Caution - PatrikTheDog

I've commissioned this artist at the 30th of October 2019.

[Mod edit]:  Original listing - https://www.furaffinity.net/view/33612846/

Sent her references of my feral only character [1] ("feral only" means, there IS NO anthro reference), and told her the pose I would like to be in [2].
2 months followed without a response. I received not a single note. I haven't seen a single WIP.
At 12th of December 2019, she made a submission on FA. A fully finished picture, portraying my feral character as an anthro [3]. I didn’t have any say in it. I didn’t ever gave consent to this.

I requested a change and Patrik agreed [4]. So far so good.
I received a fix proposal the same day. But it wasn't working for me, the arms had anatomical issues [5]. So I told her those arms need some fixing [6], and gave her a reference to work with [7].
Even though only the arms needed fixing, Patrik was insisting she had to change the entire picture. I pressured that this was not the case, the rest can stay as it is [8].
I didn't receive a response. I sent another note to make sure and I didn't receive a response there either [9].

So then days and weeks pass and new submissions were uploaded. In January I tried speaking to her on Telegram. 3 days later I get the response that I should remain patient.
2 weeks later I ask again. No response.
2 weeks later, again, I ask again. No response.
1 week later, I ask again. No response [10].
All while she was active on FA and Twitter, mind you. Uploading all the submissions, obviously working on art, obviously being available.

And finally, February 12th, the day she started uploading submissions for the SECOND batch, I lost my patience. Thus far she has managed to work on 20 other artworks, but not on the fix of mine. I complained about her business practices and stated my ultimatum that, if she wants to keep the money, I expect a proper fix.
Finally she was able to respond, within 40 minutes even. Told me she didn't have time to do it. And left it at that without another response for another week again [11].

So February 18th (meanwhile 5 more submission were made, AND she opened slots for the third batch [12]), I asked "Will you work on the fix once your entire queue is empty?" I asked if she could finally respond in a reasonable time to me.
She responded within a minute, and sent another fix proposal [13]. It was feral this time... but absolutely not the pose I had asked for [14].
I'll be honest here, I could've left it at that and said "you know what, it's fine", but I refused to accept this after how I was treated all this time. I gave very proper instructions, very proper references and I'm getting this thrown at my face like "that's what you get, be happy with it"? No. Just no.

So what followed was a discussion about the details I gave her. I gave her all the screenshots of the notes she didn't care to respond to, which explained exactly what I wanted. I was really frustrated at this point [15]. I spoke to her about her business practices, how she is treating me and leaving me completely behind. 25 artworks on top of mine, and that's when I get my fix? I should've gotten the fix right then and there.
All she said was that every other drawing had no errors (yeah, if you don't show your customers, they can hardly complain, can they?). She "didn't have time to fix the artwork". But she had time for 25 other artworks [16]?

The discussion went a little wild at this point, too much information to put it all together. I wanted to show her how I have been treated unfairly by her.[17][18][19]

But here's the real cream of it all, and I'll pull her quote directly: "It is also your fault that you did not write in the description in which form you want your character" [20]
It is my fault that she drew my feral only character, to which she had an entire album of feral references, as an anthro?
Apparently, ALL the customers (and I mean every single one of them) do state wether they want to be anthro or feral [21].
Yes, I did in fact not state wether or not I wanted to be feral, because I had the wild assumption, that it would be completely, unquestionably obvious, that if I send an entire album full of feral only references, that I would like to be feral.

So, if it was "my fault" that I didn't state if I wanted to be feral or anthro, if she was unsure and just had to decide on her own...
"Why didn't you ask me?", I questioned.
"no time"... [22]
...
So Patrik literally claims that she had "no time", sending a note with a single question, which would take one minute at most, within the span of 2 months, before the completion of the artwork.

This is what makes it shameful. This is why I am so angry, frustrated and appalled.

At the 29th of March I have told Patrik that she has time to finish the fix until April 26th, because that's when my PayPal's Buyer Protection for this transaction will expire.
I have also told her that I extracted everything and will make an Artist Beware post soon, wether or not she actually finishes the fix. At this point she still has the chance to make it the best it can be.
Additionally I requested the artwork to be removed from all sites it had been posted on.
This message was unresponded to until short before the expiration date.
Eventually I activated PayPal’s Buyer Protection service, wrote a Trouble Ticket to FA about the Situation (about wanting the submission removed) and informed Patrik about it [23].

The 11th of May, Patrik asked me to cancel the PayPal dispute, for whatever reason. I did not comply, as it would eradicate my right to ever receive my money again [24].

15th of May I got fully refunded and FA Staff removed the submission.


I thought we were done. But unfortunately, it doesn’t end here.

At the 1st of June, Patrik sent me another “fixed” artwork, fully finished [25]. I did never ask for this. She asked me if I wanted the drawing.
I replied that I don’t. It is a finished piece of the first fixing proposal [5], which I had already rejected before. How am I supposed to receive this, after all this hassle about her not following my instructions? Not only is there so much negativity associated with the artwork now, it is still not fixed! The anatomy is still wrong on there, in a way that I find unacceptable. And again, I rejected this exact thing before!
I did not want to receive a “gift” either, that wouldn’t feel right. I was willing to pay her again, if she would have corrected it. I told her how I feel about all of it [26].

I will be entirely honest here, I don’t know why she did that. Was it supposed to be a gift, a redemption, an apology? Whatever it was, she failed me because it was the exact same thing. It was the EXACT SAME GAME she played with me here.
She finished a picture without having me look at it.
She didn’t work on the fixes I requested.
She finished it only after the entire queue was done.
I did not consent to her doing that with my character.
I am sorry, but no. These are the exact things I complained about, and she did it again. This feels much less than a gift, but more than a stab with a knife.

Patrik proceeded to show me the differences between the two finished pieces [3][25], insisting that she did change it to feral. Which, yes it was feral, but anatomically unacceptable for me, as the forelegs of a feral canine don’t bend that way.

For some reason, she picked up that Feral vs Anthro argument up again. Which lit another discussion about her business practices [27].

She then went back to insisting that she did a fix. Which I denied, telling her exactly what is wrong, and which solution I proposed before, 4 months ago [28], reciting my message from February [15].

Patrik proclaimed the case as over. Saying that now I have my money, and art. (As a fair sidenote, I do not accept the art. I’ve never added it to my private gallery and I never will.)
I responded saying that it isn’t all about the money for me. It’s about how ignorant she is towards the fact that when people pay for something, they expect a proper result for their price.
She only replied saying that my money has been returned.
At this point I admit, I lost my cool. I was infuriated by her ignorance towards the actual issue I was trying to tell her all those months since our first interaction. Telling her that she was treating me disrespectfully. Telling her how other artists struggle to even get as far as selling their art for that money, which she takes for granted. A little bit of back and forth on the same old themes again [29].

Interestingly, she admitted that her life has been changing and that it has been hard. Admitting that she doesn’t have the time to do commissions [30]. But that’s the only thing she would openly admit to me, before we were talking about business again. I’m still pushing the point that her business model is not okay and customer unfriendly [31].

And this concludes the end of it [32].


My beware reads as follows:
If you commission PatrikTheDog,
don’t expect to see a result within any reasonable time.
Don’t expect her to respond to your questions or issues. Most of your messages will go by unread and unresponded to.
Don’t expect her to respect your requests of changes, and if there are any to be made, you will be put at the end of the current (or next) queue, before she will do it.
You will not receive a WIP and she will not ask for your consent before she uploads artwork of your character, which the final result you might have issues with, as it was in my case.
She treats her customers with no respect, taking it for granted that she is earning money from you.
She will blame you for her own mistakes.
You will only receive a refund if you force her to, for example by using PayPal’s Buyer Protection service. Which she will request you to cancel, for no reason at all.


You might be asking, what do I want at this stage?

Patrik is a wonderful artist, no doubt. I absolutely admire her style, which is very unique, clean and beautiful. I am truly saddened that I possibly can not ever commission her again, to have any valuable piece of her artworks.
But her business practices are the just absolutely infuriating and customer unfriendly. She doesn’t know how to treat her customers right, and just expects them to play along her game. You’re a good customer as long as you don’t have any complaints about her. But when you do, since you might be caring about the artwork that you’re commissioning, expect some backlash.

What I truly want from her is a sincere apology. I feel mistreated and disrespected. Not once did she show some humility to what has happened. It seems like that I was only annoying her, when really, I just wanted to be a customer and treated with, at the very least, casual respect and attention.
I want her to do better than this, revise her business practices and think about how she treats art again. It is a shame that a talented artist like herself is going such a shady and unhealthy way.


Now you know the full story. I hope I can help make a change.

Below are all the sources I marked by numbers in the text above:

(Some links contain NSFW)

[1] https://imgur.com/a/LHZBi
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[3]
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[7] https://img.thrfun.com/img/080/750/.....tanding_x1.jpg (Not the original I sent her, as it disappeared from the web. But a very similar one.)
[8]
[9]
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[11]
[12] https://www.furaffinity.net/view/35115002/
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[14]
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