By Moose
I’m Facebook friends with a female artist. She’s a professional artist and she mainly does indie comics but not porn. She’s kinda hot and she posts a lot of selfies so being her Facebook friend has it’s perks. What’s not so peachy about being her Facebook friend is she asks her users….EVERYTHING. Do you think I should draw a Marvel or a DC character today? Should I color this drawing? Should I eat bacon and eggs this morning or oatmeal?
At first, it was ok. I figured this was her way of engaging her audience to stimulate conversations, and it did work for her. Lots of the people, mainly men, commented and made recommendations. Then it wasn’t long before I noticed something interesting. She wasn’t moving forward on projects until she heard from her audience. That ladies and gentlemen, is where she went wrong.
If you look at a lot of successful, artists, writers, etc. many of them include their audience in finishing scripts, comics, albums, etc. It’s actually an integral part of this new connected age. It’s what makes living today so damn cool. The thing that you need to make sure of as an adult artist, is staying true to your artistic vision and not allowing yourself to become a puppet.
I see artists blog and they complain about not getting a lot of feedback on their posts, or Twitter page, and Patreon feeds. If you’re the kind of artist that needs feedback from your fans for motivation, I got three words for you. GET OVER IT. I admit, my ego would love fans to e-mail me everyday about how much they love my work. Maybe I could be one of those guys like Ninja Kitty on Hentai Foundry with thousands of fans and dozens of comments anytime he makes a post. My ego would love it, but it rarely translates into me doing better art.
Here’s why you don’t want to overly rely on public feedback. First, creativity is a muscle. If you stop exercising it, you’ll get creatively flabby. The more flabby you get the more you will rely on others’ ideas. Second, your audience can steer you off course. Let’s say you’ve been drawing and promoting your original characters for the last two years. Then you post some Harry Potter fan art (Hermione, naked at 18, of course). The pic goes over so well it gets more hits and feedback than anything you’ve ever posted. Next thing you know you’re getting requests for more fan art. So much so you’re starting to be known as that guy who draws fan art all the time instead of being known for your original characters. Sooner or later you’ll have to make a decision. Sell out and keep drawing what “they” want, or stick to your guns and go back to drawing your original characters. Sadly, most artists sell out.
Third, like my Facebook friend, you don’t want to get annoying. If you have to ask your fans, followers, etc. every time you want to draw something, most of them will get bored or down right annoyed with you. Don’t do it.
If you find yourself with artist’s block or not sure what to do, the solution is to flex your creative muscles. Here’s an exercise! This is something I learned from James Altucher. Everyday write down 10 ideas on different topics. I’ll write down 10 ideas for a comic, 10 ways to change a tire, 10 ways to kill a person with a door knob, anything! The secret is to not cheat or cop out and say shit like, all I can think of is eight. Most of your answers will suck, so quality isn’t what’s important, getting to 10 is. I like paper but you can write them down or type them on your phone or tablet.
Think of your art as you driving to Miami. You ask your audience, how would you drive to Miami? Then get their feedback and if you hear a good idea you didn’t think of, use it. But if your goal is driving to Miami and they convince you to go to Atlantic City, the process is broken. As you create content involve your tribe but don’t let them overly influence your art and your career.
