Hello! First time poster for this subreddit. I originally posted this on the choosing beggars sub reddit, but realized it's more an entitled people story with some choosing beggar aspects, since the entitled person expected way too much, then complained when they didn't get exactly what they wanted. Anyways, I heard voicey had a sub reddit, so I wanted to post the story here too. Big fan of him and hope he reads this! :D Sorry about my spelling and format. English is my first language and I'm not on mobile. I'm just bad at typing sometimes so please excuse me :') Onto the story.

Cast:

EP: Entitled person who couldn't grasp the concept that not everyone will be head over heels to do that much work for no money.

ME: Anime nerd who spends more time drawing than I should.

For some background info, i'm a female who loves to draw as a hobby. Keep in mind I've been drawing seriously for about three years now and I'm at a fairly basic art skill level. I sometimes post my art online as well. This particular time I posted fanart I drew for an anime on an online community. It was a small community so the drawing got featured, which is how this EP found me. They messaged me saying they loved my art and wanted to know if I was up to take a special offer they had. I asked what it was, and they said that they were working on a big project where they were writing a story, and was looking for someone to illustrate the WHOLE THING FOR FREE. This is a summary of the conversation. It won't be exactly word to word how it went since this happened a while ago, but i'll try to make it as exact as I can remember.

EP: "Hi I really like your art"

ME: "Aw thank you!"

EP: "I was wondering If I could ask you something?"

ME: "Yeah sure what is it?"

EP: "I've been working on a huge project lately involving a story I'm writing. I've been searching for people to illustrate it for me. Only problem is I don't have any money to pay them. Your art looks nice so I was wondering if you'd do it for me."

(Side note. Let me mention they started off saying they would commission me, then shortly after they explained what they wanted, changed and was like, "Oh no wait I'm sorry, I actually don't have any money to pay you whoops.")

ME: "Wow I'm honored you like my art enough to want me to illustrate your comic book series! And that sounds like an interesting idea, but I don't think I can do that."

EP: "I promise it'll be great and you get to draw all my fun characters! Plus I'll credit you since I plan to post it to YouTube and have my friends voice over it. That way you'll get more followers."

Ah yes, paying in exposure is so much more beneficial to me than actual money.

ME: "I don't doubt your story is great, but illustrating a comic isn't easy. Especially for me since that's not really what i'm good at."

I began to asking them questions about what they wanted in case I had advice on who they could go to instead of me. Turns out this comic book series would be MANY BOOKS LONG. And they not only wanted me to illustrate it like any other comic book. Oh no no no, they wanted every single panel to be fully colored and shaded. And they wanted it to be drawn at a professional skill level like other mangas you would read. Like My Hero Academia and Attack on Titan (A manga is a Japanese comic book). They even gave me examples of what they wanted, and they straight up sent me images of comic pages from professionally illustrated Manga, which I wasn't capable of doing since I'm close to being a beginner artist. They also mentioned this story was an original idea, but it took place in the same world as the anime I drew fanart for, and almost all the characters belonged to that anime, not them.

ME: "So this is a fan comic you're saying?"

EP: "No not at all. It's completely original and I thought of everything myself. I'm just using characters from this anime."

ME: "It may have a few of you'r oc's in it (Original characters), but if it has characters from a preexisting franchise and takes place in the same world, it's still considered a fan comic."

EP: "No I promise you it's completely original. So are you up for it?"

ME: "Sorry, I just don't have that kind of time or motivation. Even if you were paying me, I'd still turn you down. That's just too much work for me to handle. Plus I'm not at a professional illustrating level yet, and won't be for a while. I can barely draw basic backgrounds."

EP: "But I promise you'll love the story and will have a blast drawing for it! And I'll allow you to take breaks if you want. They just can't be too long, and you have to continue when I want you too."

ME: "I'm sorry I can't. If you want to find someone to illustrate it with all the requirements you want, you're going to have to commission a professional, and trust me when I say you'll have to pay A LOT of money to commission all that. I'm willing to draw you a sketch though if you want, just so you can see what the characters would look like in my style."

EP: "Alright." They then tell me which characters they want me to draw.

ME: "I'm sorry, I don't know what they looks like. Could you send me a reference picture of them? "

EP: "How do you NOT know who they are? They're super popular in the manga!"

ME: "I'm sorry, but I haven't gotten to that part of the story yet."

EP: "Pfft." They sent me reference pictures of the characters, and explained they want a few changes done to their appearances.

I draw them a simple sketch of the two characters and send it to them. They proceed to complain about EVERYTHING.

CB: "That's It??? The eyes are way too big ,and you really need to work on your anatomy. If you're going to illustrate my story I need some improvement on your skills."

ME: "I'm sorry but like I said, I'm not at the skill level you want, Also I gave you something for free , please just take it. I can't illustrate your comic but I'm willing to sketch you stuff."

EP: "Alright, I'll request more art from you."

I didn't want to be rude so I left it at that.

Time skip a few days:

EP: "Hey I want you to draw me something."

ME: I didn't want to draw them anything, but I have a hard time saying no. "Sure what do you want?"

EP: "So I want you to draw a seven panel comic page of my characters- (Proceeds to detail every single panel)

After they sent me a long detail message of what they wanted, I realized they were trying to trick me into drawing a portion of their comic and passing it off as a simple request.

ME: "I'm sorry dude, but I already told you I won't be illustrating your comic. I'll do a simple sketch, but nothing else."

EP: Hmph ok. (proceeds to give me details on what they want. It was something like two of the characters from the anime waking in the snow with one character on the other's shoulders. And a bunch of details in the background)

Me: I finished the drawing and sent it to them. "Okay, here's the drawing. It's a simple sketch, and I couldn't put all the details in the background you wanted since I didn't know how to draw that stuff. But I tried to add as much as I could. Sorry about that."

EP: They complain about everything again. "Your anatomy is off, and the eyes are still too big. I wish there was more people in the background and you got the design of the character's scarf wrong.)

ME: "I'm sorry but you never detailed what you wanted the scarf to look like so I did whatever I could think of. Also please don't insult my art. I draw like that on purpose since it's my style."

EP: "It's fine whatever, I'm going to request you again."

ME: "Sorry, but I'm closing requests. I have too much on my plate right now to draw for people for free.

EP: "That's not fair! I need art for my story! My story a really good and people will love to read it! But whatever. I can just request someone else who knows how to draw them better."

ME: "Then do that'

I've since blocked this person, but i still occasionally see them commenting on people's posts, expecting others to illustrate their comic book series.

I'm sorry if this story was kind of long or lame, but that was my first experience with a really entitled person. I've had other people ask me for free art, but they are either satisfied with a simple sketch, or understand when I say I can't draw for free. I've never had someone be so pushy with what they wanted. Anyways, that's my story. I hope everyone has a good day!