I posted a poll pondering, "What are your LEAST favorite ways of getting art?"

I want to start posting journals of my thoughts on various things. Today I was thinking of different ways to get arts, besides from doing it yourself. Considering the pros and cons of each method and decided to write them down. There are 4 ways I thought of to get art for yourself; trades, commissions, gifts/requests and raffles.

---

Trades In exchange for an art, you get an art. Fairly simple. A few trouble in trades happens a few ways.

Traders who are friends with each other may hint at doing art with one another, but never actually going through with it. It's a better plan is to just giftart a friend and just let them giftart back whenever they choose to.

Also when one person finishes a trade up sooner than the other it "Trade Interest". The longer one person has to wait for their end of the trade, the more the late one feels a need to finish up. This can lead to avoidance on their part, and a straining of relationships. Because conversations resolve around “You gonna finish that trade” at some point.

There’s also group art exchanges such as Secret Santas, but those can go badly as well. Typically one person puts a lot of work into their art, only to receive a poor artwork in return. Worse, not everyone in the group finishes their art and then alot of people feel bad for not finishing things on time.

Commissions the money method of art getting. The buyer has seen enough of the artist’s work to want a work, and the artist has enough professionalism to do a job well. That’s how it is supposed to go

The artist can do plenty of wrong in this deal. They can an under deliver, misunderstand description, take an extremely long time, or not finish at all My greatest annoyance is artists that have commissions, yet continue to take more. It’s akin to going to a restaurant and waiting for your meal, while others are coming in and getting their meals before you.

Sometimes the buyer who can cause trouble. They can not pay, ask for numerous revisions, be vague with their descriptions, or just extremely unreasonable. Fortunately, most of these problems have had solutions worked out for them. Artists can make their rules known and avoid the common troubles. I’d say this is the best option to getting arts you want

Giftarts and Requests are also free, but timelines for actually completing the art is variable. The only way you’ll be able to get these are if you’re on good terms with people. Quality can’t be complained about and the art is expected as is- unless you’re a particular someone.

Artists reserve requests for friends or for special occasions or during stream times. It’s commonplace for a streamer to be woking on a commission, and once they’re done, doodle a few members of the chatroom whom the artist likes or feels adds to the chat atmosphere.

Artists may also use gifts as ways to open conversation or buy goodwill from others. If you get gift art from an unknown, it’s fairly easy to look at it with suspicion.

Raffles are usually free, and low commitment on part of the art wanter. The art will likely also be done on a reasonable schedule. Want to enter the raffle? Advertise on your profile and you’re in! The artist on the other hand gets free advertisements in return for a small chance for a free picture.

However, the chances to win are thin, so to win numerous raffles will have to be entered. Wanters will become accustomed to whatever raffles and giveaways that occur. And thus their profiles become walking billboards.(unless they clear it out often)

While I think it’s a good idea to give people the chance for free arts, the involvement is quite minimal. Raffles bring a particular crowd who are only interested in getting free art. While not too unsurprising, the connection with the artist and the art wanter is diminished. Art wanters generally aren’t extremely huge fans, they’re mostly there for the chance to get a free work. So when an artist is looking for involvement in something outside of raffes, they may find out theres less people to interact with than what’s shown.

---

Anycase, that's my thoughts. If there's anything you want to ask, feel free to.