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Opening Remarks

Humantek Art is a company that seems to have a lot of shady practices. I have personally had a few issues with them and their artists in the past, but after 3 of my friends overpaid for art from them that was well below their expectations, I decided to look into them and once I started, it just got worse and worse at every turn. I've decided to compile what I've found through browsing their websites, their social medias, and interviewing other people who have interacted with them in order to share my conclusions, but also to let potential clients of theirs draw their own conclusions with more information.

People I Interviewed About HTA

In order to give the most accurate information I can in this document, I have talked to a wide variety of people who have either commissioned HTA, been contacted by them, or are artists themselves. Some of these people wish to remain anonymous so I have used aliases in their case, but I have given links to everyone who was willing to be named in this project of mine to their preferred social.

My Main Problems with Humantek

In this category, I will outline what I believe to be the most problematic things that I found while looking into the company. These are the 5 big things that I want people to see if they see nothing else in this document.

Tracing Art

Human Tek seems to trace a portion of their art. Whether this is directly from the references given to them or from a template seems to vary, but the biggest example I have is when HimmyVT ordered from them, his reference emotes were copied almost 1-1. The emote he paid for copies the hair, eyes, facial structure, and mouth from the this emote, which he provided as a reference. I've overlaid the two images here. The BRB Screen and the Ending Soon also draw heavily from this emote as well as another reference he provided to the artist. When confronted with this fact, they said it was because he wanted the same which he(Himmy) never indicated.

After he expressed that he was no longer happy, she then provided him with an updated version of the emote with a different head in another style which did not meet the original design specifications given when discussing the character, but this may have been because they said their mental state was disturbed after he refused to accept a redo of the emote or a different emote for free to win him back.

Additionally, they seem to use templates despite saying that they make everything from scratch, but I dont have concrete evidence of this and its all just from comparing references that they've sent to me which share similar traits such as what seem to be the same arms, eyes, etc.

High Prices and Discounts

A lot of times the prices quoted by the artists will be above what I've seen for the market average, especially for comparable quality of work. In some cases like with StillChris, who paid 25USD each for 5 sub badges, all 5 were the same badge but with different colors and effects layered on top while on places such as Fiverr and Vgen you can get more sub badges of equal or greater quality for cheaper prices.

In another instance, Himmy VT commissioned 3 items for a total of 220USD while similar emotes, also animated, can be found for about 15-35USD on Fiverr and Vgen and the screens that I can find closest in quality and style were a much wider range of 20-100USD also on Fiverr and Vgen.

Humantek Artists will often offer discounts saying that they are giving a discount just for you and not to tell other people in some cases. These discounts often don't even bring the price down to the same level as the other prices I was able to find on sites as shown above.

Artists Are Pushy and Keep Doorknocking Comms Even If You Say You Are Uninterested

Many HumanTek artists will doorknock commissions even if you tell them that you aren't interested. This has happened to Me, Nochu, Brent, and I would bet that its happened to many other people. They will strike up conversations with people in twitch chats or DM's from a shared server if they think they can get a commission from them, then try to get them to plan out a project then give them a price after they've already sold them on the vision of the commission.

The Company is Supportive of AI

In a blog post from their website on April 19th 2023, they say that AI has been used in movies as far back as the 2000's with good reception. I did some digging on this topic and came up empty, so this may be referencing depictions of AI such as the AI in A Space Odyssey, but this doesn't make much sense to me either. They also said that artists shouldn't fear the progress of AI in art as it is more likely to spark creativity and innovation. While this could be true from one perspective, they have also sent me an AI image that has been traced over as a reference image for their work, which ties back into tracing art kinda.

At Least Some of the Trustpilot Reviews and Probably Other Recommendations Are Faked

I was lucky enough to speak to some of the clients of Humantek and one of them told me that the Trustpilot review of his commission which included a shoutout for their Vtuber models is fake as they never gave a shoutout of any kind and their Vtuber was from an artist on the site booth. The specific people I talked to about their reviews who told me that they were faked wished to remain anonymous, so I will not be providing any specific names here, but if you look through their reviews on Trustpilot there are a lot of positive reviews that seem overwhelmingly glowing, follow a pattern like a template, have very strange message structure and composition(speaking on the english reviews only as I do not speak the other languages I saw), and/or the reviewer usually only has 1 review.

As an additional pattern I found interesting, on August 23rd 2024, I skimmed the Trustpilot reviews and the dates they were posted and noticed that they were getting a lot of reviews within days of each other and also a lot of days where they would get multiple reviews on a single day. There was a brief period where they received no reviews for 19 days, but that was the only time I saw a gap that long all the way back to January 2, 2024, which is about 8.5 months back at the time of writing this, most gaps being 1 to 5 days, but almost always falling within that span with a few exceptions.

General Shadiness

In this category, I will outline and showcase what I feel are either sketchy, disrespectful, or just generally icky practices of Humantek Art and its artists. None of these are quite as bad as the first 5, but they definitely set off some alarm bells, especially when paired with the first 5 topics.

Asking for Different Methods of Payment From Different Clients

When being paid for a commission, I believe that there is usually a standard method of payment, especially if it's a company running the operation. these artists often ask for Paypal as in the case of StillChris, HimmyVT, and Spaceman, but when talking to my friend Nix, the same person who did HimmyVT's commission asked for Zelle before any other form of payment. This struck me a bit weird as normally I see artists go through paypal and then maybe another method if that doesn't work out, but I haven't heard of an artist just proposing a different form of payment than usual without a reason.

Customer Promotion Videos are Severely Edited and Sometimes Feel Like a Script

The shared experience videos on their website and YouTube channel all feel rather strangely edited and in some cases like they are reading from a script. Neither of these things are proof of them being dishonest, but for a recommendation video, I personally feel like a more natural video would feel a bit more genuine even if it extended the run time by a bit.

I was able to reach out to one of the creators who recorded a video for the HTA YouTube channel who was willing to answer a few questions, but they wished to remain anonymous. They did confirm that the sentiment expressed in the video is accurate so this could very easily just be me taking issue with the editing style.

Testimonials on Their Website Rarely Mention the Same Artist More Than Once

The testimonials on their website showcase tweets from clients shouting out their artists, but they never show the same artist more than once with one exception. This may be because they want to show multiple reviews of different artists, but if an artist was doing really good, I would imagine that they would want them to be front and center so that they could get more commissions and they already have one artist with more than one review, so why not have more for the others too?

They Often Ask for a Shoutout Post and/or Other Forms of Recommendation

After the work is done, or even before in some cases, the artists will ask for shoutouts on twitter, instagram, discord, and/or Trustpilot. Sometimes they even make panels for the client to put under their stream. I understand asking for referrals when the work is finished, and its a definitely common courtesy to give your artist a shoutout after they do work for you, especially if you like it, but asking almost a week in advance like in the case for HimmyVT just feels weird. The animated emote sent on the 30th in the screenshot is when the emote was delivered to Himmy followed later by the panels.

The Amount of References Doesn't Match the Desperation for Commissions

HumanTek Artists always seem desperate for commissions. Doorknocking for commissions in streams and on discord and not leaving you alone when you say no has been a complaint that both I and others have had with them, but they have reference after reference if you ask them for some, which implies that they've had a lot of work. if they're getting so much work to have so many references, shouldn't it be spreading from word of mouth rather than having to hound random people on social media to get them to buy from them?

I fully get that being an artist can be hard, especially if you're trying to make a living off of it, but I really don't think that harassing people for commissions is the best way to go about this. I believe that a better way to get your name out there if you are still trying to do so is to join a commission site like Vgen or Fiver, post to twitter to showcase your art as you work on new and different things, and make content that's cool, funny, or relatable. I know I'm personally more willing to commission an artist I don't know under these conditions over one who showed up and started begging for work time and again after I tell them no. I've talked to multiple artists such as NixJellyGod, Wooien, and Faerlie, and they all agree that interjecting it on people's streams and such is not a great way to go about it.

Multiple Artists Have Sent the Same References

Many artists will share references that are super similar to each other, sometimes even different pieces to a full profile for someone where 2-3 different artists all have a different piece of it but with the exact same style. Additionally, on their twitters, they all use art that is credited to other artists with no distinction between that and their own commissions. Some artists have also sent art as their own when asked for references that other artists have in their portfolios such as Eloise Ethan sending an image to brent that Bliss_Bella has on her artstation portfolio. That's the only example I have specifically, but I have not delved extremely thoroughly into the rabbit hole that is all of the twitter users affiliated with Humantek Art. I've included a list of some of the Humantek Artists I've looked at the twitters of here if anyone wishes to look for themselves without tracking them down.

Will Leave Communities After Getting Commissions in Some Cases

Sometimes after finishing a commission, the artist will leave the server if they joined from a stream, and in some cases, the whole account is deleted and they reach out on a separate account to ask for more commissions. I have no idea if this is in any way a tactic to get more commissions or make them harder to track down, but this has happened to 2 of the 3 people I know who commissioned HTA artists and the 3rd I know at least has a 2nd account as they reached out on it after their other account was blocked by my friend.

Why is Their PayPal at the Bottom of Their Website

I know some people will just have their link to stuff like this in places, like on the back of their car with the tag, "Buy me a drink!" or something, but for a company to do it, it just seems like a really strange thing to do. like if you were to go into a shop to buy something and they just had a bucket that said, "give us free money!" which is kinda just tipping culture, but that's usually reserved for after a service is rendered and is delivered at the same time as the payment for said service and not just a thing to do without reason.

They Have Five Different Addresses for Four Different Branches

The company posts its addresses for its 4 branches at the bottom of their website and also under their contact us page. That's a pretty normal thing for a business to do, but they have 5 different addresses for their 4 different branches. The addresses at the bottom of their page are the ones people will usually see, but under the contact page, the UK branch leads to a different address that's roughly 90 miles away.

I don't know why they have 5 addresses for 4 locations and why all of them lead to places where it seems they aren't, but it seems a bit strange as a company since having the wrong address makes it harder to contact them as a company.

Closing Thoughts

My initial opinions on this company were never phenomenal, but after looking into them, I firmly believe that they are taking advantage of smaller streamers who don't know any better ways to get art, or what good prices for said art should be. I believe that it's better to get art from artists off of a trusted platform or from someone on twitter with their commissions open who has a consistent style and a good reputation. Not everyone may agree with that, but hopefully this document will remind everyone who reads it to be careful, watch out for scammers, and to appreciate your artists.

Thank you for taking the time to read,
Butterfae