Stock and Resources
What is the difference between the Scraps folder and The Stock & Resources Gallery?
For many, the line between what belongs in your Scraps folder vs. what to submit to the Stock and Resources gallery can be a blurry mess of confusion. Today we are here to draw a firm line in the sand, and clarify the difference between the two. Before we get started, it is important to direct your attention towards FAQ #809: What are DeviantArt's stock image guidelines?
It is the golden rule of Stock and Resources, and something you should be familiar with before you begin submitting to the gallery. For a detailed breakdown of the faq, please take a moment and read this over first: FAQ 809: Line By Line. Stock and Res Golden Rule
Scraps:
Scraps system, largely unfinished or unpolished images view-able in a member's 'scraps' gallery and separate from the main gallery.
What this means:
- This means your scraps folder is the place for your "junk" art that you haven't finished, don't like, or think that it won't fit in the other DeviantArt galleries. This includes your finished character sheets/descriptions, Mario fan art sketches, unwanted muro drawings or literature pieces, memes, screen shots, etc. You can still share your scraps with others. They are not hidden from the world.
- If it does not meet the minimum size guidelines of 1000 x 1000 px, it goes in your scraps folder.
- If you do not want others to use it in their art pieces, but do not want to submit it to the art galleries, it goes in your scraps folder.
- If it does not fit FAQ #809: What are DeviantArt's stock image guidelines? or other gallery guidelines, it goes in your scraps folder.
Stock and Resources:
This DeviantArt main gallery is reserved for photographic images and other resources that are labeled for reuse by artists to create new art pieces. When you publish a resource or stock image in this gallery, you must have the necessary permissions to distribute that image. Often this is referring to the fact that you have taken the photo yourself, the model release, created the resource yourself, or permission from the original author to redistribute the material you plan to publish in the gallery.
Stock and Resources Gallery Descriptions Recap
Click the link above for the individual descriptions of what should be submitted to each gallery folder.What this means:
- You should only submit items that you wish others to use in their art to this gallery.
- It should fit FAQ #809: What are DeviantArt's stock image guidelines?
- You should have the necessary permissions or have created/photographed the resource/stock yourself. (This means submitting celebrity/anime "renders" is a big fat NO! This includes using them for preview images for actions.)
- Your redistributed images (i.e. premade backgrounds, action preview images or brush preview images) need to have their original source cited clearly in your artist comments area. This is so that the artists know that you have permission to redistribute the resources for their use.
Why is this important?
It is important as a community and a gallery to submit to the correct areas, so that the galleries are not inundated by random and irrelevant material. When a gallery is flooded with things that do not belong, it squeezes out and buries the stock and resources submissions that artists can actually use. This impacts the quality of the community experience, and for stock providers, it impacts the traffic of artists using the stock that we provide simply because they can't find it. Artists, especially photomanipulators, will go to other sites for resources in lieu of wading through the things that should be in scraps to find their resources. Some stock providers get frustrated and leave, which also diminishes the community as a whole. If we want to encourage growth in our community, we must first start by making sure we are submitting the right things to the right places.
The Stock and Resources gallery is not a digital junk drawer. It is a gallery tree for stock artists to create materials for other media artists to use and love.
Your Scraps folder is your digital junk drawer.
Stock and Resources Pro Tip for Artists:
Artists, if you don't feel like spending the time going through the main gallery tree, we suggest following stock and resources groups instead. These groups are put together by the people of the stock community, whose galleries reflect what the main gallery should look like without the miscategorized submissions. They often filter out what should be in scraps from the group by requiring submission approval, so that useful stock images and other resources shine through.
Side Note:
For those that deliberately publish their art pieces in the Stock and Resources gallery and think it will gain more exposure for your art, it won't. Your best chance of getting your art seen is to submit it to the correct gallery. Most users will browse the gallery of their interest for art. They will not be looking in a random gallery for something completely unrelated to the gallery description. They will not be searching for magical rainbow farting unicorn art in Stock and Resources, for example. This art, even if it was the most wonderful and fantastic farting unicorn of all time, will not be featured as a Daily Deviation simply because it is in the wrong gallery.
