DeviantART Search Tips

6 min read

Deviation Actions

elee0228's avatar
By
Published:
12.3K Views


Search is a pivotal piece of the Internet.  Google has become the successful company it is today because it understands this simple fact.  With all the information out there today, it can be difficult finding useful data.  With artwork and images, the task is even more difficult since we are dependent on the accuracy keywords and text descriptions.  If you have ever tried to find the source of a particular piece of artwork, you know how painful this task can be.  The goal of this article is to help give you some tips and take some of the pain out of the process.

1. Know the Basics


FAQ #577: How do I use the Search? is required reading.  Knowing how to use parentheses and well-placed "or" statements can make a huge difference.  You should also be aware you can use the minus-sign in front of keywords to exclude them in your search.  Just read that FAQ entry and you can be putting together awesome searches like:

stooges (moe OR larry OR curly) -shemp

2. Titles, Keywords, and Description


This may seem an obvious point, but it needs to be mentioned.  When that magic DeviantART search bot goes out and looks for answers to your query, it's basically only looking at three things: the title of the deviation, the keywords the artist has added to the deviation, and the description of the deviation.  That's it.  It's not doing OCR on text in the image, it's not looking at comments, and it doesn't know what's in the picture unless the deviant has typed it into one of these three fields during the upload.  If it ain't in one of these fields, you ain't finding it.

Moral of the story?  Make sure you add useful information in the title, keywords, and description.  Doing so means people will actually be able to find your artwork.  DeviantART doesn't let you have blank titles or descriptions, but maybe it needs to require useful information, too.  It is unfortunate that there are wonderful deviations in DeviantART that will never be viewed because deviants are not adding descriptive text with search in mind.

3. Be a Code Monkey


DeviantART has some cool shortcut codes that are used all the time.  Did you know that you can use these as search terms?  It's true!  And very handy too!

:iconusername: :devusername: :thumb#######:

Don't believe me?  Here's a little tale for you:

Once upon a time, a lad named Johnny had discovered the wonders of DeviantART.  He stumbled upon the gallery of an awesome deviant who commissioned a lot of artwork.  He saw that the deviant commissioned so much work that he didn't upload it all into his gallery.  He set about searching based on the deviant's name and came across some of the artwork in the galleries of other artists.  But there was a hole in his soul, as he lamented all the deviations he may not have found.  The DA-Fairy heard the cries of his heart and said unto Johnny, "Fear not, little one" and gave unto Johnny a search term that would fill the emptiness in him:

:iconusername: OR :devusername: -by:username

This baby right here is some mighty powerful searching.  You'll get everything that mentions the deviant except for stuff in their gallery which you know about already.  This is an awesome weapon to have in your search arsenal.

4. Learn a Foreign Language


DeviantART is home to nationals of countries all around the world.  A lot of them don't speak English, which means you have an opportunity to learn a foreign language!  Like Naruto?  Try searching for ナルト.  Hit the Babelfish and translate your favorite search terms into a foreign language and go to town.

5. Google it!


Sometimes you have to think outside the box.  DeviantART's search is really useful, but it has some limitations.  You can use Google to search DeviantART by using the term site:http://deviantart.com followed by what you are looking for.  You can uses this over at Google Images for greater effect.

Hope you got some useful information out of this.  If you did, click the +love button and help spread the word.  Send me a note with any other tips you think should be included in this article and I'll try to keep it updated.



Credits

Brought to you by elee0228

Journal designed and coded by kuschelirmel-stock with textures from lebstock
© 2011 - 2024 elee0228
Comments20
Join the community to add your comment. Already a deviant? Log In
Ludjia's avatar
How does deviantart handle spelling mistakes and capitalization in search?