Everything we're learning about sharing art, getting discovered and growing a creative community.
Honest gift ideas for artists: real pens, paints and digital tools at four budgets in AUD and USD, the 2026 art advent calendars and how to judge them, what to skip, and the dates that matter.
The NaNoWriMo nonprofit announced its closure in March 2025, but 50,000 words in November carries on. What runs in 2026 (NaNo 2.0, two Novel Novembers, Reedsy, World Anvil, Novel Quest), a pacing plan with real numbers, and an outline you can build in one weekend.
A Picrew image belongs to the artist who made the maker, not to you. What the default rules allow, why a page that takes tips counts as commercial use, when you can trace or redraw, and how to turn a maker result into an OC that is yours.
Tapas ends service on 31 March 2027 and no longer sells Ink. What to save while it is up, how to get paid out, and where to move a webcomic or web novel.
Where to post your art when you are just starting out: what a beginner actually needs from an art community, the places that provide it in 2026, and a first-month plan for getting seen and getting useful feedback.
Who runs artbase, what it costs, what happens to your art, how the community works, and the parts that are not finished yet. Everything worth checking before you post your first piece.
The biggest art platform is rarely the one where your work gets seen. A guide to the smaller art communities worth joining in 2026, what each one is actually good at, and how to tell a quiet community from a dead one.
Junk journal searches are up 63% year on year and the format is everywhere right now. For artists it is more useful than it looks: composition and colour practice with the drawing removed, built out of receipts, op-shop books and packaging you were going to bin anyway.
Stickers get treated as the cheap thing you put at the front of the table. The journalling boom has quietly turned small-format work into a repeat-purchase category with its own buyers, and most artists are still making it wrong. The specs, the maths and the honest downsides.
Pro is the paid plan on artbase, priced in your local currency: US$4.99 a month or US$49.99 a year, A$69.99 a year in Australia. It adds profile themes, card styles, post boosts, scheduled posts, bulk uploads, username changes and unlimited private collections. Everything else stays free.
Founding Member, the permanent badge that carries Pro at no cost for life, closed at the end of Sunday 6 September 2026. Anyone with an artbase account by then keeps it. Pro is now a normal paid plan.
Two months after the doors opened, artbase is closing in on 300 members. The honest version of how fast that happened, a blunt ask about dailydraw, and why a room this size is still a good one to walk into.
Anime and manga style art, fan art and original characters are at home on artbase. How tags, collections and groups work for fandom artists, what the community is like, and how to settle in.
The Inktober 2026 prompt list is out. The official rules allow pencil under-drawings, allow digital, and explicitly bless drawing every other day instead of daily. Here are all 31 prompts, the kit worth owning, and the decisions to make before 1 October.
DeviantArt has 25 years of history and hundreds of millions of artworks. artbase opened to everyone in July 2026. Here's our honest take on how the two compare, including the parts where DeviantArt still wins.
artbase is the up-and-coming art platform of 2026: a portfolio and a community in one place, built in Australia, free to join, and young enough that new work actually gets seen. Here is the full tour, from artwork pages to dailydraw.
artbase's daily prompt site is live. One prompt a day, drawn from a pool at midnight UTC, the same one for the whole world — make it in any medium you like and share it on artbase.
Coming back after months or years away is a different problem from art block — it's guilt, rusty hands and a wobbly identity all at once. A gentle, specific re-entry plan, and why your first pieces back look worse than you remember.
Art block is often just an unmade decision wearing a costume. Here's why an external prompt gets you drawing when a to-draw list doesn't, how to use one when the idea doesn't spark, and the failure modes that turn prompts into another source of guilt.
He was the fourth account ever created on artbase, and the first person to find the place on his own. Within ten minutes of signing up he had posted his first painting. Two days later he had posted a hundred. An interview with mondstern, who paints open-source app icons in acrylic and hangs them on gallery walls in Germany.
There are two ways to lose years of work — the drive fails, or the platform deletes your account. Here is a backup system for artists that handles both, why cloud sync is not a backup, and the file structure that makes it painless.
You can teach yourself to draw at a professional level — but only if you replace the three things art school actually provides. Here is an honest look at the costs, a curriculum you can follow, and the failure modes that stall most self-taught artists.
Posting fiction online runs on different rules from publishing a book — cadence, tags and a backlog matter more than a perfect first draft. Here is how serials actually build an audience, and what fanfic writers should know before hitting publish.
Fees, hidden catches and the Apple deadline nobody told you about. An honest comparison of the three big creator-support platforms for artists — and the question that matters more than any of them.
Small canvases, repeat clients and a steady market almost no art tutorial covers. Here are the exact specs, realistic rates, and the design rules that make an emote readable at 28 pixels.
A character reference sheet is the single most useful thing you can make for an OC — it powers trades, commissions and gift art. Here's what to put on one, how to lay it out, and the mistakes that make a ref useless.
Adoptables — original character designs made to be sold — are one of the most beginner-friendly ways to earn from art. Here's how adopts work, how to design and price them, and how to buy one safely.
Bluesky has become a real home for artists leaving X — no AI training on your posts, custom feeds, a friendlier culture. But it's still a text-first social network. Here's an honest look at what it does and doesn't do for your art.
You don't need a 200-page bible before you're allowed to make things. Here's how to worldbuild the way it actually helps — outward from your characters and art, just far enough to make the next piece better.
The invite-only days are over, and artbase is open to everyone with no code needed. This is the July 2026 public launch announcement, plus the Founding Member badge that ran alongside it and closed on 6 September 2026.
A complete 30-day drawing challenge with a daily prompt list designed to build real skills — plus how much time each day actually needs, and how to finish without burning out.
Every month of the year has an art challenge — Inktober, Mermay, Smaugust, Huevember, Swordtember and more. What each one is, how the unwritten rules work, and how to actually finish one.
Every July, hundreds of thousands of artists draw each other's original characters in a month-long game called Art Fight. Here's how it works, how to join mid-event, and how to have fun without burning out — plus what's new for 2026.
Skip the colour-wheel lecture. The working version of colour theory: hue, value and saturation as three dials, why value does most of the work, and how to build palettes that don't fight themselves.
Composition is the craft of steering the eye. Focal points, value structure, flow, framing and negative space — the practical toolkit, plus the thumbnail habit that makes it automatic.
Layers, lerping, sketch vs lineart, DTIYS, render, values, DPI — a plain-English glossary of the digital art and online art community terms every beginner runs into, in one place.
A good warm-up loosens your arm, calibrates your eye and lowers the stakes — in ten minutes. The exercises artists actually use: lines and ovals, gestures, blind contours and more.
Making your drawings move is less mysterious than it looks. This is a beginner's roadmap to 2D animation — the core principles that matter most, the tools worth starting with (including Procreate Dreams 2), and a first project you can actually finish.
A complete guide to creating an original character — finding the core idea, building personality before costume, designing a readable silhouette, and actually developing your OC by drawing them.
A master study is reverse-engineering, not reproduction. How to pick a piece, study with one question, extract the lesson and apply it to your own work — plus the etiquette of posting studies.
Inspiration isn't weather — it's plumbing. How to build an input diet, keep an idea bank, and use constraints so you're never staring at a blank canvas waiting to feel something.
Your painting deserves better than a yellow, skewed phone photo. How to photograph or scan traditional art with gear you already own — lighting, angles, glare, and the edits that fix the rest.
Most sketchbook habits die of perfectionism, not laziness. How to build a daily(ish) sketch practice that survives busy weeks — ugly pages, tiny sessions, anchors and all.
Amid screen fatigue and a rising tide of AI-generated images, a lot of artists are deliberately picking up physical media again — gouache especially. Here's what's driving the slow-art movement, why it feels so good, and how to bring some of it into your own practice.
Blind boxes and designer art toys are one of the biggest creative markets of the decade — and artists, not just big studios, are cashing in. Here's how to take a character from drawing to physical toy, from a one-off DIY custom to a small production run.
VTuber models are one of the biggest-paying commission markets for character artists right now — but the workflow, the pricing and the collaboration with a rigger are unlike a normal illustration commission. Here's how the pipeline works and how to break in.
Stuck staring at a blank canvas? Here are 100+ drawing ideas sorted by what you actually need today — quick warm-ups, skill-builders, story prompts, and low-energy comfort draws.
From overpayment tricks to fake 'I want your art as an NFT' collectors, commission scams follow a handful of scripts. Learn to recognise every one of them — and the simple habits that make you a hard target.
Art block isn't one problem — it's four different ones wearing the same trench coat: fatigue, fear, input starvation and the taste gap. Diagnose which one you've got, and the fix picks itself.
Drawing daily isn't the same as improving. Deliberate practice — specific goals, focused reps, honest feedback — is what separates ten years of growth from one year repeated ten times. Here's how to apply it to art.
Art style isn't something you find — it's something that accumulates from thousands of small choices. Here's how to speed that up deliberately, steal influences honestly, and stop treating style like a missing organ.
Opening art commissions is mostly preparation: a sheet that answers questions before they're asked, terms that protect you, and a payment process that never leaves you working for free. Here's the full checklist.
Most artists price commissions by guessing low and hoping. Here's a calmer way: a formula built on time and a real hourly rate, a worked example sheet, and how to raise prices without losing clients.
You don't need an expensive tablet, the "right" software or a fundamentals bootcamp to start digital art. You need a modest kit, one program and a fortnight of play. Here's the roadmap, step by step.
Your bio is the most-read thing you'll ever write about your art — and most artists leave it blank or vague. A fill-in structure, three worked templates, and the difference between a bio and an artist statement.
No single tool stops AI scraping — but layers help: platform settings, Glaze and Nightshade, noai signals and sensible posting hygiene. An honest guide to what each defence actually does, and what none of them can.
Prints, stickers and merch can turn an art following into income — but the margins, the platforms and the effort are widely misunderstood. An honest starter guide to print-on-demand vs doing it yourself.
Scroll for ten minutes and everyone draws better, posts more and grows faster than you. Comparison is wired into us — but artists can rig it to inspire instead of crush. Here's the practical rewiring.
artbase is a community-driven platform where digital artists and writers share work, get genuine feedback and build a portfolio — built in Australia, free to join. Here's exactly how it works, what it costs, and how to get in.
Found your art reposted, traced or on someone's merch? Don't spiral — escalate in order: document, report, DMCA, de-index. A calm, practical playbook for getting stolen artwork taken down.
Which art sites ban AI-generated work? Which require labels? And which platforms train AI on your uploads? A plain-English guide to AI art policies in 2026 — from DeviantArt and Pixiv to Cara, ArtStation and artbase.
Art trades, collab pieces, DTIYS, zines — what each format is, how to find a partner, and the etiquette that keeps collaborations fun instead of stressful.
A practical guide for Australian digital artists — the conventions and artist alleys worth knowing, arts funding you can actually apply for, the boring-but-important business basics, and where to share your work online.
Pen tablet, pen display or iPad? An honest guide to the drawing tablets worth buying in 2026 — from a US$40 starter to studio flagships — plus the specs that matter and the ones that are marketing.
Short stories, poetry, serials and fanfiction all need a home. An honest guide to where writers should share their work in 2026 — plus some news: artbase now welcomes writers, too.
Every platform rewards something different. An honest guide to where artists should post their work in 2026 — art communities, portfolio sites, social media and newer platforms — and how to combine them.
Followers are nice; friends change everything. A practical guide to finding your people as an artist online — where friendships actually start, the moves that work, and what to do if you're shy.
Is fan art legal? Can you sell it? A practical guide to sharing fan art online — the copyright basics in plain English, the etiquette that keeps fandoms healthy, and the best places to post it.
You no longer need to pay a cent for professional-grade art software. From Krita 5.3 to GIMP 3.2 and Blender 5, here's what's genuinely worth your time in 2026 — and what each tool is best at.
Most artists don't fail online because their art isn't good — they fail on the posting side. Seven common, fixable mistakes, and what the data says about each one.
Burnout isn't laziness or a lost passion — it's a well-studied psychological syndrome, and creative work makes you unusually prone to it. Here's what the research says, and what actually helps.
artbase is in early access. Join the waitlist to reserve your username and earn the Founding Member role and badge — free Pro membership for life, as a thank you for being here first.
Instagram offers artists a huge audience — but ranked feeds, video-first discovery and AI training policies have real trade-offs. Here's an honest look, and what to use alongside it.
A portfolio isn't just everything you've ever made — it's a curated argument for your work. Here's how to build one online, step by step, even if you're just starting out.
Good critique is a skill — and giving it sharpens your own artistic eye. A practical guide to writing comments that help artists improve instead of just saying "nice".
Starting from zero is the hardest part of sharing art online. A realistic, no-hacks guide to earning your first hundred followers — on artbase or anywhere else.
Looking for a new place to share your work? Here are some of the best DeviantArt alternatives in 2026 — from community-focused platforms to professional portfolios.
A great piece can go unnoticed if it isn't described well. Here's how to use tags on artbase to connect your artwork with the people looking for it.
Sharing your work, receiving feedback and connecting with other artists can help you grow far faster than creating in isolation. Here's why community matters.
