I'm just some newbie who has no idea what she's doing but I saw people doing #introduction posts?

I'm Eilia and I'm a game artist/writer/comic artist. I'm not a social media buff and have mostly shared my stuff in tiny communities on DeviantArt and Discord. :')

I write and read fantasy, be it historical or contemporary! I've mostly focused on writing and an isometric game concept lately so I don't have many big illustrations to show. Just rough doodles like below. x'D

Ah, text limits...

As an addendum to this intro post. I'm not yet certain what my goals for this site are. xD I guess I just occasionally update on whichever personal project I've made progress with?

And I'm hoping to follow some other artists, game devs and writers who make stuff in the same genres. :>

I'm huge on original fantasy content especially! As well as games like Rune Factory, Zelda and Warframe, which definitely are three very similar series!

@Eiliakins welcome to the fediverse! I like your art!

The text limits are one reason the hubs and I have our own instance powered by Akkoma. We can set the text limit to whatever we want. It's currently set at something like 8,000 characters, which is waaaaay more than I ever use.

I'm a beginner artist, still very much learning and not settled on any particular style.

@Laurie Thanks!
Ohh, the text limits are different in different places? That's neat! This one has a 500-character limit which can be both frustrating and a fun challenge for the editor side of me. :D

Ah, art style... I'm a so-called professional artist and I STILL haven't settled on a style. x'D I feel like I switch it for each new project! (And I say, it's fun to always use different styles. :D )

@Eiliakins mastodon tends to be shorter, around 500 characters I think. And complicated to change the text limit in the backend. It's part of why we went with Akkoma - easier to work with. The hubs is a programmer, but also busy.

I suppose even great artists like Picasso and whatnot change their style, so... we're just normal, right? Right? 🤣

Plus yes, the brain wants candy, and that means play, and that means experimenting. :)

@Laurie Ohh, shame it's complicated to change! But I'm glad it's at least an option for those who need it. :>

And yes, could be changing styles is normal! If not, I will gladly embrace being weird. :D

@Eiliakins it's something that has to be changed on the server end, so not a setting that a user would have access to. The husband can be rather, er, prolific with his posts, so, yeah. :)

Weird rocks!

@Eiliakins dot art is a very active instance. I don’t know if you haven’t actually followed anyone yet or I somehow can’t see your follows from my #Calckey instance but I’d suggest going to your local feed and following as many people as you can. You can always unfollow later if your interests don’t match.

Also @welshpixie is awesome

@CynAq Oh, I have followed some people already! Though I'm very shy so I've mostly followed people who followed me first. 😂

It's wild how people here often tell people to follow and unfollow later if it's not a match. o: On Twitter I saw people lamenting about those who mass-follow people and then unfollow when the person follows back or something and now I'm terrified of unfollowing anyone. 8'D

@Eiliakins Welcome to masto :D

@dirchansky Thank you! Loving the features of this place already even if at first I was super confused about EVERYTHING. :D

@Eiliakins Welcome! A newbie tip: people with similar interests can find you if you put some hashtags in your posts. You can edit your intro (we can do that here!) to add them in, if you want.

Some good hashtags for book folks are #AmWriting , #AmReading and #bookstodon . You can also follow those hashtags to see what others are talking about. I don't know the art hashtags but there's probably one for #DeviantArt .

@willaful Thanks! Ohh yes, I saw a couple of posts about hashtags after I made my intro! 😂 Neat to know they can be edited in later! I sure am prone to forgetting they exist.

That #AmWriting tag looks promising! Thank you for the recommendation! I'll have to look into what kind of art tags there are. Here's to hoping it'll be easier to find like-minded people here than on Twitter!

@willaful @Eiliakins One of the main hashtags for art is #MastoArt and often people will add tags for more precisely what they're doing, like #Krita #DigitalArt or #WaterColour or whatever

@melindrea @willaful Ooh, MastoArt sure is one I wouldn't have thought of on my own. o: Thanks!

I've been looking at specific themed tags, like fantasy, but there clearly is a lot for me to try to find!

@Eiliakins It’s a different effect because here there isn’t an algorithm curating what people can see. You won’t see much unless you follow enough people to populate your feed with interesting content and even more accounts through their boosts.

That being a natural part of the experience, people are giving you the only advice that works, which is to curate your own experience through actively following and unfollowing accounts.

Anyway.

#Welcome to the #fediverse, and enjoy your stay!

@CynAq Thank you for the advice and the welcome! Mastodon sure has felt like a friendly place to be during these first 24 hours. vuv

@Eiliakins Yahh hopefully the confusion doesn't turn you off! It will become easier in a few days 🤣 after you've set up everything to your liking (timeline, posting privacy, etc.)

If you ever have Qs, there are so many folks around to help answer ╰(*°▽°*)╯ or there are accounts like @feditips too!

Looking forward to seeing you around~

@dirchansky Hasn't put me off yet, at least! Once I realized that oh, these AREN'T like forums where you have to sign up for each one separately to interact with people from other forums, things got a lot more understandable. 😂

Thanks again!

@Eiliakins one thing that at least works on the browser clients (which I use more than anything else) is to start writing hashtags and it'll show how many posts using it was written in the last week (which is probably based on your instance, but still gives you an idea).

You can also (in the browser) pin a particular search (such as for one or more hashtags), and you can also (in all clients) follow a specific hashtag.

@melindrea Oh yes, I saw that and it's such a handy feature! Definitely makes it easier to pick out relevant tags for posts too so it's not just a guessing game. o:

Thank you for the tips!

@Eiliakins Maybe try asking for fantasy specific tags on one of the big ones. You can also always make up your own, but it might or might not get picked up by others. @melindrea

@Lurizon Thank you! It's been a blast so far. :D I feel it's been way easier to find artists to follow compared to other places!

@Lurizon Ohh, not a bad idea. o: I haven't stumbled upon any other art server admins yet. 🤔 Time to dig up the list I was sent when I asked what Mastodon even was. xDD
Thanks for the idea!

@Lurizon Ohh, I'd love to take you up on that offer, especially if you already have the list ready and it's no trouble! 👀 I already stumbled upon the Comics Town Mayor which defo goes on my follow list!

@Lurizon I didn't even know what Alt-Text was before I joined this place. 😂 And now I'm addicted to writing all these detailed descriptions.

Thank you for the warm welcome and the help! eue