Is Newgrounds a good place for casually posting art?

[squibbless]

Soo I've been looking for sites where I can post my art lately, and it's been a little tricky. Twitter's format of this long, constantly updating thread is really off-putting for me, and Tumblr's been hammering down on NSFW, which I was hoping to post a bit of too. Then I remembered Newgrounds, and looking through it now, it does seem pretty ideal! There seems to be a tight community, the formatting is nice, it's pretty active, etc.-- but upon actually looking into how art posts work around here, I'm not so sure anymore.

For a bit more background, I mainly just do art as a hobby, and am not particularly interested in amassing some huge following or posting only my finest pieces in a formal environment. Really I just want somewhere where I can just post a variety of complete pieces and shitposts/quick drawings, (Mostly involving OCs, rather than characters from pre-existing media,) while still getting at least some interaction going-- just enough so I know some people are actually seeing my stuff, y'know? The latter seems doable here, as long as I'm active in the community, but I'm unsure if Newgrounds is a great place for just posting whatever art I want. Posting art in NG seems a lot more... professional than it is on other sites from what I can tell? Like the process of which art gets noticed and which doesn't seems a lot more scrutinous, and there's a lot more focus on critiques. While these aren't inherently bad attributes or anything, it does make me question if NG is what I'm personally looking for right now, despite all the site's other strengths.

I've already read a few other forums of people asking similar questions, and while they've certainly helped, I wanna be as thorough as possible, so I'm posting one of my own to get a little more insight on the matter. If anyone could help me clear things up, and eventually decide if this is the place to be posting art or not, that'd be much appreciated!

[Newbluud]

At 5/1/23 06:02 PM, squibbless wrote:Soo I've been looking for sites where I can post my art lately, and it's been a little tricky. Twitter's format of this long, constantly updating thread is really off-putting for me, and Tumblr's been hammering down on NSFW, which I was hoping to post a bit of too. Then I remembered Newgrounds, and looking through it now, it does seem pretty ideal! There seems to be a tight community, the formatting is nice, it's pretty active, etc.-- but upon actually looking into how art posts work around here, I'm not so sure anymore.

For a bit more background, I mainly just do art as a hobby, and am not particularly interested in amassing some huge following or posting only my finest pieces in a formal environment. Really I just want somewhere where I can just post a variety of complete pieces and shitposts/quick drawings, (Mostly involving OCs, rather than characters from pre-existing media,) while still getting at least some interaction going-- just enough so I know some people are actually seeing my stuff, y'know? The latter seems doable here, as long as I'm active in the community, but I'm unsure if Newgrounds is a great place for just posting whatever art I want. Posting art in NG seems a lot more... professional than it is on other sites from what I can tell? Like the process of which art gets noticed and which doesn't seems a lot more scrutinous, and there's a lot more focus on critiques. While these aren't inherently bad attributes or anything, it does make me question if NG is what I'm personally looking for right now, despite all the site's other strengths.

I've already read a few other forums of people asking similar questions, and while they've certainly helped, I wanna be as thorough as possible, so I'm posting one of my own to get a little more insight on the matter. If anyone could help me clear things up, and eventually decide if this is the place to be posting art or not, that'd be much appreciated!

Hey, good to see you thinking about posting here!

The art portal is generally reserved for complete pieces, yes. Once you start posting, your works will go on the undiscovered artist portal, where viewership is lower, and standards are kept to the barest minimum (in line with site guidelines.) If your work is considered of good enough quality, you will be scouted by an already established artist on a vouch system. After that, your work will appear on the main art portal and reach a spike in viewership. This is how the art portal is kept clean of bad actors such as tracers, reposters, and AI. It sounds more intimidating than it actually is, just set and forget, and you'll find yourself on the main art portal before you know it.

Generally, it's bad form to ask to be scouted, but if you post consistently good work, it will happen.

As for casual posting, the art portal isn't really the place for it. You can post your completed works there. You can upload sketches but you need to mark it as such. In doing so, it will not appear in the main art portal but will appear on your page. You won't see as much interaction there but people who follow will still see these.

There are other ways people post casually though. The most common one is curating your own thread here in the community portal. Something simple like "squibless' art thread" as a topic would do it. There, you can add to thread with any sketch, WIP and shitpost you want, and it will see some viewership. It's also a good way to interact with people that like your stuff. I'm hoping to start one when I'm less busy with my day job.

[squibbless]

At 5/1/23 06:36 PM, Newbluud wrote:

At 5/1/23 06:02 PM, squibbless wrote:Soo I've been looking for sites where I can post my art lately, and it's been a little tricky. Twitter's format of this long, constantly updating thread is really off-putting for me, and Tumblr's been hammering down on NSFW, which I was hoping to post a bit of too. Then I remembered Newgrounds, and looking through it now, it does seem pretty ideal! There seems to be a tight community, the formatting is nice, it's pretty active, etc.-- but upon actually looking into how art posts work around here, I'm not so sure anymore.

For a bit more background, I mainly just do art as a hobby, and am not particularly interested in amassing some huge following or posting only my finest pieces in a formal environment. Really I just want somewhere where I can just post a variety of complete pieces and shitposts/quick drawings, (Mostly involving OCs, rather than characters from pre-existing media,) while still getting at least some interaction going-- just enough so I know some people are actually seeing my stuff, y'know? The latter seems doable here, as long as I'm active in the community, but I'm unsure if Newgrounds is a great place for just posting whatever art I want. Posting art in NG seems a lot more... professional than it is on other sites from what I can tell? Like the process of which art gets noticed and which doesn't seems a lot more scrutinous, and there's a lot more focus on critiques. While these aren't inherently bad attributes or anything, it does make me question if NG is what I'm personally looking for right now, despite all the site's other strengths.

I've already read a few other forums of people asking similar questions, and while they've certainly helped, I wanna be as thorough as possible, so I'm posting one of my own to get a little more insight on the matter. If anyone could help me clear things up, and eventually decide if this is the place to be posting art or not, that'd be much appreciated!

Hey, good to see you thinking about posting here!

The art portal is generally reserved for complete pieces, yes. Once you start posting, your works will go on the undiscovered artist portal, where viewership is lower, and standards are kept to the barest minimum (in line with site guidelines.) If your work is considered of good enough quality, you will be scouted by an already established artist on a vouch system. After that, your work will appear on the main art portal and reach a spike in viewership. This is how the art portal is kept clean of bad actors such as tracers, reposters, and AI. It sounds more intimidating than it actually is, just set and forget, and you'll find yourself on the main art portal before you know it.

Generally, it's bad form to ask to be scouted, but if you post consistently good work, it will happen.

As for casual posting, the art portal isn't really the place for it. You can post your completed works there. You can upload sketches but you need to mark it as such. In doing so, it will not appear in the main art portal but will appear on your page. You won't see as much interaction there but people who follow will still see these.

There are other ways people post casually though. The most common one is curating your own thread here in the community portal. Something simple like "squibless' art thread" as a topic would do it. There, you can add to thread with any sketch, WIP and shitpost you want, and it will see some viewership. It's also a good way to interact with people that like your stuff. I'm hoping to start one when I'm less busy with my day job.

Oh, there's an undiscovered art portal? That actually changes a lot! I knew about the art portal, and how scouting/vouching worked from reading up on it, but I was kinda under the assumption that the only way to have my art seen prior to getting vouched for was if someone went out of their way to search for my account, or a tag I added in my art. Good to know that's not how it works lol

Starting an art thread sounds like fun too! More than anything I wanna chat with other artists-- especially ones with shared interests, or who take interest in my art-- and that sounds like a pretty good way to go for such a thing.

I'll start posting some art to see how it goes, so thanks for the help! Though I've also got one more question, if you happen to have an answer; is having more than one account on Newgrounds a good idea? I was considering having my main account, and another for NSFW art, though if that's a bad idea then I guess I'll just have to make do with one account.

[Newbluud]

At 5/1/23 08:54 PM, squibbless wrote:

At 5/1/23 06:36 PM, Newbluud wrote:

At 5/1/23 06:02 PM, squibbless wrote:Soo I've been looking for sites where I can post my art lately, and it's been a little tricky. Twitter's format of this long, constantly updating thread is really off-putting for me, and Tumblr's been hammering down on NSFW, which I was hoping to post a bit of too. Then I remembered Newgrounds, and looking through it now, it does seem pretty ideal! There seems to be a tight community, the formatting is nice, it's pretty active, etc.-- but upon actually looking into how art posts work around here, I'm not so sure anymore.

For a bit more background, I mainly just do art as a hobby, and am not particularly interested in amassing some huge following or posting only my finest pieces in a formal environment. Really I just want somewhere where I can just post a variety of complete pieces and shitposts/quick drawings, (Mostly involving OCs, rather than characters from pre-existing media,) while still getting at least some interaction going-- just enough so I know some people are actually seeing my stuff, y'know? The latter seems doable here, as long as I'm active in the community, but I'm unsure if Newgrounds is a great place for just posting whatever art I want. Posting art in NG seems a lot more... professional than it is on other sites from what I can tell? Like the process of which art gets noticed and which doesn't seems a lot more scrutinous, and there's a lot more focus on critiques. While these aren't inherently bad attributes or anything, it does make me question if NG is what I'm personally looking for right now, despite all the site's other strengths.

I've already read a few other forums of people asking similar questions, and while they've certainly helped, I wanna be as thorough as possible, so I'm posting one of my own to get a little more insight on the matter. If anyone could help me clear things up, and eventually decide if this is the place to be posting art or not, that'd be much appreciated!

Hey, good to see you thinking about posting here!

The art portal is generally reserved for complete pieces, yes. Once you start posting, your works will go on the undiscovered artist portal, where viewership is lower, and standards are kept to the barest minimum (in line with site guidelines.) If your work is considered of good enough quality, you will be scouted by an already established artist on a vouch system. After that, your work will appear on the main art portal and reach a spike in viewership. This is how the art portal is kept clean of bad actors such as tracers, reposters, and AI. It sounds more intimidating than it actually is, just set and forget, and you'll find yourself on the main art portal before you know it.

Generally, it's bad form to ask to be scouted, but if you post consistently good work, it will happen.

As for casual posting, the art portal isn't really the place for it. You can post your completed works there. You can upload sketches but you need to mark it as such. In doing so, it will not appear in the main art portal but will appear on your page. You won't see as much interaction there but people who follow will still see these.

There are other ways people post casually though. The most common one is curating your own thread here in the community portal. Something simple like "squibless' art thread" as a topic would do it. There, you can add to thread with any sketch, WIP and shitpost you want, and it will see some viewership. It's also a good way to interact with people that like your stuff. I'm hoping to start one when I'm less busy with my day job.

Oh, there's an undiscovered art portal? That actually changes a lot! I knew about the art portal, and how scouting/vouching worked from reading up on it, but I was kinda under the assumption that the only way to have my art seen prior to getting vouched for was if someone went out of their way to search for my account, or a tag I added in my art. Good to know that's not how it works lol

Starting an art thread sounds like fun too! More than anything I wanna chat with other artists-- especially ones with shared interests, or who take interest in my art-- and that sounds like a pretty good way to go for such a thing.

I'll start posting some art to see how it goes, so thanks for the help! Though I've also got one more question, if you happen to have an answer; is having more than one account on Newgrounds a good idea? I was considering having my main account, and another for NSFW art, though if that's a bad idea then I guess I'll just have to make do with one account.

Same! There are some fun group threads for that too. NSFW Artist Hangout is usually pretty active, as well as multiple threads for sketch dumping and critique.

There's no need to have multiple accounts. As NG has built in content filters, if someone has mature/adult content filtered, your profile will show everything except those pieces. In other words, the only people seeing your illustrated asses and the like are the people that want that as part of their experience. Just remember to apply ratings to your work correctly.

There's no algorithm to cater to. Featured works are hand picked by humans, so unlike places like Twitter, you don't have to purposefully separate your content into two streams to avoid any shadowban fuckery. Having adult works on your profile will not flag your profile to be hidden from SFW users.

[smashbrethren]

id say so? having a sketch thread to throw unfinished works and shitposts has been nice since people actually engage here, not super duper often in my experience, but you get enough comments to make it feel worthwhile, and the art portal is of course where you can put all the works you actually want to show off properly although getting eyes on your work feels hard if you dont also post about your latest pieces in a thread somewhere

[DioShiba]

@Newbluud is pretty much on the spot.

What I would say is that Newgrounds is a pretty good place to post your work whether you're doing it for hobby or professionally. I tend to meander between a few different platforms, but here is pretty much the most convenient for many reasons. Far as the portal is concerned whether it's animation, art, music or games, this is one of the more organized platforms on the web and I genuinely prefer the BBS over discord.

[Skoops]

Yeah, don't let the top level stuff discourage you. You can make a thread on the forum to act as your art journal (put "NSFW" in the title if you're going to include it), and upload pieces as sketches.

Journals + Sketches = Casual

Art Portal = Ranked Competitive (but not really)

[aapiarts]

Seems like nobody mentioned it yet. You can also post sketches, wips, shitposts, etc as news/blog posts

[Mabelma]

Newgrounds definitely is a good place to post your art. There are a ton of artists here from all skill levels and we're all willing to provide feedback, tips, and suggestions for you to get to the next level. It also helps a ton to have a community of like-minded individuals with which you can bounce your ideas.