(Please note: In no way is this intended to be patronising.)

Comments On dA.  You're doin' it wrong!

Okay, admittedly it’s only a small proportion of the dA community who seem to be sadly uneducated about the standard level of courtesy meant to be used when addressing people. Making insensitive, rude and stupid comments does not make you opinionated or brave. That sense of pride you feel when making a conflicting comment is sadly misplaced. Why? Because you’re hiding behind cyber walls. I highly, highly doubt you would say those things to the person’s face. (And I’m not talking about trolls, because trolls are just losers with no motive except to scrabble for the title of Biggest Douchebag on the Internet.)

Here are my rules of thumb, and perhaps I’m being arrogant and self-righteous by hoping someone might take something away from this, but consider it a tutorial of sorts on what NOT to write in comments. (Please note that all the examples I’ve used are from other artists’ work).

Rule 1: If you don’t have anything nice to say, don’t say anything at all OR If you don’t like the piece, don’t comment. Don’t write: ‘I don’t like it.’ That’s not helpful, and no one cares. Examples I’ve seen: ‘This one kinda sucks compared to your others’

Rule 2: Offer criticism POLITELY. CONSTRUCTIVE criticism helps an artist progress so IF YOU KNOW WHAT YOU’RE TALKING ABOUT then always POLITELY offer criticism.

Rule 3: Don’t JUST write something critical. That’s hurtful and negative. Balance it out with something you LIKE about the picture.

Rule 4: Don’t write something vague. Examples I have seen: ‘It’s not perfect’ and ‘Wow um…’ and ‘Omg’. This is NOT helpful to the artist. It’s barely an opinion.

Rule 5: If you don’t like the subject in the picture, kindly keep it to yourself. Examples I’ve seen: ‘Lady Gaga is pathetic’ and ‘I don’t like Tifa’.  No one cares what you think. Why did you click on it and bother writing a comment if you don’t like the subject matter in the first place? I.e. refer back to Rule 1.

Rule 6: Don’t write things that aren’t related to that piece of work. Save that for the artist’s profile. Examples: ‘Why did you change your screen name?’

Rule 7: Don’t demand work/answers from the artist. Examples: ‘Why did you draw her blond?’ and ‘Draw Edward.’ It’s unconstructive and frustrating. If you want to ask a question, ask it POLITELY within a constructive comment about the piece of art. For example: ‘I really like the colours in this picture. Do you think you’ll ever draw Aeris?’ Barking questions at the artist is rude and you probably wont get a response.

Good Rules to follow:
1. Pick out something specific you like, no matter how small. E.g colour, composition, expression.
2. Pick out something you think could be altered. BE SPECIFIC. E.g the flow of the hair, the perspective, the shoes.
3. End on a positive note.
4. Always respect the artist’s style. Just because you don’t like the style, doesn’t mean it’s a bad picture.

A good example of a comment might be: ‘I really like this piece. The composition is unusual but very striking. My only crit would be that the left arm is a little too elongated. But it’s a brilliant piece of work, well done!’

How to turn this comment bad: ‘I like it’ OR ‘Arm is wrong…’

I’m not saying comments should be an essay (nor am I dictating how people should comment) but it’s worth taking that extra second to think before you type.

I don’t want people to think I’m ungrateful for comments, because truthfully I’ve only had, like, three comments that are worded negatively. For some reason it makes me mad when I see comments like that written on OTHER people’s art. It makes me wanna proper have a go at them, but that would just be petty and wouldn’t get me anywhere. The only time I leave ‘angry’ comments is if the art is stolen or offensive.

I’m not sure whether to label the people behind these comments as ignorant or just rude, but either way, THINK BEFORE YOU WRITE. There’s a person with feelings behind every piece of art, and it really doesn’t take much effort to realise this before you start vomiting your inconsiderate nonsense all over their comment box.

If you feel the same then of course you can share the rules I wrote up/like the article. I like to think I’m spreading love, haha. Maybe I’m deluded but meh. The reason for this rant is because of a poor girl I came across on dA who got so much abuse over one of her pictures. She was obviously young and… had some room for improvement, but the level of abuse she was getting was completely unacceptable, from ‘It looks terrible’ to ‘You should never draw again’. C’mon, now, that’s just MEAN.

Anyway, like I said, it’s a small and stupid minority who write comments like that and I’m not in any way, shape or form bitching about leaving comments in general. I personally appreciate the time, thought and effort behind every comment and I love the connection and communication created by the ability to write comments. I just wish people would think a bit more before they write.

And before anyone says so, of course I could just ignore the bad comments written on people’s work, but if everyone ignored everything that’s bad then how can we ever improve?

Your opinions on the subject are, as usual, always welcome. I love a good discussion What are your experiences involving comments? What do you like to see in a comment? What DON’T you like to see? Will trolls EVER stop trolling? (<ha joke)

(My favourite comment I ever received was simply ‘…’ lol, what is that even supposed to mean??)