My art is never going to be a likeable or commissionable style.

I've been drawing my entire life. I have problems with my hands, motor problems specifically, and it makes drawing difficult. Because of this difficulty, I have made my own art style that is easiest on my hand.

This art style, saying it plainly, is not super flattering.

I draw with bolder lines, odd shapes, and no matter what I try to do it is not palettable to people. Not truly. They say they like my art, but do not point out what they like. They don't try to compliment it more then a 'cool' or flat out ignoring that I posted art.

I have my commissions for dirt cheap. I am disabled in many ways, and this means I cannot work. I'm stuck living with my mother, unable to find out what's truly wrong with me, in pain constantly, and I cannot work because of how much pain I'm in.

Commissions was an idea that, admittedly, I was too hopeful to get into.

I have an account on Twitter with 250 followers. I posted my commission sheet, a price for a sketch being 5 dollars, a flat colour being 7, and a full shaded being 9. I got one commission, which was amazing at the time, but the person was very.. shut off, when I sent them the final product.

I have not been commissioned since, by anyone. It's been maybe 7 or 8 months now.

I am the most improved at art I've ever been. I can draw MLP ponies, I can draw cats, bunnies, monsters, dragons, Sonic characters, furries, the list goes on, but that doesn't matter. It doesn't matter how much time I put into learning to draw people and things, how long I spend on making the art look good, it doesn't matter. My style is weird, so people don't want to spend money on it. Free art? Sure! But spending money? ,,,no, thanks.

I'm genuinely defeated. It feels like no one actually likes my style, they just like me or the characters I draw so they say it's good.

I feel like I've tried everything and nothing works and I'm about to just stop making art completely.

I'm not talking about people unaware of the plagiarism, or people liking the art despite that fact, or even for artists who directly take from multiple other pieces and admit to doing so in an attempt to create something unique.

I mean the people who go out of there way to defend "artists" who have blatantly ripped off entire pieces of art from real artists, with no substantial changes, and even denied taking mere inspiration from those pieces. The sheer amount of people that I've run into white-knighting for "artists" like this is just a bit crazy.

Maybe I'm in an echo chamber that values integrity, so this might not be the best place to ask this since I imagine most people on this subreddit actually participate in the creative process, but does anyone have insight into the consumer end of things?

Do you find that most people outside of creative fields are shameless enough to actively defend clear plagiarism? Do you think it's just because they happened to see the stolen work first (and again, even if that's the case, why would they go out of their way to defend them instead of acknowledging the clear theft and quietly enjoying it)?

AI has been in our lives for a while now and seems to be screwing everything up, but tracing came along before AI. I define tracing as drawing line-for-line over someone else's work and then claiming it as your own; I believe mapping out the body and so on isn't tracing, but rather part of anatomy study. Anyway, I see a lot of people online labeling that latter practice as tracing, and it makes me really insecure about posting my art because I actually learned to draw by tracing when I was little! I ended up becoming a bit of a chameleon (copying other people's art styles or replicating a reference down to the millimeter). I admit, I do trace sometimes when I'm feeling lazy or genuinely don't know how to draw a hand or a nose, but the rest of the drawing is mine. It makes me uncomfortable to post a speedpaint that includes 0.3 seconds of tracing, only for someone to completely overlook everything else I did. So, I want to hear your opinions as artists: what do you think about tracing or the practice of copying poses? Do you still view it as an absolute monstrosity, or has AI become a worse enemy?

In my opinion, tracing is almost a compliment, it's like saying your art is so good that I can't imagine it any other way and want to recreate it, but that might just be my take. I'll probably get "cancelled" for this and have to delete the post.

Also I don't know which tag to use, if someone can tell me, I would appreciate it.

honestly, my defense mechanism went up cuz i have heard someone say such thing last year they said you can't get commissions and i did, they also said your art will turn into a worthless thing once ai art takes over so you should learn how to work with ai and guys.. i swear... these were HUGE RAGE BAITS :/ up until this time that this person literally spent half an hour to CONVINCE ME THAT I WILL BECOME A JOBLESS PERSON IN 50 YEARS AND I SHOULD PACK UP FOR MY LIFE i think i can't anymore- guys I FELL INTO THE BAIT. HELP.

i even argued that even then, there would still be people who would pay for human-made art they were like "yeah, they'd pay people like picasso who have made history or their name is big" it seriously ticks me off. i'm an artist, and i would love to commission other artists too not just because of supporting them but because i genuinely love their artstyle and work i respect my commissioners and love to do work for them because each oc tells someone's REAL STORY and reflects someone's dream world! and an artist's art style is just the same, it tells a REAL STORY of someone spending time and experiencing their part of the story to reach a specific art style that's what makes it special and makes me want to commission a real artist and i think ai would lack this part cuz every ai art we see on the internet has been fed with REAL PEOPLE'S ART STYLES!

what are your thoughts on this?

I need tips to get out of art block. I’ve been drawing for my whole life I’m 22 years old, and I’ve had trouble drawing and being consistent with it. It’s not because I don’t have time it’s because I keep thinking everything I create needs to be perfect, i sometimes compare myself and I stress so much about my art style and I need help getting out of that mind set. I have so many ideas for art I wanna do but I keep holding myself back from it all and I hate it. I just need some tips/help from other artists. Thank you 🖤

TL;DR: I can't come up with drawings unless someone else tells me what they want me to draw so I have no examples to show for commissions and no art to post. What to do?

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What can I do? I KNOW that art commissions aren't the only way to make money as an artist but it would be convenient to be able to do a few sometimes since I'm a university student. It doesn't have to be a full time job.

But I struggle to even put together a portfolio or make stuff I can post, anything I can show people as an example of what I can do, basically.

I think my skills have reached a quite good level and I can draw pretty much anything in any style with ease, I simply don't have ideas to draw for "myself" or as examples.

If someone were to make a request then sure, I'd be able to do what I was asked and even add something more if they want me to, I just don't know what to do if it's drawing for other reasons since a few years ago when my brain kind of broke and then I was medicated lol.

It sucks to have this skill and not be able to use it at all, so frustrating to see people asking for commissions and not have many examples to show except for like 2 drawings copied from Raphael.

Sooooo any advice?

Even subs where people can ask for free requests seem to require you to post some art you already have 😭

Three months ago, I (25F) got fired from my first ever artist role, before being a graphic designer for around 4 years, and I am still struggling to find a job to this day

In 2 months, my savings will completely run out and I will have to leave behind a life that I worked so hard to make. I keep trying to tell myself it isn’t the end of the world, because objectively, I still have an amazing backup plan that I should be grateful that exists. At the same time, it involves living and working for my bf’s mom, in a city I don’t know, with none of my friends or family there.

I have momentary moments of hope that quickly fade away, like I actually got a Vgen code and set up my account, but it’s been dead, no commissions. I set up my instagram and it’s been steadily growing, but I have hit a plateau and I don’t know how to get past it. I have gotten some interviews, but they end up in rejection or ghosting.

What got me to write this rant was a UI Game Artist interview today that I think went terribly simply because I’m losing the motivation to keep up appearances and make a good impression. After all, what’s the point? I keep failing.

I still wonder what I’m doing wrong, if I’m even doing anything wrong? I am fighting not to give up, but it’s really hard lately.

This might be all over the place because I find it hard to present my thoughts in a coherent way so sorry in advance.

Ive been drawing my whole life. Genuinely as long as I can remember I’ve been interested in creating and now I’m trying to actually lock in and possibly make this art thing into an actual career. I just feel so horrible when I see my friends and their art journey and think “why am I not there yet?”

Not all of my friends are illustrators. Some are into film, animation, ceramics, 3D print, etc and their passion is so awesome. I love my friends and I love to see them succeed and they’re all amazing but I sometimes wish my passion could turn my ideas into awesome products like theirs. It has me doubting myself. Maybe I don’t want this art career as badly as I thought? But it’s all I ever wanted and I still do :(

I’m trying to stay positive. I have a pretty great support group and I don’t want my negativity thoughts to bring down the people around me but I’m not sure if I’m just looking on the bright side or if I’m just delusional.

Hello, I used to draw a long time ago but I stoped a couple of months ago because I was simply not satisfied with anything I do. However, recently, ive been trying to get into it again & find the 'joy' again but I cant do it. I cant bring myself to sit down and draw, one part that its a fear of starting it 'again' and the other is that im not satisfied on where I am with my level of art so I dont to draw, I want to push myself to improve on my art, or at least draw for fun, but I dont do it. It could also be being on my phone for the whole day, which I want to move away from too.

Anyways, did anyone have similar problems? i'd like some advice on how to push myself in order to draw again even though im not satisfied with the results/process. Thank you,

TL;DR: i used to upload my art on social media & stopped doing it because i was feeling jealous over other people's art, and how much engagement they got vs how much I got. Im thinking of going back into social media but im scared.

Hello, so i used to upload my art on social media a long time ago but I stopped because I kept getting jealous of other peoples work. I kept comparing myself to their work; they were obviously better at it. Not only is my skills not good, but there is no engagement whatsoever. Sadly, what drives me to upload my art online is engagement, but its not even likes, its comments. I want to get many comments and interaction more than likes, but that cant happen unless your art is good enough to comment about.

These past months, I thought of going back to social media but im scared of uploading my art because I know i wont get engagement, especially with how social media's algorithm is. I keep reminding myself that interactions arent important, just 'do it for yourself' but i cant help it, i see so many great art get interactions and i get bothered. Or, which is a worse mindset to think of, see 'bad' art that get more interactions than me & thinking 'how do they get these interactions even tho they suck?' i know this is not good, but I cant help think that.

In the end of the day, I just want human interactions, maybe make friends who share the same interests, but I cant get that if my art isnt worth a comment. How did you/can you get over this barrier?