The grass really is greener elsewhere...
If you follow this account on a regular basis you will probably notice I've become increasingly erratic about posting here. My apologies.
Deviant Art isn't the best place to post cartoons online for a variety of reasons. Considering the way the site is designed it's hard to find cartoons and it is hard to figure out where to post them where people will see them.
Plus DA just doesn't have that large of an audience for cartoons unless you create Furry, Yaoi or other work for very specific fandoms.
I won't stop posting on DA in the foreseeable future, I'm just probably going to be pretty flaky about it.
If you're interested in following Vegetables for Dessert (the name of the strip) on a regular basis you can find it on:
tapastic.com/series/vegetables…
Tapastic, a great site for viewing and posting comics. If you are a cartoonist I would highly recommend using this site.
www.facebook.com/VegetablesFor…
I'm pretty sure you all know what facebook is. Though facebook won't always tell people when a new cartoon is posted.
www.tumblr.com/blog/vegetables…
I hear tumblr is pretty popular with the kids these days too.
Priya, I will do this for you.
My diet consists of lentils, beans, potato, fresh fruit, vegetables and the occasional gorging at a cheap pizza buffet. There's a lot you can live without.
Vacation, when you've been barely employed for years everyday is a vacation.
Not a movie or book but Calvin and Hobbes had a pivotal influence on my life.
I like all the lights and decorations but the only time of year I personally get excited about is Halloween.
The feeling you have when you sit there laughing uncontrollably about something you've just written.
To be honest I decided Santa wasn't a logical concept in 2nd grade so I don't know if I could even teach a child about Santa.
Working in a haunted house and scaring the crap out of people during Halloween. I can't think of anything more touchy feely off the top of my head.
Cult of Personality by Living Color
A younger MLP fan was upset with a particular cartoon I had done about Princess Celestia. I politely explained why I did it, why other people enjoyed it, acknowledged they were upset for valid reasons but also told them in this situation the best thing to do was simply to ignore my work and move on to things that made them happy. It was a very civil exchange between two individuals of different viewpoints. They seem to have quickly learned a valuable life lesson at an early age that I still haven't been able to pound through my thick skull.
The first doodles are up!
vegetablesfordessert.tumblr.co…
Please excuse the fact I'm not posting them in my Deviant Art profile. I'm trying to get my tumblr followers to interact to see if they're actually paying attention.
Bishop, Monster, I will get to your requests. Honestly these drawings take no time at all. Your requests just required me to do a little bit of thinking and I've been pretty lazy the last month. I'll get to them in the next week.
If you can't tell I'm quite serious about this cartooning thing and over the course of the last half year I have spent a good chunk of time trying to figure out how to promote this thing. While Deviant Art is the first place I've posted my work, Vegetables for Dessert (the title of my comic strip) is posted in quite a few different places now. DA, facebook, tumblr, drunk duck, tapastic, even pinterest. It sure as hell hasn't taken off like a rocket, but it has been steadily building a following. I have 162 followers on tumblr, 50 to 60 on Deviant Art (yes I have a load more but most of those people are watching because of a handful of mlp cartoons), another 23 likes on facebook, 5 on Drunk Duck and another 6 on tapastic.
At this point I've posted a fair amount of content on line, its been nearly a year, I've collectively received around 100,000 views of my work (which unfortunately doesn't mean much on the internet.) and its time to celebrate something. Therefore I've decided to celebrate 250ish. As in approximately 250 people are following my work at this point in time.
I will be celebrating by taking requests and drawing random crappy doodles. Want godzilla getting a manicure? You got it. Have a cute picture of your kid? Little Billy is becoming a cyborg! Or a mutant, depends on what I feel like. Give me requests, ideas, links, photos and I will draw whatever randomness compels me to. Sound like a deal?
Oh yes, by the way I'll be posting these things on facebook and tumblr in an effort to get my audience there to engage with me.
I was initially planning to write on the subject of building a fan base for your work all the way back in February. I kept pushing this off, because while it is an important and compelling subject matter, I really didn't have much insight and to be honest I still don't. However I do have a few worthwhile thoughts and observations I can share.
The first thing to consider is if you are interested in building a fan base is why? What's your objective? Are you hoping to find a group of peers to relate to, are you hoping to find people who will help you grow as an artist, do you just enjoy the attention, or are you hoping to make a living from your art? They are all valid reasons but keep in mind they aren't the only ones, and more likely than not your are going to have several different reasons, some more important than others.
Your reason is going to dictate how you move forward. If you want to enjoy the company of your peers, try to find a small DA group of like minded artists, who actively communicate with each other. If you just want to be popular, make fan art for something you enjoy. If you're like me and wish to grow a fan base with the greater goal of supporting a career things get a lot more complicated and that's probably a long winded article in and of itself.
There are a few basics that I can share. First have work that people want to look at. If you produce fan art, people will look at your work because they are already endeared to the subject matter. Because you already know what people want this creates a low barrier to entry. Better fan art will get more attention, but even clumsy work will get attention because people love to share their enthusiasm for the subject matter. If you want people to look at your personal work, you have to offer them a certain personal distinctness with a combination of your art, writing and creative voice that will make people choose to follow you despite their infinite other entertainment options.
What makes for good art and writing is a subject that is well explored and there's already plenty of information out there about those subject matter. Additionally this is something you can study yourself by looking at material and asking why you like it or don't like and figuring out just what that means. Honestly as an artist this is something you should train yourself to do regular when viewing work. When you start developing opinions and finding the reasons behind your opinions you'll start having insights that will help you grow as a creator.
Creative voice is not as obvious as the other two subject matter because it is entirely personal. Creative voice is how you choose to express yourself. What are you trying to say when you create a piece and what compels you to do it?
As anyone who looks at my work regularly knows I have a dark cynical sense of humor, though I try to avoid being vicious, cruel, and I'm not a fan of gore. Though from time to time my work is kind of gorey I make a point of being as absurd and cartoony about it as possible. Why do I have a dark sense of humor?
The short of it I grew up a depressed loner who only started developing meaningful friendships after I turned twenty, and with people who were several years older than me, except for one exception. I never fit in with my peer group in school or college, was frequently bullied and humiliated, occasionally sexually harassed, entertained thoughts of suicide for over a decade and was constantly tormented by the pop culture narrative of youth being a fun and wonderful experience. The life I was told about never matched the life I was actually living. While I'm blessed with wonderful parents, I'd be dead (or worse) without them, I grew up a depressed, lonely, needy, cynical, insecure, bitter, introverted and mentally detached nervous wreck.
For me cartooning started off as a safety valve that allowed me to blow of steam. My humor expresses my worldview. People who enjoy my work more than likely share that world view.
The point I'm trying to make is that people are drawn to a creative voice that in some way speaks to their personal experience. If you appreciate the darkness and cynicism of my work its more than likely because you have some personal darkness of your own that enables you to relate. The specifics of experience will vary but it is that bridge of common feeling through similar experience that will connect your work to your audience.
Not all connections may be that bleak. There are some who appreciate my work because of its creativity and absurdity, but in general try to find the common ground your work will share with its audience. If you are a gamer, put your work before other gamers (but be aware there are a lot of cartoonist doing the same thing who are better at creating work and promoting it than you, at least in the beginning.) If your work speaks to how you've felt divinely touched in life, go to were people of spiritual nature hang out. If your work reflects the sentiment that organized society is upheld by lies, find the anarchists. If you like cute things and pretty colors, find the people who are into the same.
In you want an audience that loves cartoons, find where the other cartoonists are at.
In short:
What motivates you to create will motivate your audience to read.