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Message
Posted
I'm new to the site. I've been putting some pictures into my gallery, and it's provided me with a snapshot of what people MAY prefer about my images. A surprising snapshot. I wasn't going to write this until much later, but now may be the best time. The gallery gives you your top 5 pictures with the number of views. This is all new to me, previously it's been family and friends, plus art group pals who've given me feedback. When people click on the gallery pictures to get the larger images (which must register as a 'view') they aren't saying they LIKE it, but they are expressing an interest..I think I can safely say that. I'm going to dismiss a picture with the highest number of views, because it was placed in the banner pictures at the top of the gallery section. (I don't know why, perhaps the site operators add random new pictures). Pictures here clearly get more 'air time' than the other pictures, which slowly disappear as members add pictures, and so presents a distorted count. Of the remaining pictures, I've been surprised by those getting the most...shall we say...ATTENTION.
Like most artists, I'm never satisfied by my drawings and paintings, which is why I keep doing it, I guess. As many others have remarked in these forums...my best picture will be the NEXT one. Obviously, I only put pictures that I think are OK in my gallery...I'm not going to put the duffers in, am I? Oddly (or perhaps not), the pictures I like have received the least attention.
These thoughts were prompted by reading members remarks about their best picture being their NEXT one. As I've said, I share that view, but if I ever get round to painting it...I may well be the only one who likes it. Clearly, you can only paint pictures for yourself, and hope that other people like them. If they didn't like them, I'd still make them...because I enjoy the process of drawing and painting.
I hope this isn't taken as a complaint...it's great to get your work looked at, even better when it's commented on. It's interesting to see how people react to your work, even if it's not how you expected. I find it fascinating and it makes me want to keep at it.
I'd be interested to hear if anyone else has had similar experience.
Posted
I have posted many pictures and cartoons on the gallery and I have never had anyting but lovely encouraging comments on my work.Thats what keeps me going. producing pictures which are then put in a big plastic envelope for posterity or possibly mild interest
The POL gallery is a great way to let others see your work and comment on it. I would be disappointed if I got no comment which means that no viewer likes your effort but this has never happened although I did in the distant past have only one comment by some kind hearted gent who broke my duck .Mind you i hated the painting while i laboured on. it and I deserved criticism but a lot of kind people didnt comment. Yes the top banner is for those liked by the top brass and yes a lot of pictures stick while others dissolve around them but we get to expect that many artists paint better than you. It is an unfair business but thats lifeand as long as we like what we are doing and others may like our efforts its a great way to go......Happy painting...Syd
Edited
by SydEdward
Posted
I too really appreciate the encouraging comments I get, and yes they do help to keep me going. I am never satisfied with my own paintings, can always see what I might have done differently. A couple of my early ones sank without any comment which did prompt me to try to assess why they didn't appeal. I just love seeing others' paintings, follow about 8 - 10 artists so that I don't miss their work (sometimes paintings vanish off the first screen very quickly depending on how many artists are uploading their paintings at the time), and also find the forum a really valuable source of information and advice.
Posted
You can't really judge this very easily - some people may love your work, but find they have nothing say about it beyond 'lovely', 'that's nice', or 'very good' - and you do feel a bit of a turnip if that's all you can think of to say, so probably just don't say it. And the biggest thing making it impossible to judge how a work has gone down is that it might just not stay even in the first 5 pages for more than half an hour - the rate of churn here can be phenomenal.
As for the top row, which lingers a bit longer - yes, it's what the site manager and any little elves she may have helping her like, but it's also that some pictures lend themselves to the format of the top gallery better than others. I've liked all your paintings and drawings, Lew - but life being on the short side, I can't comment on everything I like; which is what the 'like' button's for - I'll try to press that a bit more frequently if I can't think of a comment.
Posted
I find the whole process interesting. I posted a cartoon version of the Mona Lisa that's just edged into my top five 'viewed' pictures. A painting of my grandson, that I think a much better picture, has been viewed and commented on...which is absolutely great. But I can assume it's attracted less interest, I'm also assuming the only place that shows the number of 'views' is the top 5. Please understand, I'm in no way complaining about this, it's just an observation. Syd commented on the fact that you'll find many artists better than you...ain't that the truth. Some of the work on this site makes you wonder why you bother. I guess the answer to that is that I love doing it.
This brings me back to the reason why I posted this topic. If I ever get round to producing this fabled 'next' picture that completely satisfies me, and if I were to post it (based on my current experience), I might well be the only one that likes it, and it could drift through the gallery like a piece of tumbleweed. I find that notion wonderfully ironic. I guess all this is a bit academic, as it's not going to happen.
I've only just cottoned onto this 'follow' gizmo, and will use it more. I've got Syd on it because I love his cartoons. The one about wrinkles had me laughing out loud. Cartoons have a nostalgic value, Syd's one about an artist who can't find his ultramarine because he's standing on it, brought a memory into my head. A few years back I used to make animated films, mostly with plasticine characters. One day I was filming a sequence when I couldn't find my dragon. Yep, you've guessed it...I'd trodden on it. It was stuck to the sole of my shoe...I wondered why I'd been limping.
The only downside to joining this site is that there's so much good stuff to look at, and so many useful tips, that there's a danger I'll spend more time surfing it than making pictures.
Posted
Lew, I wouldn't read anything into the figures that are displayed, if you do, you may be in danger of concentrating on the style that gets the most views, not that you would of course, that would be ridiculous.
So, if I look at my figures during the two years that I've been posting on this site, it is actually quite surprising. I have posted 306 paintings which have received 285,262 views, the top one by quite some way is a small oil 'Baroque Cathedral, Venice' with a staggering 20,674 views. This painting as I recall was one of my 30 minute loose sketches, I don't particularly like it and it is stored along with several hundred others in a large cupboard never to see the light of day again.
So, what does this tell me, basically that others see and view my work differently to how I perceive it, what I may think is just another quick sketch creates a great deal of interest.
Posted
Yes Alan, I totally agree with what you say. And I wouldn't dream of adjusting my style in any way, I wouldn't know how. Your remarks about your Baroque Cathedral painting are interesting. I guess it's a case of confirming what we already knew...you can't predict what people will like. As, for example, many movie companies know to their cost.
Posted
I wasn't so much referring to changing style as perhaps subject matter, although I can and do change styles frequently, I call it experimenting... something that I have always enjoyed and was encouraged during my college years, in my case this helps prevent my work becoming 'stale' and predictably similar, that's my theory anyway.
To just briefly touch on my Baroque Cathedral again, it is a perfectly decent oil sketch and I am pleased to have so many people view it; what surprised me when I looked at the stats this morning (something that I haven't really done before), was the huge volume of people who took the time to view what I consider to be a simple 'run-of-the-mill' sketch.
Posted
Yes, to have over 20,000 people view your painting is great, quite an achievement. And 285,000 views overall is mind blowing. All this is new to me, I'm very small beans in viewing numbers but in the week that I've joined this site, I'm probably had more people look at my work than the rest of my life. Quite sobering.