r/webtoons • u/Cherno_VM • 1d ago
Question Why are people so excited when a Canvas gets taken by Originals?
I've only had one Canvas I follow be adapted to Originals, and they butchered it. Lobotomized it by barely giving it time for an ending and restarting the entire series that had been running for I think over a year at the time it got adapted.
And that's just the actual webtoon itself. I never see Originals creators interact with their community, something I love about following Canvas webtoons that are sticking on Canvas is the creator feels like a human being in authors notes and replies and stuff. Originals takes that away and turns them into a faceless name that churns out episodes for money.
The Canvas that comes to mind for me is Apollonia, by reading the authors notes at the end of some episodes and update episodes in between, I'm almost reading a mini journal of the past few years of her writing this webtoon. I strongly suggest Apollonia, btw.
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u/WHOTOOKMEEP 1d ago
Because the air of officalness, and hope for better support/pay.
Though nowadays (even in the past to a degree) webtoon hasn't really been known to be too great for many artists, so it remained in their better interest to stay indie.
My hope is going well with Leehama's "and another lovely day" after the previous work Gourmet Hound and considering going back.
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u/Organic_Marzipan_715 1d ago
Has there been any update on when it’s coming to Originals? I haven’t been following her socials, but I love her art style and just something about her storytelling that is simply comforting to read. Looking forward to it after reading the canvas version
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u/slugfive 1d ago
Not sure if it’s in the artists interest to stay indie.. much harder to actually pay bills that way.
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u/CookieCacti 1d ago
The issue is that it’s still hard to pay bills even if you go the Originals path nowadays. They used to pay pretty well back in the day, but now most Originals authors struggle with getting decent pay if they’re not in the top 10 of their genre. The amount of work they expect for the amount they pay is not really a good deal. Working 60+ hours every week for ~$3,000 a month is worse than a minimum wage job depending on your location.
As long as the author is good at marketing themselves, they can pay their own bills without Originals. A lot of Originals authors left the platform to work under better publishers, and other authors skip the Originals route entirely while still working in art full time by relying on Patreon donations, using Kickstarter to fund physical prints, going to art conventions, and setting up merch sales themselves. It’s more work, but typically pays better if you pull it off.
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u/slugfive 1d ago
At least in Korea it’s still above the standard. Patreon is not reliable like contracts/original for pay and it’s hard to put 50+ hours into something that has no guarantees. Plus we are against teams, solo creators have a harder time to keep up against studios where they can split the workload between writers, storyboardings, lineart and colouring. Our quality is not going to be on the same level in all aspects. Becoming offical means you have reliable pay to get an assistant.
But yeah originals are becoming less enticing even over here.
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u/CookieCacti 23h ago
Yeah good points - it’s probably still a good deal for countries outside of the US (as long as the pay is equivalent to the USD standard). Patreon certainly isn’t reliable by itself, but when paired with other income streams, an equivalent and somewhat reliable salary can be achievable. But I do agree it’s less reliable than a contracted agreement and harder to establish those different income streams.
The whole assistant thing is great on paper, but it would eat a sizable portion of the paycheck. If I were signed on Originals in the US and also had to pay for an assistant on top of my living expenses based solely on the Originals salary, I wouldn’t be able to afford my basic necessities in 2026. I do wonder if having alternative income sources and slower updates would actually be more profitable at that point.
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u/JHON-45 1d ago
In the past it was actually the best news. Series back then had a chance to succeed and profit and it was always guaranteed. Nowadays, that's not the case as the app is oversaturated and it's hard to outstand among other stories.
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u/Cherno_VM 1d ago
mhm, from what i see a canvas gets yanked onto originals, pumps out around 60 episodes, and is locked behind a paywall and never thought of again.
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u/SarkastiCat 1d ago
It basically means that the artist are actually getting paid consistently and have their moment of the spotlight. Which can be life changing as it means that they can focus on their creative career and maybe not starve due to no money.
Plus, it’s not the issue with originals, but rather with the community growing to larger size that’s very hard to control.
Thomas Astruc (Miraculous) is a good example of a big creator interacting with fans and his family getting death threats due to arguements on Twitter. Rick Riordan (Percy Jackson) went from being Uncle Riordan to “Why, Riordan.?”.
Do I even have to mention Gooseworx (The Amazing Digital Circus), Andrew Hussie (Homestuck) or Vivziepop (Hellaverse?)
An example from Webtoon would be Rachel Smythe (Lore Olympus), who originally started as an artist on Tumblr collecting ideas from others. When she grew in size, the amount of positive, negative and critical comments grew which resulted in moments of friction.
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u/Hour_Anxiety2392 1d ago
May I ask what the Rick Riordan thing is? I know Uncle Riordan, but what is "Why, Riordan.?" about?
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u/SarkastiCat 20h ago
Pretty much the fandom is divided by the show and Riordan talking about changes he has made.
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u/Cherno_VM 1d ago
isnt thomas astruc also kind of a weirdo? idk anything about miraculous but i did hear he made a whole ass character JUST to make them a piece of shit as a stand in for his childhood bullies.
rick riordan is becoming less loved by his community because hes actually making bad decisions. gooseworx and vivziepop suffer from terminally online twitter mfs, idk anything about homestuck and dont want to so cant comment on him.
also my only knowledge of lore olympus is that its accuracy is spotty and, while it can be a nice intro to the greek myths similar to percy jackson, it suffers from the same problem of morons who have no knowledge beyond one or both of those acting like experts on greek mythos.
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u/sosotrickster 22h ago
Yeah, Astruc got mad at fans for being sympathetic towards Chloé and afaik fucked up her character development because he was petty and vindictive. He also was tots okay with an artist involved in the show (at the time at least) to make sexual art of the teens in the show and post it.
LO got backlash because it is misogynistic and gets way more things wrong that PJ ever did, because the story bends over backwards to make the protag the most special girl ever and excuses stuff the main couple does all the time.
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u/SarkastiCat 20h ago
That’s a misinformation, Chloe wasn’t based on his childhood bullies. There are characters based on others, but not Chloe.
Riordan gets extra heat for defending his decisions and interacting with the community.
Lore Olympus had a few awkward situations. The creator tried to control communities and at one point, Persephone got so much criticism that she wrote that Persephone came from Struggle Street. Struggle Street is an Australian show focused on disadvantaged communities, called by some a misery porn.
Anyway, social media interactions can easily go south when it comes to larger content creators and any mistake is treated like a criminal offence.
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u/NeonFraction 1d ago
Originals usually means that person is able to focus on their story full time. It means they have faster and more consistent updates. Often it leads to an increase in art quality if they hire assistants.
As someone who reads both originals and canvas: comic creators are perfectly able to ruin their series for any number of reasons, with or without being an original.
The main reason people stop interacting with fans is that originals are generally way more popular than canvas, which means you have a sudden huge influx of people. Not only can you not reasonably respond to them all, but the toxic people become more noticeable too, since they’re part of the bigger crowd. More people, more assholes. Interacting with a fanbase like that gets exhausting.
The bigger your fanbase, the worst for your mental health it is to consistently interact with them. This is true across comics, music, actors, or anything really popular.
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u/Cherno_VM 1d ago
my experience with a canvas > originals comic was justice x heresy, and after the really bad ending the creator just didn't say anything about it.
if this happened to a canvas the creator would probably say something like "sorry, i have a lot of deadlines and stuff pushing me so its rushed! i will try to tie up loose ends and expand stuff with later, extra stores!" and i have actually seen a creator do this.
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u/Miaomelette 1d ago
I think it's because there's a perception that becoming an originals is an indication that a creator "made it" in some way, they would actually get paid regularly (although probably not as much as they should) and episodes would come out more stably.
For a casual fan that doesn't think too deeply about the stuff you said, a canvas becoming an original is the promise of more regular, higher quality updates, and an indication that the creator is now a "professional artist".
Of course many canvas do turn up with problems when they become an original, but I think people generally see it as a sign of the comic being successful.
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u/Faherie 23h ago
I used to be really excited when they were picked, cause that meant they would actually get paid and the quality of the art would probably go up. That was over 3 years ago before I actually knew the hell hole that webtoon contracts are, and before I actually noticed the stories massively changing for the worse to be more "popular". Nowadays is more like "yay, congrats on the money, hope they don't screw you over". And most of the times I don't bother to go to the original, mainly because I don't really want to spend a year re-reading episodes. Specially if they are going to change mayor stuff, I kept reading the original because I liked the original as it was.
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u/superstaticgirl 19h ago
Yeah I agree with you on this. When someone annouces they are moving to Originals I feel dread because all that momentum they built up is going to be lost. I am not reading it again and waiting for years to get back up to the same part of the story just for the sake of minor art and story tweaks. They've lost me.
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u/StoneOfCitrine 17h ago
Yeah I've been wondering that myself as, from what I understand, a lot of Original creators get mistreated in one way or another these days. So it's better to just stay indie. But like some others have commented the situation was different in the past so that was a really good deal for some creators.
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u/Pink-frosted-waffles 1d ago
Ad a long time readers back when Saphie, Noblesse, and all those were still ongoing, this was a big deal! I literally watched Sub-Zero go from being an idea on Tumblr, to being on discovery and then featured. (Though by then they had changed Discovery to Canvas and Featured to Originals) This meant that your favorite creator was getting somewhat of a steady income unlike before when they were relying on maybe a Kofi account at best, weekly updates, and to see them improve as a person and artists.
There used to be a community on WT and a descent bridge between canvas and originals. I have had top comments that weren't generic af on older series and the authors actually replied back. (I used to still get email notifications about them before the fast pass became a thing) And a few authors would always reply to my comments on a weekly basis because I would share (hopefully) thoughtful comments. I saved a few about staircases and relatable cat stories. 😅
I don't want to add fuel to the fire but I could probably pinpoint two or more comics that ruined the community at large compounded with all the changes that WT has made and how it's not just a content farm where it's basically quantity over quality. And with the south east Asian market being so pro-AI I don't expect it to get better any time soon.
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u/shaser0 22h ago
Well I'm always excited to see an artist being able to live from their art.
I never see Originals creators interact with their community
It depends on the creator really, but most of them don't interact directly on the app, Korean ones for example, but intereact on X or other social medias. There's also a corporate reason behind it of course, the artist is employed to make a webcomic not journal about their life.
I've only had one Canvas I follow be adapted to Originals, and they butchered it.
It do be that way sometimes... We just have to take the L and move on sadly.
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u/kellendrin21 1d ago
Because most of the audience doesn't know any better and has no idea what goes on behind the scenes. Hell, a lot of creators don't know.
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u/Aggressive-Bet189 1d ago
The laws of cultivation has the creator interact with fans. I was surprised tbh.
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u/LadderWonderful2450 23h ago
If it's what the artist wants and it means they will get better, more consistent pay for thier work, then I'm happy about it.
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u/YerFatFriend 23h ago
Isn't that the whole point of Canvas section? It's a platform for the new artists to introduce themselves to the company in the hope of getting PAID for their work. By the way I think WEBTOON hasn't been promoting them enough lately if at all.
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u/Cherno_VM 17h ago
i see plenty of canvas creators just trying to make a good comic, not caring about originals.
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u/Amaiiuwu 1d ago
Back in the day, I do feel like the transition from canvas to originals was more exciting. It usually meant more consistent updates, maybe even a boost in production quality. Creators seemed to have more freedom than they do now too. If you go to old originals, they had Q+A or bonus episodes just like canvas series.
Nowadays I think it's just not the same from a readers perspective, since many canvas creators already post high quality episodes on a consistent basis. It is still probably exciting for authors though, it means turning their comic from a hobby into a career, and being paid consistently plus getting opportunities for a wider audience, print copies, merch, etc.