If anyone comments that it needs to be labelled "Mature," they are instantly attacked with comments like "The female body is beautiful!" and "Everyone knows what naked bodies look like, so what's the problem?" Those are both good arguments against the censorship in general, but that doesn't explain why the art in question is exempt from the "mature content" rules. Why is an artwork exempt from using the mature content tag just because it's really good? That's what the label is FOR. Giving the artwork a mature content label doesn't mean it's poor quality, it means the art contains mature content. All I'm saying is, if we aren't going to use the mature tags for "mature" artwork, then why do we even have them? We should either get rid of them all together and up the age requirements for using DA, or actually enforce the use of mature tags.
  • Actually, the Mature Content tag is required for full nudity showing female nipples, the buttocks, or genitals. Many people just like to think they're above the rules.
    And it is enforced; you just need to "report deviation" and there'll be an option "Mature Tag Needed". Just be warned that the DA staff is, from what I hear, swamped with a huge backlog of reports, so it might take a long time to get to.
    (This may be why it's becoming more common, now that I think about it. Since it's not being handled promptly, people see that others are getting away with it and think that makes it OK for them to do it.)
    • Thank you for replying to me so quickly. :) That makes a lot of sense. Also, if anyone has time, I'd like a second opinion from someone on whether something like this should be labelled mature: http://armene.deviantart.com/#/d462zx5 It was on the main page the other day, although the question I asked was prompted by another picture I saw on the front page today that showed breasts (that picture isn't on the front page anymore, so I'm not sure what happened to it). Anyway, the picture linked is a nice work of art and technically it doesn't show the genitals.... but it comes extremely close. I clicked to see if anyone had reported it for needing a content tag. It has been reported, multiple times in different categories, but each case has been closed because a staff member doesn't think it needs a tag. Er... I don't think it's a poor quality artwork by any means, but how exactly does this not need a mature tag? It's certainly not something one could get away with having on a computer screen at work or school. Sorry if I'm rambling and not being clear, but what I'm trying to figure out is what the line is between appropriate for most ages and "mature content" if that image is considered completely appropriate.
      • Yeah, that's a lot more questionable... the staff just loves to equivocate on technicalities on edge cases, which I find frustrating and annoying. My suggestion would be to try reporting the deviation again (either through the tool if it'll let you, or via the Help Desk if it won't). Sometimes those edge cases, the decision can differ depending on the admin which responds to it.
• Why does everyone freak out on you if you're not Japanese and you use a Japanese word? I mean, I understand if you over- or misuse it, but sometimes it can get really dumb. For example, I have a series of stamps about tropes, reading things like "I'm a Jerkass" and things like that. I made one that said "I'm a Genki Girl" and someone complained that since I'm not Japanese, I should've said "Energetic Girl" or something like that.
  • Combination of two things:
    One, all instances of gratuitous usage of foreign words tend to look very silly at best unless it's a loanword or there isn't a good English equivalent for the term. (...in which case it usually eventually becomes a loanword anyway.)
    Two, probably more relevantly, Gratuitous Japanese is one of the warning signs that you might be dealing with the type of anime/manga fan that is crazy and obsessed with their fangirl conception of what Japan is like and thinks Japan is super awesome and better than everything else and wants to be/act Japanese. Which is really, really friggin' annoying to deal with for those of us who don't share their... enthusiasm. To the point where people get kneejerk reactions at any typical warning signs even when done by people who actually aren't Anime Fans That Are Crazy. Consider it a case of Tainted By Association.
  • The "Wapanese" are highly notorious for spouting Gratuitous Japanese, and perhaps they may account for a percentage of hatred towards the anime fandom in general. I agree 100% that for someone to have criticized you for a single foreign-language word was rather extreme, (it was the trope name, after all), but that person could have been traumatized by too many a "weeaboo" to the point where any indication of being an otaku will get you Fan Hater Internet Backdraft.
• Why is the Artistic Nude category still allowed when 98% of all entries are blatant Fan Service without meaning?
  • Because of the 2% that isn't. You wouldn't ban everything just because of Sturgeon's Law, would you?
    • Tell that to Jark, and all the Jarkians who still believe anime and anthro art should be banned because of Sturgeon's Law. Or where they crack down on anime and anthro art becuase it's pornographic...while at the same time, a daily deviation is the artist's boyfriend jerking off in the bathtub.
• Why aren't there options to select things you don't want shown, like a checkbox so you don't get a ton of things like mature content, furries, or yaoi/yuri art? It would make the searching easier, much like that 1000-deviation cap. Plus, it lets people see more art without having to sift through things they don't want to see. Anything past the cap will very rarely be seen, since searching for the same thing twice gets the same results. Not everyone LIKES yaoi/yuri/furries/etc. It'd be nice to have an option to not have to view it when I go looking for art of one specific character or word.
  • While there's no auto checkbox for this, you can still remove search terms via: -yaoi -yuri -furry -sonic and so on. Basically a minus sign in front of every term you don't want to see. And Mature Content items can be removed by turning on the filter, as I think Mature Content just isn't shown at all now if you have the filter on.
    If you find yourself wanting to use the same set of negative keywords frequently, I recommend setting up a custom search on your Channels page at http://channels.deviantart.com/ And (warning, shameless pimping alert) if you want to know the other ways you can set up custom browsing/searching, see here: [1]
    • I did not know that. Thank you.
• When looking at comments for DA entries, how come everything is so positive? I was getting ready to write some constructive criticism and suggestions to improve a rather poorly written story, but I was afraid to since no one else did it and I was afraid of getting hate mail like I've gotten on other websites. Can anyone explain?
  • I think it's exactly what you mentioned, but on a larger scale—everyone is afraid that if they offer criticism, and no one else does, the artist or other commenters will attack them for being rude. It's really a shame that the few vocal people on dA who freak out over any criticism have made it impossible for those of us who want to improve to get helpful criticism. It's basically down to an alarming number of users not knowing the difference between positive and negative criticism. Anyway, I'd say if you want to give some helpful hints to someone, just be as polite as you can and let them know you only want to help. If they attack you for that, just ignore them or tell them you were trying to help, but if they cannot accept that their artwork is anything less than perfect, you will not give them any positive criticism ever again.
  • It's interesting mostly because, as anyone who went through art school knows, criticism is the best form of commentary. Many artists ascribe to Platonic theory and feel a work could always be better, no matter how great is is now. It's also the case that a compliment can be detrimental to an artist's development, especially if the artist in question is young like many DA users. It tends to create a desire to keep compliments coming by repeating as much as possible.
    • Probably the penultimate example of this was Snapesnogger, the infamous Harry Potter fan-artist. Many people noted that her art style developed in normal strides before coming to everyone's attention. Once she became 'internet-famous' her style locked down. In the later parts of the drama arc with her, trolls pointed out you could layer works years apart and they'd match up. When Snogger went to Concept Art.org looking for a new venue, she was mortified that they offered her criticism rather than praise.
  • I'm surprised - normally I see everyone being negative under the guise of constructive criticism. However, what they are not doing is actually being constructive. I read one story that did have some flaws in it, so I saw the Constructive Criticism - and then I wanted to bang my head because they were NOT being constructive. Then for the next entreis they complained about how she did not listen to them. Well honestly, her stuff needed a lot of work, but there's a difference between "Your grammar here is a bit awkward" or "You keep using this word a tad too much, and have repeated descripbions" rather than saying "Your grammar's like a chinese waitress" and then saying stuff like "Hello! I am chinese waitress, how many I serve you today?", "Get a vocabulary, weeaboo". The absolute worst was "tl;dr , read a few bits, don't post fanfiction here." You wonder why she wasn't listening to your "Constructive" Criticisms? Because there's a difference between being constructive and just being a dick. See if they ask you for critique when you don't offer anything constructive. One thing I find a lot of is "Don't draw Anime." That's not constructive in the least bit.
  • This is definitely true. I almost gave up art completely when I was just starting out because all I got were comments like "you should never draw again". You can't blame someone for being sensitive to criticism when the only kind they get is of the jerk variety and after receiving it for so long, it can be hard to distinguish constructive criticism from negative criticism.
• Why is Microsoft Smart Screen blocking DA? Has the site been hacked?
• Why are there so many Hollywood Atheists on the site? I ask because they seem to be far in the majority when it comes to extremists on DA. Seriously; just look up "religion" or anything related to it and you will come across an enormous amount of stamps espousing on how religion is the most evil thing ever and how if you even slightly disagree you're brainwashed/stupid/etc. I'm really curious why it's so prevalent on the site, and what draws so many of them to it.
  • I think it's the result of two things:
    • 1. Deviantart has a LOT of teenage users, many of whom (not all, but many) think it's cooler to be an Atheist because they think it makes them edgy.
    • 2. Trolls who like to post offensive things because they know attacking someone's religion is the easiest way to get them angry.
  • Basically, it's the same sort of people who make it hard to be a real Atheist in real life, because as soon as you tell someone you are one, people assume you're just like all the jerks who behave like this.
  • Same reason that there are so many straw libertarians and straw communists on the site - they think it's edgy without realizing that they technically believe in things that are against the way they live.
    • My problem is how to tell if the person is just a troll or really trying to "convert" people to what they believe. It's more obvious when they have a parody of a religious symbol, or more blatantly, a stamp outright saying "Religion is Bullsh*t", and then go on to say in the description that it's "to inform, not offend" and "anyone who doesn't like this will have their comments ignored". But it's good to know I'm not the only person who finds them offensive.
  • You must be on the wrong site. I've only seen christian homophobes. Though, in the interest of fairness, most artists are emotional people, and emotional people tend to be irrational, hence why there's so much extremism.
• Why does the site not filter demotivators and screencaps? I can understand when people are using them just for stamps, but it otherwise hardly qualifies as art. What's the reason for this? (Note I'm not really complaining, since there are some very funny ones)
  • Technically screencaps and demotivators are supposed to be against the rules unless they use art you personally made. In practice DA is ridiculously slow at dealing with violations.
• Is it just me, or... how come that, whenever there's a deviant who proudly displays their belief in Jesus in their signature or username, they are almost always also a Sonic the Hedgehog fan? I know it sounds weird, but it's true. Just... why?
  • The only explanation that I can give, being a religious Sonic fan myself, I think it has to do with lifestyle associated with being religious. I gravitate towards things that makes me happy and doesn't go against my virtues, and one of those things happens to be Sonic the Hedgehog. I suppose there might be others who are similar.
  • I'd guess it's because there's not much about Sonic that anyone could find offensive, at least from a religious POV. And Sonic is wildly popular among people of a certain age regardless of religion.
• Why is it that a deviation can express EXTREMELY racist/homophobic/offensive views, but they won't take it down unless it is 'encouraging the killing or enslavement of a specific race/people.' 90% of the bigoted stuff doesn't cover that, so it stays up, even if is reported. What
  • That's basically how freedom of speech works in general. You're allowed to say whatever you want, even if it is terrible, so long as it does not actively incite violence.
    • So, putting the cute little saying "Chrisian's head + knife = world peace. It's like they were made for each other or something", doesn't count as 'encouraging the killing or enslavement of a specific race/people'? That was in someone's signature. Yes, I know they were an Axe Crazy Hollywood Atheist, but still.
      • Well technically they weren't ordering anyone to go out and cause genocide. It's in the darker end of the gray area, but still gray.