Update: people using Chrome-based Web browsers (e.g. Opera etc) can install the handy DeviantArt Filter.
Ever wanted to block those ‘giant mega-boobs’ Poser/DAZ renderers from your search results in regular DeviantArt searches? You probably know the ones. You’re searching for something sedate like “gardens” in Digital Art / 3D and… bam, “oh, I’ve run into the mega-boobs guys again”. Since they make pictures of clothed models, they show up in search results even if you block nudity and violence. It’s their right to make such pictures, of course, if it pleases them. I’m very much in favour of free-speech. It’s just that such pictures add nothing to my enjoyment of DeviantArt, and the makers do tend to make a whole lot of such renders. Often of exactly the same scene from slightly different angles.
Here’s how to block them easily from your search results…
1. Install the free Adblock Plus browser add-on, if you don’t already run it.
2. Go to a suitable set of keyword search results. Click on the Adblock Plus icon. Choose “Block Element”.
3. Mouseover and select the booby preview picture, in your search results page.
4. AdBlock Plus will then pop up a search filter rule suggestion. Edit down this search filter by adding a few * wildcards. For example, your resulting blocking rule should look like:
||*.deviantart.net*USERNAME.*
Note that the blocking rule also blocks all file types by adding a final USERNAME.* rather than .jpg, as that would just block the user’s .jpg files (they may also use .png or other types).
However, you will also want to cover the possibility that DeviantArt will sometimes add a tracking -hash after the username, such as USERNAME-7gftu4. For that you’ll need a final blocking rule of…
||*.deviantart.net*USERNAM*.*
Note that the last letter of USERNAME has been snipped off, which will also cover possible use of the tracking hash in the image URL. Be careful with this, as it may also block previews of pictures from other users. For instance, block the user BlubberBlubberBlubber01 and the above wildcard rule would also block pictures from BlubberBlubberBlubber02. So it’ll be down to you to judge how unique your target user’s Username is.
The result…
You can still mouseover the blanked result, and see the picture’s title and stats, and even click through…
Since you set a blocking rule using multiple * wildcards, all that user’s other previews in all future search results will be similarly blanked.
If you want to delete a filter rule, they’re in: Adblock icon | Options | Add your own filters | Remove selected. There you can also “Edit filters as raw text” and copy-paste in a mass blocklist with one instance of ||*.deviantart.net*USERNAM*.* per line.
A note on browsers: I usually browse DeviantArt using the Opera Web browser, and thus use Adblock Plus 1.13.2 to get the above result. I tend to use Opera for DA because of its Turbo Cache feature (Opera’s servers cache large chunks of high-traffic websites) and Opera’s free VNP sometimes helps reach the site when it seems down. All of which is to say that users of the Firefox Web browser may find they will also need to install the Adblock add-on Element Hiding Helper to do the same blocking.