Similarities and differences between

social media platforms of:

Flickr and DeviantArt, & Vimeo and YouTube

As an artist another way to promote your digital online self and business could be in the form of creative and informative videos. Sites such as Flickr and DeviantArt , or Vimeo and YouTube offer great free social platforms for this purpose.

Flickr enables users to “upload their own photos” (Moreau, E 2018),  that can be shared with your Flickr followers and other friends.

You can view my Flickr page, to see some of my other photography and artworks here: https://www.flickr.com/people/152328257@N08/

Another example of an artists beautiful artworks posted on the social media platform of Flickr, is by Anna Wolf (Wolf, A. 2007) at: https://www.flickr.com/photos/annas_atelje/5598328437/

Alternatively, you can view Anna’s work from the image and link below:

Flickr is purely a photo sharing social platform, and many professional photographers display their images here for others interested in photography to enjoy. In this way it differs from that of Instagram, Facebook, and DeviantArt as only photos can be shared. Users profiles show a profile photo and a brief bio. Flickr can give your artistic talents great exposure to the public, by giving interesting descriptions of your photos on where and why they were taken and the inspiration behind it. Using keywords to tag your photos will also “increase your chances of your photo showing up in search results” (Moreau, E 2018).

On Flickr you can keep your images in photo collections and albums, which enables the sharing of an entire album. Statistics are shown in charts and graphs, which includes recent views of your photos and how other people are viewing your images. Comments can be made and received on the photographs. Your Flickr page can also display photographs of other images that you really like, that belong to other users. Flickr is definitely a great community to be part of to promote yourself.

DeviantArt also targets artistic creativity and promotion of oneself, however, it’s not just about photography. It is a social platform for sharing and viewing all areas of artistic creations from traditional art, to film and animation, designs, game development, digital art, photography, literature and so much more! Users can search through the many categories and keywords to find individual artists or styles and view thousands of learning videos. Becoming a DeviantArt member is free, and the platform has “over 46 million members” (DeviantArt, 2018). As a member you can create a professional looking portfolio which looks very similar to a website and give and receive critiqued feedback on your work and that of others. DeviantArt offers unlimited uploads for free, and even supports a great slideshow player.

Another great feature of DeviantArt is that you can write a journal onto your page to help attract people there, and automatic alerts are given to your followers and friends.

Instant private messages can be sent and received by users, and members can participate in “exclusive sponsored art contests’ with great prizes! (DeviantArt, 2018). DeviantArt also offers members the opportunity to sell and buy original artworks and digital prints, through a shopping cart feature. The site handles all the processes of printing, framing and shipping to customers upon sales of your artwork, and Items can be shipped to many countries worldwide.

Additionally, Vimeo and YouTube are also social media platforms that could be advantageous for promoting your business. Both sites offer video sharing (including video blogs) and are free to join, although the free subscriptions do have some limitations. For most users, a free subscription is sufficient.

Vimeo’s larger storage options and interaction tools for example, are only available with payment plans. There is no advertising on Vimeo like YouTube has. Videos range from short and brief to more in depth tutorials and films (Vimeo, 2018).

Moreau (Moreau, 2018) comments that Vimeo is “very much known specifically for creative artistry”, and therefore varying somewhat to YouTube, aiming more at professional artists. YouTube is also to date, the leading video platform with a larger audience, however, sometimes videos get lost in the crowd. Both platforms give users the opportunity to watch, share, Save to your Watch List, and comment on.

Other comparisons between Vimeo and YouTube are the different upload and storage restrictions. Vimeo’s free account videos are not as good quality as the paid subscribers and storage is only 500MB per week. YouTube on the other hand has no limit on uploads, or video quality, which is therefore more suitable for frequent video makers. There are more than 3 billion videos viewed daily on YouTube and “more than 48 hours of user-generated video content is uploaded every minute” states Moreau (Moreau, 2018). With statistics like this, an artist really should consider their video marketing and self-promoting strategies seriously.

References

Creative Commons, 2018, viewed 30 August 2018, https://creativecommons.org.au/learn/fact-sheets/attribution/

DeviantArt 2018, viewed 30 August 2018, https://welcome.deviantart.com/

Moreau, E 2018, Lifewire: What is Flickr?, viewed 28 August 2018, https://www.lifewire.com/what-is-flickr-4147535

Moreau, E 2018, Lifewire: What is Vimeo? An intro to the video sharing platform, viewed 30 August 2018, https://www.lifewire.com/what-is-vimeo-3486114

Moreau, E 2018, Lifewire: Vimeo Vs YouTube, which video sharing site is best?, viewed 30 August 2018,  https://www.lifewire.com/vimeo-vs-youtube-which-is-better-3486370

Vimeo, 2018, viewed 30 August 2018, https://www.vimeo.com

Wolf, A  2007, Flickr 2018, viewed 30 august 2018,  https://www.flickr.com/photos/annas_atelje/5598328437/