It’s a little disheartening after spending a week on an image to have so few people actually look at it. 40 views in three days, and most of them from me. I think most of those that did look at it have commented and I appreciate that but then I see something apparently whipped up in half an hour in Poser with a gazillion comments and favs. It seems pointless even bothering when you’re not willing to pimp your stuff in the forums. It used to be so good here, I was so inspired. Admittedly I was spoilt by having a few things featured but that’s very rare now, and never with anything new. I can’t even find any groups where my work would really belong.
The new content guidelines was just icing on the cake.
Di Edwards, 9 months ago
Man, I dream of having 40 views in 3 days. I’m lucky to have 40 views total on most of my stuff. It’s hard to get noticed. If it’s any consolation I think your stuff is fabulous; I just haven’t caught up on my Activity Monitor yet after being away for 3 weeks.
Steven Lippis, 9 months ago
I didn’t comment on your latest image (I watch you both here and on dA), but I was blown away by the intricacy. Probably the most complicated piece i’ve seen from you!
So while I looked, I’m also lazy.
webgrrl, 9 months ago
i understand your whinge..
ive noticed this myself…..as RedBubble gets bigger, we seem to get ‘lost’. Like you and many others, i too have sensed the lost of ‘something’ here in RedBubble..
i suppose this happens, as always.. when things/people get more bigger/wider audience.. I use to really love RB cuz it had an ‘Aussie’ warmth, something i was very proud of, and proud of promoting…
Soon RB will just blend in with all the others.. just like the others…
ah well… que sera sera..
Danny
,
9 months ago
Fuck it
I’m just lazy
I love your work
You’re on my watchlist now
Ivy Izzard, 9 months ago
Aww, now I feel crappy for complaining. It’s really because I was so spoilt when I first joined.
And you’re right webgrrl, I guess it was bound to happen but it is disappointing.
Thanks guys.
DigitalMagic, 9 months ago
Things always change . . . sometimes, a little more slowly than we’d like ;-)
Keep up the good art “work”, there are those who will appreciate it!
LostBoy1, 9 months ago
No offence Ivy, but people like interaction…you`ve got one person on your watchlist.
this place is growing so big so quickly that sometimes i have to look at my watchlist to see if people are still around…
When i got here you were without a doubt the best at what you do…
Ive seen one comment from you on someone elses work…
this place has changed…it used to be a friendly tight knit community…thats over
How about the fact that i watch someone because i like their work…give them nice comments and fav their stuff…but do you think they will give a single comment back?
I find that quite to be sad…i don`t want fake comments…and i don`t give them out…but surely there must be something in my portfolio thats apeals to almost everybody?
So after a while i stop commenting and simply fav their work if i like it…
No-doubt i have upset you with my honesty.(sorry)
Empress, 9 months ago
Also feeling nostalgic.
I have a card-size “Nameless” in a pale timber frame at home where i can see it every day.
Helen McLean, 9 months ago
I echo everything webgrrl says totally.
missmilly, 9 months ago
Ivy I think your work is wonderful and I have commented on may of your works . I thought the response to your last work was a bit slow given that it was such a brilliant piece. However, since rb is getting so big now, we all have probably get out there and comment on other peoples work a bit more, I don’t know maybe you do and I am talking bull. I just know when people comment on my work It always sends me off to explore other artwork that I didn’t know exisited. Quite often I get comments from people that didn’t know I exisited except I commented on their work. I love looking at other peoples work, it’s like looking at another world at times Like your worlds that you create! It might be a solution for you, I don’t know. Just keep producing your amazing work and I am sure it will happen for you! whether it on rb or not!!!
Ivy Izzard, 9 months ago
I understand how you feel, Lostboy, and you haven’t upset me at all. I have made quite a few comments but I find it very difficult so I usually just fav things I like. I used to have people on my watchlist but I’d get depressed when the only things on my activity monitor were other people posting things. Multiple things at once. Pages of them. So now I have a look at the recent pages every day – I try to avoid the popular.
Another thing, I feel very uncomfortable commenting or even faving someone’s work after they’ve just commented on mine because it looks as if I’m only reciprocating and don’t really mean it.
In any case, my issue is with people seeing my work at all, I don’t mind if they don’t comment.
Danny
,
9 months ago
Shit LostBoy
that was the eloquent thing I’ve ever seen you write.
That was lovely and true.
Ivy Izzard, 9 months ago
I should add, I’m not criticising anyone for pimping their work wherever they can – you have to to get it seen – I just can’t do it myself.
Anne van Alkemade
,
9 months ago
ditto re Lost Boy’s comments. And Ivy, I so love your work, but tend to look and not comment because I have used up every superlative I have on your works so far. It is so beautiful and intricate. I think the first thing I ever favourited here at RB was something of yours – the eel one possibly. I k now it gets disheartening – I am a writer and feel disheartened at the lack of comments on my work at times when I hear other danny ooops writers hitting huge targets!!!! It’s not jealousy but I start to wonder about whether or not I’m good enough to be here. This is certainly a doubt you should never ever have Ivy. Your work is superb.
Di Edwards, 9 months ago
I’ll echo Anne too in saying that 2 of your works were the very first things I added to my faves when I first joined RB. I’ve purchased a Wraithling tee and I just adore your work.
kathleen
,
9 months ago
it shows though… the shyer types face discrimination here don’t they?
Amanda J Slack..., 9 months ago
That maybe true Kathleen but I still check out the work from the ‘old school’ bubblers :) I agree with Lost boy – which may seem hypocritical lately because I haven’t had much time lately to comment, but when I do I try to give more thought to my comment than I did before to balance it off. I also understand your point Ivy about the monitoring. I have dropped a few artists off my list because they were uploading really average work daily, an attempt to remain noticed I think but it really turned me off. I hope you will start building your watch list again through because I think we rely on each other not only for support but also to help sift through the avalanche of images that come through daily. I love your work, it is always consistently well done, which says to me I can trust your judgment about what you like and will check out your favs and watch lists accordingly. This means the 15mins I have a day on RB is well spent with a little help of my friends :)
Sonia Hesford, 9 months ago
Hi Ivy, Just want you to know that because of all the people I have on my watchlist that So many new downloads appear in one day that sometimes I miss the perfect peices, My trick is checking out my favorite people at least once a week to see what they have been up to.
I understand your frustration, sometimes the photos I think people will like seem to not be looked at, I don’t have the amazing skills some of the bubblers have with photoshop ect, and most are point and shoot (a couple of shots I have done on my mobile phone camera and have the phones effect on them) But thats the way I like them, and if others do thats great.
I check my site each day just hoping someone has left a comment, Sometimes I do other days/weeks I dont.
Please don’t be disheartened there are lots of people who adore your work, me included, keep up the amazing work I appreciate the time, effort and finished results that you always produce, I’m, waiting for “Window” to arrive and I cant wait to have it showing in my house!!
Big Bubble hugz:)
Danae Leach, 9 months ago
I get a bit frustrated when I put up new work and i hardly get views or comments. I feel as if I’ve done something wrong and can’t figure it out and everybody else has so many comments etc…..but then I get lucky and put up a image that gets hits and comments and I feel great…..I havn’t even made any sales except for 2 t-shirts that turned out I had messed up on….but if you love what you do then keep doing it for yourself….how you feel about your work is what counts…and you do amazing work!
SpaceAce07, 9 months ago
No matter what you upload and that goes for anybody, you are always gonna get more views than you are comments. It happens on all sites like this. I don’t let it bother me any more these days.
MiMiDesigns, 9 months ago
I too am a whole lot less thrilled with Redbubble now that it’s grown so big. Every time I log on I see another batch of astonishing photographs and I wonder how any photographers make a living these days when so many average Joes can produce masterpieces. Nevertheless there is still a small hard core of people who work hard and produce truly original stuff that is infinitely more than just playing with a camera. You are one of them, Ivy.
So far the most useful thing for me about RB is that I’m able to direct people to it if they want an instant print of my work. I do enjoy the feedback when I get comments, but I’d appreciate the more constructive kind of comments such as suggestions for new themes, even ideas for collaborations. Having worked as an illustrator, I’m always inspired by texts. I wanted to do the song illustration competition, but i ran out of time. Are there any songwriters out there who’d like an album cover design? Why not set up a competition?
I’d be making more comments myself if I had time to browse around as many people as I’d like to. I’d really like to be reading the writers, but unfortunately it takes a lot longer to read through poems and stories than it does to glance at pictures. I’m about to look through the groups to see if there’s anything that I’d like to join besides Drawn to Cotton – if I can’t find anything I might start a group myself, and initiate a revolution.
And I’m also going to look up everyone who’s commented on this journal entry, as I’d like to see who else is feeling left out.
Steve Axford, 9 months ago
I don’t really think that people want to see anything that requires very much thought, so the lack of comment may be a strange sort of compliment. Have a look at the hot list to get a feel for what works. First close your eyes as you open the image and scroll down to read the comments. When you are done, scroll back up and look at the image. Make sure you are seated – It can be quite a shock.
Dominic Melfi, 9 months ago
IVY
I am a member of Artwanted since Mar 2007, I get about 50,000 hits a month without pandering I publish 3 pieces a day there in order to GET NOTICED on the current days lists, but even so I reach very few of the “Featured” lists, I would expect the top ones must get 250,000 hits per month. They achieve this by networking and some of the most mundane fractals and ordinary photos hit the top lists all the time. These are the only pieces most people can produce in enough volume to stay in the recent work lists all the time, where 90% of the action is. Truly fine artists who can only produce a couple of pieces a month soon drop out of site/sight.
I wish there were some way to avoid the popularity/networking but it seems inevitable.
I suggested to RB that they let the artist manage a page with 1 or 2 of his best pieces and have a tab on main page such as “ARTISTS SPOT”. and have it randomly show these pieces.
But if they have 15,000 members as they say, it would still be 30,000 pieces.
ArtWanted after 9 years has 400,000 pieces. RB will probably exceed that in 1 year, Artwanted only lists 3 works a day from paid members and allows unlimited uploads, but noone looks if they arnt listed. They get mostly less than 400 a day uploaded. Unpaid members are allowed 3 a month.
Deviantart has 43,000,000 pieces, just mind boggling, and you’ll hardly get a view at all if you arnt networked, they may have 5-10 pieces uploaded a second. Deviant art will become the difinitive encyclopedia for folk art for our civilization.
Steve Axford, 9 months ago
You want mind boggling – try webshots. They have 535 million photos loaded. I started using them quite a few years ago to store snapshots to share with friends, instead of emailing them. Over time my photos improved and I got a small following. I have never networked on webshots at all. I now have over 5 million hits on my pictures. In a bad week I get 10,000 hits and that is from zero posts or even loging on on my part. In a good week it could be 100,000 if some webshots person decides to feature something I have. Imagine what I could get if I networked! But … I don’t want to network. People do buy my work off the internet sometimes, but it is because they go searching and they find it. They find it because it is there in google, because it got hits in places like webshots (though strangely it’s not just hits that count and webshots doesn’t provide very many sales for me). Unfortunately, places like this get really bad hits in google. Things like favourite lists, forum posts and the like. I assume other people are like me and totally ignore anything that even remotely sounds like a forum when searching google.
peter
,
9 months ago
@Ivy – one of the reasons we’ve introduced groups it to give people and genres better ‘homes’ on RedBubble. Some folks on RedBubble are interested in photos of animals, some in digital art. The digital artists will have a better appreciation for the time and effort involved in a piece of art. And vice versa. We’ve still got a lot more work to do with groups – but we see them as an essential way to manage diversity. I.e. Give everyone a ‘home’ that suits their interests – but have central meeting areas (e.g. a collaboration area) to get the benefits of ‘cross pollination’.
@webgrrl – I think groups will also be a way to keep RedBubble feeling ‘small’. One community of 10,000 or 20,000 is just to big to engage with. I think RedBubble will become a community of communities.
@Steve try searching for Pixie’s Parasols in Google – you’ll find your image on RB is the top hit (of 36,700 hits). That’s not to say that we’re not trying to improve our search optimization – it’s just to say that for a very young site we’re doing okay.
peter
,
9 months ago
@Steve – and a Google search for ‘Steve Axford’ brings you up as the second hit.
Ivy Izzard, 9 months ago
Peter, I think the groups are a good idea but I’m actually having trouble finding groups where my stuff fits. I put something in a certain group and then find that the rules have changed and it no longer belongs there. Portraits for instance – I have quite a few of them. I put a digital painting in The Fine Art of Portraiture only to find that digital artists and photographers are not welcome and are directed to People and Portraiture Photography which, as the name implies, is for Photography or images ‘manipulated via Photoshop and/or other software programs,providing the image does not lose photographic direction’. As for digital art in general, I couldn’t find anything, just one for the art of Photoshop which doesn’t seem to be about digital painting as such either. I have put a couple of manips up there, so that’s okay but I am having a hard time placing a lot of my stuff, including the latest one.
Helene Kippert, 9 months ago
Ivy there’s a group called The Digital Interface which is for digital artists – check it out!
Ivy Izzard, 9 months ago
Thanks Helene.
peter
,
9 months ago
Ivy – if we don’t have the right group for you we can also start one.
Ivy Izzard, 9 months ago
Thanks Peter, I’m sure I’ll find something eventually.
MiMiDesigns, 9 months ago
What I’d really like to see is a group that explains some of the techniques – as simply as possible – for computer duhbrains like me.
yolanda, 9 months ago
I agree with lots of the comments and believe groups is the way to go as Red bubble is getting so big. It does get disheartening though when you don’t get much comments especially from people on whose watchlists your on. I’m looking forward to selling my first image as I believe I have a few which would make great cards but basically I get excited to just get comments on my images.
Kathryn Potempski, 8 months ago
Hi Ivy,
I have you on my watch list ‘Green’ came up and took my breath away, I commented, I put it straight into favs then purchased.
I receive very few comments on my photos but the emails I receive from wonderful photographers and artist sometimes overwhelms me, I feel that my work has improved because people care enough to fav and then comment or email with constructive criticism.
I have not made one sale but I do love to read the the thank you when I purchase, your art work is and always will be my fav it is amazing and look forward to many more .
I feel it is better to give than to receive if I had 1 spek of your talent I would be downloading to every man and his dog .
Cheers
Kathryn
Ivy Izzard, 8 months ago
Thank you, Katherine, and thanks for buying ‘Green’. I’m so glad you like it.
I was going through a bit of a slump when I wrote this entry but I’m feeling much more positive about everything now.
Tony Elliott, 5 months ago
Ivy.
Your skill is enchanting. I am not a digital artist. I have a paint brush and as much time as work will allow. Stood next to what you create my photos of my paintings are childlike, which is why I have added you to my watch list.
I am new to this kind of place. So new and very frightened.
My view is simple. If I fall in love with your work I may comment and I may not – but I will definitely buy it.
Please don’t give up creating. I want to see what else you are capable of. What you have already shown is awe inspiring.
Blessed be