For those unawares, Pixiv is one of Japan’s largest online communities for artists, animators and storytellers. With millions members residing within Japan and across the world, you would be hard pressed to struggle finding an artist which doesn’t suit your personal tastes, whether they be safe for work (SFW) or not safe for work (NSFW). By default, members are able to message artists with support, enquiries and the occasional requests for commissions. But unlike services such as SKEB which I recently reviewed, there has been no built-in system to support request taking, payment and delivery. Until now.
In an email just sent out by the service to all members, a new Requests system will be released on both mobile and desktop version of the site. The following is how they pitched the system:
By turning on the Requests feature, creators will be able to solicit creative requests from their fans on pixiv in return for a fee. Creators can set a “target price” for their requests in advance. Fans can request work they would like to see come to life by the hands of creators who have activated the Requests feature.
Creators can choose the requests they would like to take on among all the requests received and start working on them. Requests are then completed by posting the finished work on the creator’s profile page or by posting them as URL-restricted works that can only be accessed from those who sent the request.
Requests that are taken on via the Requests feature can be fully completed on pixiv. Creators solicit paid requests, choose which requests they would like to take on, and publish their work to be delivered to their fans, all of which happens on pixiv.
The Requests feature is compatible with all four types of works that can be posted on pixiv: illustrations, manga, novels, and Ugoira. The feature is also provided in five languages and is thus available to international users as well. Moreover, in addition to one-on-one requests, we are planning to provide an additional feature to allow fans to request works together.
Given the active userbase on PIXIV, this could easily become a gamechanger for those like myself who do love spending the occasional buck (or several hundred) on a piece of artwork from one of our favourite creators. You can read more about the service HERE, but it will be interesting to see if/how they manage translations between languages, quality assurance, and any limits on whom can accept requests in the first place.
You can expect a review of this service on The Otaku’s Study when it goes live!
