"Fan Art" and Professionalism

[Zirngibism]

First off, I myself don't really make fan art. This is more of a question about the philosophy of the illustration industry.
However, there are some novels I'm really interested in, and I was thinking of making my own illustrations of them, which I think most would consider "fan art".
But I'm afraid that I won't be able to include them in my professional portfolio because of that.

I know of several people who make fan art for whatever book/game/musician/movie and choose to separate it from their online portfolios, creating a whole separate account for the "fan art". (By the way, I'm not just talking about DeviantArt, but personal websites here!) So I ask myself-- why are they to be so isolated unless they think one type of work is invaded or infected by another?

I've always been under the impression that fan illustration was considered to be on a "lower tier" than that featuring original characters.
I've assumed here that an art director would rather see an artist's ability to invent their own settings and start their inhabitants from scratch.


But here's the reason I'm making this thread: Isn't it true that most illustration jobs involve representing something that someone else has already conceived in some way? If you're doing a book cover, you're coming up with your own rendition of an existing work... which basically seems to be no different from fan art!

Even with concept art, the trade more associated with creation than rendition, the artist probably isn't always creating their new ideas from scratch, but tweaking the designs of their colleagues. It seems that even here, reinterpreting something (which is what I define fan art as) would be a required trait.

Perhaps it's just the statistical relationship between the level of skill and fan art. After all, I hear many people first get interested in drawing through whatever entertainment they're interested in, so there's a strong tie between low skill and most fan art.
(i. e. obviously traced, crammed compositions, shallow color, etc...)


But is this a problem with the idea itself?






I have a feeling most of you will want to respond that you can't "categorize" art so rigidly, and that it depends on the individual piece, etc... I guess I'm just asking you to think in terms of trends and correlations here; an employer's general opinion.

[GaussianRaider]

I don't think book illustrations could fall in the fan art category, actually they could be quite interesting, in fact they show your personal approach to the guidelines contained in the book.
Usually a good writer just points out some hints, leaving the rest to the reader's mind; this makes book illustrations extremely interesting as they show a lot of your imagination and of your personality.
Fan art is often (!) the slavish replication of ideas and characters already clearly outlined by others, thus doesn't show much of your approach.
In fact, if one's portfolio is consisted only by fan art it suggests that the artist doesn't even feel the need to elaborate on its own and relies completely on other's ideas.
I can see why fan art is "shunned", I don't necessarily agree with this attitude and I think is completely fine as long is a divertissement and doesn't detract you from developing your own imagination.
Please forgive me for my bad english :bashful:

[rpace]

I think you're really concerning yourself about a trivial matter here.

If it's a good piece and will increase your chances of getting work you include it. If it looks amateurish, or is just a copy of another's work then it has no business being there.

~R

[cmalidore]

Do what you love. It's about the picture, not the tier.

The difference between a book cover and an image created by a fan of the book is that one guy got paid for it and you're just inspired. That doesn't make the image less valid - an employer doesn't care about your inspiration as long as the image looks like it'll sell the product.

[Elwell]

First off, I myself don't really make fan art. This is more of a question about the philosophy of the illustration industry.
However, there are some novels I'm really interested in, and I was thinking of making my own illustrations of them, which I think most would consider "fan art".
But I'm afraid that I won't be able to include them in my professional portfolio because of that.

I know of several people who make fan art for whatever book/game/musician/movie and choose to separate it from their online portfolios, creating a whole separate account for the "fan art". So I ask myself-- why are they to be so isolated unless they think one type of work is invaded or infected by another?

I've always been under the impression that fan illustration was considered to be on a "lower tier" than that featuring original characters.
I've assumed here that an art director would rather see an artist's ability to invent their own settings and start their inhabitants from scratch.
FOR GOD'S SAKE, YOU'VE GOT TO GET OUT OF THIS AWFUL TEENAGE DEVIANTART MINDSET!!!!!!! IT HAS NOTHING TO DO WITH THE REAL WORLD!

If you are looking to be hired to do book illustration, what better samples to show than illustrations from an actual book?

[Zirngibism]

Thanks for the replies, guys.

I think this question might have been more based on what the definition of fan art actually is. I had always thought it was a bit broader than it probably is.

But anyway, the book cover was an example. It seems like it might be harder to get away with using characters from a popular video game or something, even if it was an original scenario.

I suppose it's just more motivation to make sure something is REALLY good so as to avoid reminding the viewer of amateur work... :)

[Farvus]

To me "fan art" is what GaussianRaider and rpace mentioned. When you just copy existing character or picture beacause you're fan of it.

In case of illustrating book you have to think creatively the same way as you would do it professionally so it's rather illustration for book or picture inspired by book rather than "fan art".

[Zirngibism]

FOR GOD'S SAKE, YOU'VE GOT TO GET OUT OF THIS AWFUL TEENAGE DEVIANTART MINDSET!!!!!!! IT HAS NOTHING TO DO WITH THE REAL WORLD!

If you are looking to be hired to do book illustration, what better samples to show than illustrations from an actual book?

Yie!
I agree with what you're saying-- it would make sense for people to see a sample of what you want to be doing for them.

And this "mindset" is not just formed from online communities I've been to, but mainly what I've gleaned from a couple of my teachers in ART SCHOOL.

How much they know, I'm not sure, but I have to have at least some confidence in them, right?

Ok, they do give assignments that tell you to re-design covers and stuff, but they tend to frown upon representing existing characters from games/movies, even if you present them in a fresh new manner and don't copy poses, etc... And this isn't for classes about designing stuff like characters, but general foundation stuff. Which makes me think there's a bias against using pre-existing designs for anything.

Forget what I said about book covers, it wasn't a well-thought example I guess.

[Elwell]

Context is everything.
If you were doing Lord of the Rings paintings as book cover samples, you certainly wouldn't want to base them on the movie versions, because what an AD would he hiring you for would be your original take on those characters and setting. But if you wanted to get work in say, licensing or packaging design, then versions taken straight from the movie designs would be exactly what's called for.

[arttorney]

Edit: Ahhh! I can see Elwell is here elaborating. This stuff I have said is just add-on, although it applies across industries. I have been something analogous to a freelancer since 1995 and I have learned the hard way that you must never lose sight of the audience to whom you are pitching. Who are they? Direct your presentation exactly to them.

Somebody must have drawn the cover of the video game too. I think your best approach is to think about this in terms of markets. If you are approaching a representative of a market needing book covers then your portfolio should show what you could do in the area of book covers. The video game thing is liable to be irrelevant to that person.

Conversely, if you are trying to access a video game related market then your portfolio should show off what you could do in that genre.

Look at the stuff you produce and decide what is your market. Refine and hone to fit that niche.

[CCThrom]

If you are looking to be hired to do book illustration, what better samples to show than illustrations from an actual book?

Really, what he said! And I'm sure the same holds true for other industries. If you want to break into video game art, why shouldn't your portfolio include solid pieces drawn from known properties? Your own spin on known characters or titles.

Certainly the art directors at Marvel (for example) don't want to see a portfolio full of your own comics characters & ideas... they want to see how you can handle THEIR characters. If you do a good job with "fan art" it's a strong indication that you will do a good job following the editor's / art director's direction.

That all is predicated on the idea that you are looking for an "industry" job of some sort. Gallery art is a whole different story.

[DavePalumbo]

Certainly the art directors at Marvel (for example) don't want to see a portfolio full of your own comics characters & ideas... they want to see how you can handle THEIR characters

this is specifically the example that I was thinking of myself. ADs want to hire artists who they know can properly handle their material, and this often extends to wanting to see samples of their own characters or brand.

The distinction that I make between fan art and portfolio samples is purely quality. "Fan art" implies amateur quality to me, though I guess technically it's all the same. In a way, intent also plays a part. I feel like fan art is something that a person makes for their own enjoyment or because they really really like whatever the subject of the work is. If you're doing it as a sample to get work from that company, I feel like it's not quite the same. Though this also probably ties in to quality :shrug:

words... meh

[Zirngibism]

Ok, it's good to see that the system is more practical and fitting.

I'm thinking perhaps the teachers at my school discouraged people from using existing characters/settings because they were afraid the students would blindly copy things and not make any decision for themselves. I was perhaps wrong in thinking this discouragement had to do directly with portfolios and AD's.

[Elwell]

I'm thinking perhaps the teachers at my school discouraged people from using existing characters/settings because they were afraid the students would blindly copy things and not make any decision for themselves. I was perhaps wrong in thinking this discouragement had to do directly with portfolios and AD's.
This sounds right to me.

[Viridis]

As others have said, what fan art consists of and whether or not it's good to include in your portfolio largely depends on what you're looking to do.

For illustration, basically everything you do is going to be "fan art" because it's all about taking the existing concepts and other people's ideas and creating your own images out of them. So it's an excellent thing to work on-- I'm actually currently doing this myself, reworking book covers of well-known titles to offer in my portfolio. Taking images out of a book is a little more "respectable" (if we're talking about these made-up hierarchies) because you're still coming up with all the imagery yourself. Look at the Lord of the Rings or Harry Potter. Before the movies came out, there were a myriad of ways the characters were depicted in various fanart that I've seen.

For something like comics, the portfolio is probably stronger with your own versions of Spider-Man or Batman or whoever, because that's who you'll be drawing all the time. Of course, if you don't want to spend all your time drawing those characters then comics might not be the best place for you...

For concept art, I can't see putting in a bunch of preexisting characters as being very helpful... the whole focus is supposed to be on what character designs you can come up with, not how well you can copy others.

So it really depends.