Between 10-15 years ago, I used to draw comic page commissions where I would offer to illustrate a page of script by the commissioner.  The idea was that this would set me apart from all of the artists doing mostly pinup work, and it also sounded like a fun project.  It *was* pretty fun for a while, although the kind of jobs that would come my way quickly transitioned (so to speak) into mostly fetish or transformation pieces. 

I was OK with this for a while, and did them for a couple of years.  I felt an ego boost from having folks enjoy my work and be willing to pay for it, but eventually wasn't real happy with the subject matter and ceased doing fetish-style work about ten years ago.

At the same time, I would post the work here on DA, and they would get a *ton* of views and faves.. which is also gratitifying.  As years went by, I found that I wasn't super proud of a lot of the work I had posted due to the subject matter, and I'd also improved as an artist/inker to the point of disliking my earlier work because it wasn't as well done.

I removed a goodly chunk of the more risque pieces from my gallery, but left a few milder ones... which still get a few favorites a month, many years later.  These faves still feed my ego, but the work is so far removed from the quality of work I do now, that even the more innocuous ones make me cringe when I see them.

Also, those faves mean people are seeing that work, enjoying it, and might even enjoy my more recent work, which is pretty mild in comparison.

Anyway, I think I've convinced myself while writing this into doing another purge of the rest of that stuff from my gallery... it's just not 'me' anymore.   Even though a few of them have tens of thousands of views.