I've made a lot of posts that have taken a considerable amount of my time to make, mostly video edits. I don't think any of them (over 100 across 2 accounts) have ever gotten above ~50 upvotes. About a year ago, I made a post of a meme with the guy getting kicked out of the office saying "High effort and quality gifs". It got over 500 upvotes. That made it seem like people actually want that. In response, I've spent many hours doing video edits, even creating !high_quality_gifs@lemmy.sdf.org (since the LW community is parked and never will receive posts), and making content for that community until I started to get burned out on my hobby. A large percentage of what I have posted has been OC on principle. I've learned that people just don't care.
Why in the world should I keep making video edits when the entirety of the fun has been sapped out by people not caring? I could spend 8-10 hours on a project and people simply won't care because it isn't instantly digestible. Things like memes and 40-100 year old comic strips do incredibly well. It seems like the only 2 examples of high effort that get some engagement are SDF's own !unix_surrealism@lemmy.sdf.org , and !custardfist@feddit.nl. Notable mention to some of the pics communities.
I guess what I'm really ranting about here is not that the things I make aren't appreciated (because the very few comments are generally positive), but the fact that most people don't even want it around or care.
I'm not sure I can keep up the grind anymore. The joy has been sapped out of my hobby. And for what? An instantaneous downvote with every post.
I decided to check out your posts on high quality gifs and they all seem to have the same problem. They are very difficult to follow. There are a number of reasons for this but more often than not, it is a combination of some or all of the problems.
I am not providing an opinion on the quality of the posts, only on their accessibility.
EDIT: Also, I had no idea the community existed. You might want to cross post some of your creations on the star trek meme communities to help others find you.
Thanks for this. The posts have been mostly me trying with no prior experience. I will certainly adjust things with this feedback. I haven't posted there in some time, and I think I have gotten better overall, but you make a very valid criticism about accessibility.