[Talk] Usining Fanart as A Tool

[Nina]

There's a few things about fanart that gets to people. The first, is that fanart gets more attention then people's original works, and sometimes that really gets an artist down. The second, is that it's "clear" when certain artists build a following by hopping on the latest trend or show with fanart or derivative content. Some people feel that it's ungenuine to be more calculated when it comes to what art you produce and when/where to show it!

I'm personally of the opinion that art is a business, and it doesn't make anyone's art 'less' if they produce it as such. But those are just my surface level thoughts. I wanted to know what everyone else thinks?

 

[Venia Silente]

Art already is a tool. And that's not a bad thing, mind.

But also, art (and by extension fanart) is not only that.

As a fanartist whose medium is writing (sorry, subforum locals ^_^ ) I oft see the arguments of the kind that doing fandom work is wasting potential, that somehow writing for fandom is less "worth" than writing original (whatever "original" means which in the context of most conversations tends to just be "I conveniently forget that the last original according to my own definition was Shakespeare") etc etc... Of course they are also accompanied by the arguments that doing fandom is exploitative, done for the easy buck (as if Disney's "original"s weren't), that it is or it is not political enough, and that it gets you notoriety and a portfolio to pursue other paths - which, to be fair, does work both ways if the animator career is any indication.

IMO in the end those classifications only really matter for those who have to judge things as a job - interviewers, auditors, wannabe lit/art criticism class students. Given any practical definition of "art" can be heavily played with and there are even entire industries defined around making it so, I'm more a proponent of the effects of the Two Cakes Theory - if someone is in need for art, sees mine and goes "woo hoo! more art!", well then it's art.

Also to a lesser extent if it was made just so I could get the idea bunny out of my head to make room for more things, then it's art. Oh well.

 

[Megan]

Business is all about a steady income stream. If you don't get paid regularly you're out of business very quickly. fanart is a good way for artists to make money because there will always be fans of something. So there will always be people looking for more of whatever they're a fan of. As long as what they get is good, they don't care where it came from.

Original art on the other hand is a lot more difficult. There's no guarantee that it will ever catch on. Doesn't help that you're responsible for the whole design process all by yourself. The few success cases that we know of just happened to luck out. Either because they had a lot of capital to work with or they never went in it for the money (nowadays we call these "passion projects") or sometimes they only catch on way later sometimes even after the author died. Insofar they are simply not reliable as an income stream.

Selling fanart is just business as usual.

 

[killer-curry]

In my view, fan art is something that people derive from already made character in terms of traits, characteristics or some meme related about it. It can be a tool to show what the character don't show in game such as slice of life, more variety of expression. It can be a tool for commissions that people request for artist to express what they want, or a tool for artist to gain attraction while the hype bandwagon still hot.

I think the fan art is not "art-less" as original creation, instead it just easier to generate ideas for drawing compared to original art because you know what the character is like. Sure original art do not give much attraction, but it is a good practice for artist to try something new. Creating your own characters is much more fun than drawing someone else character, and also improve your creative designs.

In conclusion, it is good to consider fan-art as business, or passion thing to do. Everyone has their own freedom to how what they produce, and its good not to think too much on getting attraction in social media, fame will come to you overtime when you improve your skills.