An observation

This may be just me, But I have noticed a pattern between the lack of feedback and the caps.

Well not the caps exactly but here it is.

This is two part.
First.
Jezzi Stewart
is pretty much the only consistent artist to place there stuff on the forum
Vaingirls is always getting a little feed back, even from me.
For both sites my primary point of contact is the forum.
And I don't check the front page of TG Caps at all because although it's look is similar to TG Comics the random art doesn't really showcase the new stuff well.
I use the RSS to check the new stuff. if it's not there I really don't want to fish through the site searching for stuff.
Caps are a quick simple pleasure If I have to work hard to find the new ones they will likely go unseen.
That's why I don't visit Yahoo Groups. I'm not going to sign up to be tracked for something I can't at least see some up front.
The few I have joined haven't had any greater quality work than what I find here, and often angle further away from my personal interests.
So For me If I don't see the artist actively posting on the Forum I really don't see there work unless it catches someone else's eye to such a point that they start a new thread.

Second, unless I feel moved by it I don't post.
The quality of stuff hasn't dropped but there is SO MUCH of it that nothing feels new or fresh It's all SSDD. so it makes the caps field as a whole feel stale.
I think this didn't happen when it was over at TG Comics because it was mixed up with so many other things that it wasn't looked at this closely but TG Caps is like putting it under a Microscope so the repeat if themes and plots becomes a lot more evident.

Original projects and community works die pretty fast unless they already have a following.
I have started two works now and asked for feed back from the community and all I get is your doing good I want to see more.
with few acceptions I get little to no actual informative feedback.
Like I can't really relate to such and such character or the plot seems to fall apart here, or what happened to this or that. Or even it would be neat if this happened.
I know this is not the exact same thing as here at TG Caps but I think it roots in the same problem.
We have a lot of spectators who only want to be spectators.
They just want to watch the show, they don't want anything else so they say nothing else.

If you want people to speak up then then give them something to speak up about, let them know that the artist is not just passive or a behind the scenes player.
Jezzi Stewart, and helen_buckley
Are both very active on the forum and we know them as real people. most of the other artists say very little till being prompted so they feel like they are on the sidelines of the community pumping out fan pulp and not trying to satisfy themselves.

Like I said I may be full of it but that is what I see.

What do the rest of you see here that might be improved and help the feedback process?

I agree with Tristra.
I am a massive fan of Helen Buckley's caps, she seems to have the elusive "hook".
Don't ask me what that is, it simply....is.

I'm currently trying to complete a project and the split second it's finished (2-3 months) I'll have more time to delve into TGCaps in more detail and become better acquainted with Jezzi 's, Suezz's and other captioneers work. Until then I have to ration my time here and concentrate on specific authors.

It might help TGCaps if a few "tasters" were posted on Femur's TGComics blog.

I have started to wonder if TG captions are an entry point for many folks into the wider TG-media field which they eventually outgrow and move on to comics, manga, Youtube, fiction, etc.
Just my two-pence worth :-|

Tristra, if I understand you correctly, you're saying, "Hey, recappers and artists! If you want feedback, let us get a feel for you as a person -- post on other threads beside your own!"

I don't know how to respond to that. I post a lot, both at TGComics and TGCaps, and so I'd like to think that people here "know" me. But when I posted my two Green Lantern photoshopped covers, four days ago, I got almost no comments. I'm puzzled and dismayed by this lack of reaction.

Trista,

Thanks for opening this discussion. This feedback is interesting.

Thank you, Tristra. The reason I am consistent in posting my work on the forum as well as at the regular site is that I am a comment hound and the forum is now the only place where one can make and receive comments. I think we should go back to being able to comment under the normal post (as well as at the forum). I think there may be viewers/readers at the regular site who might comment if there were an immediate way to do so. For my work, one of the advantages to viewing it at the site as opposed to the forum is that my comments - and I try to comment on each cover as well as cite the original - are right underneath each cover. At the forum the commentary for all 5 -10 covers is above them and it's easy to ignore it; I think the viewer doesn't get as much bang for her buck if she does. (Hmmmm - vanity AND pride. It's about noon, so I'll now go practice gluttony :-)

I am also ENVYous of the skill and talent of my fellow posters -you rock, ladies and gents!

As one of the fickle spurned posters I have to agree with Tristra. I don't comment on others stuff so why should I expect others to comment on mine? Guilty as charged. I guess I have always regarded myself as a reluctant member of this community. I like making these things (I don't really want to call them work, let's call them contraptions) because it's a creative outlet for me. But the other part of this equation is that I don't always feel like I belong here. And I don't say this because I have felt actively spurned I just think my interests don't always mesh with this audience. And by interests I probably mean I'm not into magic or superheroes or body suits etc. I like making things that deal with being tg in some way or other and that doesn't always have to mean something silly or ironic or camp though I've certainly done dozens of those kind of things. There's a world of emotions and being tg (However you define it) has a whole constellation of feelings. I'd like to see more latitude given to thos different kinds of expression. To be honest, Femur guessed quite correctly that the lack of interest in my stuff has caused me to petulantly withdraw it but the reasons behind that petulance are more complex than just "the hell with you." There's a lot of the "hell with me" as well. And a lot of....this is the wrong venue for this stuff. I have been writing this comment in my head for a long time and believe me it was much more eloquent before it reached my fingers.

That's basicaly it yes
and GrimGhost I'm sorry I didn't mention you.
I know you are good with feed back.
What I was meaning to get at is Most people here don't even know there is new stuff till a thread is started here.
So if you want a bit more feed back start a thread linked to your new work so people can discus it.

As far as your two covers, they were good, but they were also nothing new.
I like the quality of the work here for the most part the edit jobs are great, but you can only give praise on a certain concept so much before it becomes old hat.
Your work is still just as good as it used to be but While I can't speak for others I'm not going to comment on things I've seen a dozen times before.

I liked it like that and I was more prone to post that way but many times I felt that I was the only one speaking up.
My comment felt like those little cards that no one reads at the bottom of a painting in an art gallery.
It has the strength of a quick post, but the weakness of being distant from the community where others are actually going to talk.
You are right though
your caps in the forum I do skip over the text for the most part.
you could link to them in the site and have people look at them that way.

Imelda Marcuse, In my opinion. that is more of what we need.
We need what is not being done, what people feel like doing and have there heart set in.
This is not in any way to say that what people are doing here is wrong or bad.
In fact it is quite good.
But it is old you can take any 10 caps and there is a good chance that 2 of them use the same concept and could almost be interchangeable with the exception of art.

I personally favor the stories that take a new approach to these tried things.
We talk a lot of TG but usually these are more forced fem than TG.
The plumbing has changed but it was involuntary and usually very spiteful.
Lately (within the last year) there has been a rise in other types of caps, but only after the whole character death debate or the talk of deeper TG concepts.
If you want to cover forced fem and sex that's fine and you will always have an audience but do it because you want to.
I feel this shifting because of the discussion boards degrades the heart of why you do it, Unless it truly inspires you to take a new path.

We see time and again that people want to do bold new things but they feel discouraged because of the status quo.
I would suggest. Reseek your inspiration and do what you love and you will find those that love you for it.
But the more you sell out to get a few hits and a little praise the more your going to loose the praise your longing.

That said, I can't say why you do it. But for me it is becoming stale we get a few good fruits but other than that we get lots of same old same old.
when it comes to a persons caps I'm not going to say anything unless it moves me.

I know I may come off like I'm being bitchy and I really don't mean to but if we sugar coat this it's not going to go away.
The flat hard facts are it's getting stale and people want the artists to talk first about there art.
and maybe even about each others art.
you are all fans of each other.
your not the only ones that have faltered here. every contest has had week returns on this forum.
We just don't get the traffic needed for the contests to work.

Our members are higher than ever but we only see the same old faces here.
nothing we can do to change that.

I was thinking you might be able to put a frame above the categories on the TG Comics forum and put an RSS for this site in that so the news is in a higher traffic area that might get the numbers up.
but there are no guarantees.

If anyone else has anything to add or wants to chew me a new one now would be a great time.
But I really don't mean to piss any one off. this is just what I see.
I could be wrong.

Trista, your comments are obviously very heart-felt. I don't want to let them by slip by without giving them their due, but like others I have a hard time figuring out what to say in reply. There's a lot to what you say, but your comments do aim in a lot of directions. So, I guess this response is itself going to be rather scattershot.

For instance, I'm not sure if you are commenting on an aspect of TGCaps itself, or on the state of the forums. Are they notes about a lack of community, or a lack of creativity? Or are the two comments connected?that there is a lack of community because there is a lack of creativity, or that there is a lack of creativity because there is a lack of community?

I'd make a few observations, not to justify or excuse the identified problems, but to explain why they may be arising.

The first is that there are actually only a handful of contributors to TGCaps, and it would be odd if each contributor did not have his or her own unique interest or purpose in contributing. I'm pretty sure my interests are unique. I'll go ahead and confess?and hope people will forgive me for it?but I have absolutely zero interest in "TG" issue. I don't mean I disdain them, or that I feel anything but respect for those who are interested in them. But they don't mean anything to me.

I enjoy making caps as a kind of literary exercise?usually for humorous and subversive effect, but occasionally for dramatic effect. I have written TG fiction, both in text form and as modcomics, but in those cases the TG stuff is a device to get at certain dramatic situations?at what it means, for instance, to be a certain sort of person who has suffered a certain kind of change (a TG change). I notice that one real difference between my fiction and other fiction, for instance, is that 90% of everyone else's fiction has a happy ending. My stories are usually more ambiguous, because I don't have a strong inclination to give TG stories "successful" endings. I give them the endings I think the situation requires (though that can be a happy ending too).

Second, I contribute because I regard each cover as a kind of experiment, and there is no point in carrying on experiments if you don't post the results, both successful and unsuccessful. Anyone who has ever written or painted knows that 90% of what you dribble out is crud?it's figuring out what works and what doesn't. Problem is, it is very hard to tell what works and what doesn't without putting it out there to see what gets a reaction. I post almost everything I make not because I think everything is a winner, but because I'm constantly surprised at what gets a "hit" response and what gets ignored.

[I feel like I need to offer this justification, because 8 of the most recent 10 updates are mine, so a complaint that recently it has all been "stale and repetitive" certainly feels like a remark?intentionally or not?that is aimed at my stuff. I certainly don't take it amiss if you find my work very much of a piece, but I would like to explain myself. :) ]

Meanwhile, in a backhanded way, this may go to something you haven't quite come out and said, which is that there is almost a complete absence of constructive criticism on these forums. If you like something, you say you like it. If you don't, then you say nothing. This seems to be everyone's default position, unless there are technical matters (such as font choice) that photoshoppers feel like discussing. (Even here discussion is limited, because it is obvious that not everyone has access to the same set of powerful image-manipulation tools, and so it can be undiplomatic to point out to someone who hasn't, say, Photoshop, that a manipulation is very crude.)

I wouldn't mind seeing constructive criticism of my work, but I don't expect it, because it can be very hard to analyze a joke. I know I would have a hard time analyzing other people's covers. I know what I like and what I don't, but because I know that TG issues are an idiosyncratic subject I also know that my critiques are more likely to miss the other contributors' interests than to address them. I could also offer a great deal of feedback on the stories that are posted here, but again, I strongly suspect that the authors' purposes in writing them would not really connect with the kind of critiques I would offer, which would be directed toward more traditional forms of storytelling.

I don't know if what I've said advances the conversation any, but this is my attempt to fruitfully reply to your interesting and important concerns.

Tristra wrote [about my two Green Lantern covers]: "As far as your two covers, they were good, but they were also nothing new."

On the contrary, they were photoshopped, not just recapped. I can recap a comic-book cover in less than half an hour, but these two Green Lantern covers took me days, which included planning and lots and lots of single-pixel, semitransparent erasing. I busted tail to avoid the Exacto Knife look and make the new art look like it had been there from the beginning, that the cover had been drawn that way.

But thematically, you're right, my covers are old hat (except for using a Green Lantern power ring as the means of transformation, as opposed to magic; that part's new).

When I was a little boy with transsexual feelings and also a reader of Justice League of America comics, I decided that if I ever got a Power Ring, the very first thing I would do would be to make myself into a girl. My two GL covers were my 2010 efforts to turn that long-ago thought into images.

Seuzz:
(1) "is that 90% of everyone else's fiction has a happy ending.

I think that the reason there are so many happy endings is that that is what most of us who are TG would like - but we live in the Real World where I would say most TG issues do not end happily or at least not completely so. Mine certainly haven't. If I want unhappiness, all I have to do is (showing my age) pick up my newspaper or read my Southern Poverty Law Center Hate Group update newsletter.

(2) I post almost everything I make not because I think everything is a winner, but because I'm constantly surprised at what gets a "hit" response and what gets ignored.

Same here. Out of every ten Vaingirls covers I always pick the one I, myself, think is my best. Usually no one else does. :-)

I will also say that with 800 covers, it does get harder and harder to come up with new ideas or fresh takes on older ones.

Jezzi Stewart
"I think that the reason there are so many happy endings is that that is what most of us who are TG would like - but we live in the Real World where I would say most TG issues do not end happily or at least not completely so."

Exactly so. Which is why I think even the constructive criticism I could offer would be beside the point, and which is why I've never thought I should offer it. :)

I apologies for that I see many things at once and for me none hold any greater value than any other
it makes it hard to put things clearly into words without leaving things out.

Right on all parts.
People tend to point fingers.
I try not to and in so doing I seem to point at everything.
To point a finger only agitates the issue.
The work is old and people are all to eager to say that the fault lies on someone else's back. when in fact it lies on all of us even me.
To be a community is more than a word and can not easily be described or quantified, and in attempts to quantify it you can find peaces only to kill the whole that's what pointing the finger does.
It quantifies an issue.
but it is a convenient way to get people talking.

Never said you had to and in fact if you all did then it would be that exact issue that is old now.

Good that's a very challenging thing to do.

While in part I agree, you have to be careful that the heart of your work is not lost in search of that reaction.
Commercial work needs to fit the mold but the more free form the art the more it should fit the artist.
I told a friend of mine once "Always be in awe of your art and the world will always be in awe of the artist."
I still feel this is true.

I know it's hard for most to understand, but I have almost no grasp of time.
what happened a year ago is as fresh in my mind as what I ate for breakfast.
When I speak here I speak as to the whole of my experience, and only refer directly to those things i mention directly. So I am sorry but it is not directed at you.

Very observant, yes I did say that both directly and indirectly, in fact even almost paradoxically.
But I wouldn't leave the issue as so technical as the tools available.
A person can still say what they liked about a work or why they do not like something.
The frustration is in the ready vagary Where a person just says they like or dislike something and that is the end of it.
(sadly I do this myself when I post in the morning, I'm not a morning person)

Very true, but how long can a joke be told or retold before it looses it's funny?
with true solid feed back we can understand why and move to a new perspective instead of spinning our wheels in place.

Very true, you can please some of the people some of the time but you can't please all of the people all of the time. To me this raises the value of feedback. even if unpleased they may have a point that can improve your next work
or inspire something completely new.

Is it going to hurt to mention it any way?
If they don't like it they can ask you to stop or say that is not what they want to do with there work.
I find that this place is very civil in that respect.

Thanks and I think it does.
but there again I am 1 and can be fallible.


I apologies I wasn't clear enough with that statement because I felt my comments on editing made it clear. When I said they were nothing new I was not talking about the artwork, which to me in this case falls into editing, I was talking about the dialog and subject mater. which while not word for word has been done a number of times.


To turn the eye on myself
Really, I've tried my hand at caps, I like them but when I start writing I fail to tell the story to the fullness I see in my own head, due to my own way of thinking.
It requires a mile of exposition and back story for me to get everything out.
(not suited for a single frame)
because of that I admire the work you all do to elude to a whole story in a single frame is very good.
But I can't help but think that your all so busy filling a niche that your own creative process is weakened by it.

I only have one solution to this I think, expand the topic leave TG Caps as the focus but open an area where non TG related stuff can go, just random works on any topic as long as it's not going to get anyone sued. And me personally I would like to see more long running stuff I know this is TG caps but Caps can be stories as well.

The two things I have been recently working on will not be posted in ether site because I have no and plan to do no art for them.
I want to see if I can get one of my ideas completely out of my head and into coherent words.
I want others to enjoy it but the work is still mainly for me first and as you have probably noticed when it comes to the finer points I'm a picky bitch. even to myself.

Trista
"When I speak here I speak as to the whole of my experience, and only refer directly to those things i mention directly. So I am sorry but it is not directed at you."

Thanks for saying so. In truth, I wouldn't have minded if you had been thinking of my stuff. And if you had, it would have given the discussion in this thread a tighter focus. That is why I mentioned it as a possibility: as a way of actually advancing the conversation by giving it a bright bullseye. :)

Trista
"Is it going to hurt to mention it any way?"

I hesitate to say anything, but I will. I'll preface this by repeating that people have different motives for writing, and my criticisms probably are irrelevant to the reasons that most TG authors have for writing.

Basically?and here I am generalizing, and would very much prefer not to point to particular examples?it seems to me that most TG-themed stories lack elementary drama. I don't mean "melodrama"?fraught emotions or scenes of anguish. I mean that they lack conflict and they lack any moments of choice. A story, to put it bluntly, is a narrative about a person who is driven by forces that are in tension with each other into making an important choice that fundamentally changes the kind of person that he or she is.

Now, many TG stories do have a kind of conflict. Sometimes it is people yelling at each other or even hitting each other. But there are rarely moments when a central character makes a fateful choice, and what conflicts they feature do not drive that character into making that kind of choice. Instead, most TG stories are what I call "Melting Ice" stories. Here is a (non-TG) example:

"Once upon a time there was a boy who was very, very thirsty. But all he had was a very large block of ice. He put the ice in a bucket and set it out in the sun. Eventually, the sun melted the ice, and the boy drank the water, and thus he quenched his thirst. The End."

Too many TG-themed stories, I've noticed, follow this pattern. Basically, someone suffers a permanent sex change against their will, or they start experimenting with a TG change. There are a few conflicts at first, but eventually the person gets used to the change, and everyone else around them gets used to the change, and the story finally dries up with some variant of 'And everyone lived happily ever after'." The problem almost literally melts away, and the story "progresses" by having everyone sit around until it goes away.

Now, I've nothing against happy endings. Most stories have happy endings. But in a well-written story (of the classical form) the story has someone fighting their way to a happy ending and achieving it through great effort mostly at the last minute. Think of Star Wars, where the tension is screwed up to the breaking point until three minutes before the closing credits start to roll. That movie doesn't progress by having Luke sitting around while everyone brings him what he wants. He fights and he fights hard to achieve it.

Now, as I say, this is probably irrelevant to most of the reasons people have for writing TG fiction, where (I suspect) the point is to get to the happy ending with a minimal amount of trauma. Even when there is trauma, it is usually conjured away. There is nothing wrong with writing and reading this sort of thing if it makes you happy?which is why I think my criticism would be unwanted and unnecessary.

Mostly I mention this because it is good example of why not all forms of constructive criticism would have a place in these forums. Most of the stories that this general form of criticism could be leveled at would have to be junked and begun again from scratch if this line of criticism were taken seriously, and if the authors were inclined to do anything about it. :(

Is it only one eye?
I see many intertwined little things
each by themselves harmless but together the root of the issue as I see it.

Probably in this case implies uncertainty. You have nothing to loose from knowing and many things to gain.
fear is the wall but not bound to the outcome.
It can be walked around.

YES!!!!!!!! exactly.
flashy little fruit pretty on the vine but bland in there taste because they are not ripe and are spoiled by the worm holes.
book worms are a nasty thing.

I find this quite relevant and is what I'm trying to approach in my own writing.
Not as much because I feel it's missing, but because it's what I want to see.
Even if your critique does not benefit the artist it can still benefit the art.

I actually feel it is quite to the contrary. we NEED fresh and diverse voices to make the old new again and take the concept of what's being done to a new level and place.
If people want C&C that only agrees with them then they don't want C&C, they want parse and I don't think any of the people here are that egotistical.

Speak up.
I started this thread because I think there is something good here and worth speaking up for, but no mater how soft I talk or how loud I rant (and I can rant) I won't be taken seriously unless it is seen that at least in part there are others out there with a voice also.

I don't want the artists to cater to me, I want them to do there best and aspire to do more.
Do great work and I will praise it for its quality even if I disagree with the content.

To have a story (as opposed to an anecdote or a fantasy), the writing must have three things:

1) Goal-directed action -- the hero doesn't merely wish for something, but makes plans and takes steps to make something happen. And when she doesn't get the result she wants, she makes a new plan and takes new action.

2) Conflict -- someone or something thwarts the hero achieving her goal.

3) Seems impossible -- the villain is stronger than the hero, with his only weakness a seemingly irrelevant weakness; the hero is weaker than the villain, with her only strength a seemingly irrelevant strength. However much we root for the hero to win, it seems impossible that she will. In true fiction, the smart money always is on the villain to win.

Remark: Near the end of every story, there is always a "crisis," at which time it not only seems certain that the hero will fail at her goal, but also the hero will be killed/destroyed as well.

So what's the difference between a story, an anecdote, and a fantasy?

In an anecdote, there is no conflict at all -- "I woke up, then I fed the dog, then I caught the commuter train, and on the train a man..."

In a fantasy, either (a) there is no conflict, where conflict always happens IRL ("Want to boink?" "SURE! Um, do you mind if I include my roommate?") or (b) the conflict-creating opposition is puny. ("Wanna boink?" "Yes, but my husband Melvin might make trouble.")

Here's my point: Unlike Seuzz, I don't expect to find stories at any TG site. I expect fantasies, and if I find an actual story, I consider that gravy. If I read ten works on Fictionmania and none of them meet the three tests for stories, I don't consider that to be time wasted. But on the other hand, at fanfic sites for movies, TV shows, or comic books, I insist on reading "stories" that are stories in truth.