god not to get into the art twitter discourse sauce but b/tch h/rtman is really out here sounding like a dril tweet in response to people calling him out for tracing ranma huh

its absolutely incredible to me that people unironically defended him for this saying 'look it's not traced it's just heavily referenced'

https://twitter.com/DaftPina/status/1286746740494827522

he is an industry professional. these things can happen yes... in your deviantart days, not your $200 commissions

a lot of artists find it difficult to draw a character in anything but the pose they're in if their conceptualization skills have not gotten strong enough. i have drawn things like this before, where they're very close to the original, many moons ago.

but his doesn't seem to be a lack of skill so much as a lack of, i don't know, confidence? i struggle to say b/tch h/rtman would have a lack of confidence. so laziness, perhaps. can't be bothered to give the character your own spin so time to eyeball the first google result.

none of this would normally be a problem. it's... a really normal stage of drawing and learning, to heavily reference a piece but maybe change up the arm or something. for people who can't do their own stuff, or don't have the time/energy.

HEY NOT AS A PROFESSIONAL FOR $200 THO

Also he drew the thumb backward

also also i regret using the term 'deviantart' pejoratively, it's a site that a lot of artists use regardless of skill level. it's just something i associate heavily with earlier levels of my artistic skill, around the time i used to do this (heavily referencing pics).

there's nothing wrong with using the site. and to be clear - nothing wrong with being a less skilled artist, or with using references (which i do! a lot! ask me about banging my head against the wall with drawing a character in profile this afternoon).

my point is that whether it's tracing or eyeballing, you should not be able to overlay an image like this over another artist's work and have it line up so perfectly, and claim it's your own work. it isn't like, magically morally better if it *wasn't* traced

tracing aint the only form of copying, my dude.

and again 200 US DOLLARS 200 US DOLLARS FROM AN INDUSTRY PROFESSIONAL DO YOU KNOW HOW MANY AMAZING ARTISTS YOU CAN COMMISSION FOR 200 DOLLARS WHO WILL DRAW THEIR FUCKIN HEART OUT FOR HOURS FOR YOU-

i'm seeing takes like this so to be very clear about the point of this thread: i don't give a fuck about artists charging $200. i encourage them to do that thing, i have told a lot of artists to raise their rates

i only care about this shitty egotistical asshole charging $200