Pixiv bay beeeeeee my favorite art site as of 10 years now
Hello, I'm looking to branch out into some more art sites and I need to figure out which ones! Here's the ones I've already researched and the notes I have on them:
Yes:
~ ArtStation (looks professional & cool; portfolios & recruiting; read ToS thoroughly) (wait it's 18+, I'll have to wait a bit but still def getting it)
~ Sketchbook Cafe (another char site, adorable aesthetic)
~ Artfol (early access beta; can download on Discord; a lot like insta+twitter; has media & commissions tabs; challenges & critiques exist; review & functions)
Maybe:
~ ArtRi.se (still in development, following it in Discord)
~ PaperDemon (can level up & earn xp, but it looks like it's just for ARPGs)
~ Pillow Fort (the site's down so IDK much about it, I've heard good things tho? a bit ded)
~ Doodle Addicts (cool layout & daily challenges, but free accounts can only post once per day???)
~ Wysp (looks cool but I dunno about the art layout)
~ Sketchers United (instagram but for art?? I like the layout tho; "DA for kids"?)
~ Pixiv (I love the layout, but some stuff is in japanese; some NSFW gets past filters)
~ Weasyl (chill community, dominated by furries & generally labeled a furry site; accepts non-furry art but is difficult to find)
~ ibisPaint (good reviews on the drawing program but that's not what I'm looking for; rankings are cool I guess; don't like the blocky layout)
~ Mastodon.Art (twitter vibes w/ image cropping; love the layout; "instances" are weird & I gotta research them more; easy to steal usernames)
No:
~ Dribbble (the things I liked were that you could post multiple pics as one submission & that you could sell stuff, but you can't do either with a free account)
~ Ello (scrolled for like 2 minutes & saw a close-up of someone's junk, also just don't like the layout)
~ Society6 (like redbubble but shady, has bad reviews on product quality)
~ Waterfall (supposed to be non-toxic tumblr, but apparently all bark & no bite, also this post says some oof things about the dev)
~ refsheet (ok layout, but it doesn't look like you can add custom coding/layout details) (best char page ex I could find) (char profs don't link to user profs)
~ Amino (obvious no; rampant art theft, nukes art quality, bad mods, horrible reputation; primarily for minors but some still ask them for nsfw art)
~ Behance (also looks professional & cool; portfolios & recruiting; target aud. is web designers?; need to use irl name so not for me yet)
Already have:
~ ToyHou.se, obviously
~ DeviantArt (it's getting less & less active but aside from that and the updates it's cool I guess)
~ ArtFight (amazing annual month-long art trade event site; get free art & give free art to earn points for your team!)
~ TikTok (dunno if it counts as an art site and I don't really post there, but I like watching art tiktoks)
~ Medibang / ARTstreet (cool layout; sections for artists & viewers; art contests, but one is yansim??; a lot of features I like from just glancing around)
~ Poetizer (poetry website, cool layout, good reviews)
~ Comiss.io (for commissions, looks professional & pro acc is free for now)
Haven't looked into:
~ Procreate (like DA but not; meet artists, talk procreate, get resources; helpful community)
~ Pixilart
~ Instagram
~ Twitter
If you have anything to add about the sites I listed or have any other sites to recommend that I haven't looked into yet, please comment! ^^
Thanks for the suggestions! I'll try to find an invite code for Sketchbook Cafe, it it does look really cool and it'd be great to try!
I already have a DA, & I've been using it for the past 3 years! :3 it's gotten pretty inactive recently bc the devs gave it an unnecessary face lift, so a lot of users have started posting less or just flat-out left the site. There's more available with the update, like now you can make polls n' stuff, but it's overall just a lot worse design-wise and I've heard it's really buggy for some people.
Medibang and IbisPaint sound cool, but I'm mainly on PC so I dunno if they'd work for me. I'll def look into them tho! ^^
Correct me if I'm wrong, but personally due to Pixiv being infamous for having a lot of pornographic content (Specifically that of... children, which is really bad), I think you should place it under "Maybe" instead, because while it has some interesting features (I won't go into detail since I don't use Pixiv), it has a lot of child porn afaik.
Medibang is both an art app & website, so you don't actually need the app to use it. i post both from app & directly on the website from time to time.
Historical Under article 14 (prohibited conduct) of Pixiv's TOS/policies, they don't allow CP. https://policies.pixiv.net/en.html#terms
To add on to the Pixiv note---yeah, there's a lot of NSFW content (both pornographic and guro). However, it's not any different than any other website that allows NSFW content to be uploaded and it has a similar posting and sensitive content flagging system as Toyhouse does---and you'll never see anything NSFW you don't want to it if you've got the filters for it on. DeviantArt also has a "reputation," but by no means is illegal content allowed there either. If you're actually seeing something that's a problem, report it, because it's not allowed.
Interaction can be a bit different and it can take some getting used to since it's a Japanese website with a user base primarily from there, but it really is a nice art website! Pillow Fort.... is nice in theory, but it's deeeead. Nobody was ever on it even when it was up. Felt like posting art in an empty room for myself.
artfol is a new app coming up !! i don’t believe it’s currently on the IOS app store (but you can download through discord, i recommend checking their insta @/artfol for info about all this) their layout is great, it’s like instagram just made for artists lol
https://www.weasyl.com/ is another art site I personally use. They have a pretty chill community but it has become dominated by furries but accept all arts.
Historical IIDX Lemonylulu SABYRR
Thanks for the notes on Pixiv, I'll move it to the "Maybe" section & add all that to my notes! ^^
Oh sweet, that'd def fix my problem with it being an app! Thanks for posting! :3
Thanks, I'll keep that in mind about PillowFort. Maybe it'll liven up a bit after the update? ^^
Thanks for the suggestions, I'll add them to the list! ^^
I wasn't planning on looking into Weasyl because I don't really ever draw anthros/furries or anything like that, but I'll look into it! :3
I'll be tracking this thread as I'm curious myself.
I'd been trying to find an alternate to Twitter/Tumblr/Instagram. I found Waterfall far too dead for my liking.
Have you tried Mastodon? After a lot of searching, I found that place to be the best for now. It's sort of like Twitter but more personable as the server is decentralised, you can adjust the cropping of your images, the community at the main art instance is very friendly.