Join the Spy Scouts is available as a free download, or a high quality 12×18 print for $20. Either can be used for our contest.
Comic making routine / My process for survival
So, doing a 5-a-week comic is pretty challenging. Heck, I have to admit it’s the most challenging project I’ve ever done.
It would probably be fine if I didn’t do conventions, or travel for work every 8 weeks. (But I do.) Those end up hitting my buffer supar hard, nearly annihilating it. Unfortunately, this puts me in the desperate situation
Because of daylight savings time, my workplace (in Washington State) is now on the same time as I am.
- Get up at 4:30 am (iPhone = alarm)
- Make coffee, stumble to computer (Painful)
- Turn on computer, look at email
- Answer email as fast as possible, while waking up
- Stop myself from cruising the interwebnets
- Look at big time line, and see where we’re at in the story
- Review the strip I made yesterday (that won’t post for a week.)
- Get a basic idea of what I should do
- Lay down dialog (If I’m wise that day.)
- Refine dialog, start assembling the page
- Race to get done by 6:00 am (Usually I do.)
- If not done at 6:00 am, hit it again at lunch break to finish up
- Make a few notes in the document for the next strip, if I have an idea (This is new, but good.)
- Save file as AI, EPS, and PNG. (EPS prevents me from accidentally overwriting the AI)
- At the end of the day, take the PNG and compress it into a jpg in Fireworks
- Upload the jpg into trusty WordPress (which I do love)
- Schedule the comic, and attempt to write something slightly interesting (But likely fail whale)
- Repeat
- Friday, Saturday and Sunday I sleep in, so I don’t die. (I work four 10 hr days.) But, I attempt to get a comic done each of these days as well. (Usually, I do.)
What isn’t working:
- Coming back to the comic after a convention/work trip, having not done any for a week. I lose a lot of momentum for the story, and have to really retrace my steps.
- Futzing around with the artwork before I’ve written all of the strip’s dialog. This ends up wasting a lot of time and seems to slow me down.
What is working:
- Routine. Doing it everyday is a good thing, and can be satisfying if I like the work that I did that day
- Writing the dialog first, before doing ANYTHING else. You’d think that this would be easy, but when the idea well is dry, it’s just natural
What would work better:
- If I had a larger buffer, I’d not feel so stressed out when my buffer gets really low. It really does effect my writing, because I feel forced to take the easy way out. This isn’t good, and I’m fighting it with 2 fists.
- Daniel
Related posts:
(Toni is a fink!)
Wow. That’s a lot of work and dedication.
By workplace do you mean the head office? Cause I thought you went to an office in Phoenix?
Now, I work from home, for a company in Washington State. I travel up there (to the head office) for meetings with my team. But this office is also Steam Crow central, so I’m there in the mornings and evenings and weekends, too.
For the first year of Kitty Litter I did it five days a week and it killed me. My updating quickly went from five days to every other to mon, wed, fri until I had totally burned out and went on a hiatus. Now I’m doing it mon wed fri again and having to build back an audience because of two years of inconsitency. My point being is that I totally understand where you’re coming from. I’ve been keeping a buffer lately and it really does help with the writers block. Didn’t intend on writing a paragraph. Thanks for the consistent awesomeness.
Hey Ryan, thanks for sharing your experience. It’s impressive that you did 400 strips before moving onto your own URL. Cool.
I’m hoping to avoid burnout and get my buffer back up.
I know it’s a dumb thing to say, but I wish I could help somehow. You do an awesome job!! Are there hopes of making Steam Crow full time anytime in the near future? Would that relieve some stress, or just open a whole new can of it?
Hee, hee! Just noticed the Steam Crow right behind Karl & Kaz. Doh, so close!!
Ooooh, random E over the pillar. Do you see what I see?
Yes, it is my goal to do Steam Crow full time. Every year we seem to move closer, though we’re still a way off. I figure if we got $150-$200 a day in sales, we’d be there. (And remember the product itself costs money.)
How to help? There are a bunch of ways, beyond simply buying product:
1. Spread the word. Introduce new people to MonCom.
2. Link us up on your blog/site/facebook
3. Interview us, and put it on your blog/site/facebook. (Via email)
4. Post about MonCom in various forums. (There are tons with thread like “any new cool webcomics out there?”)
I’ve been wanting to really solidify the “Street Team” concept, with more helpful ideas and perhaps missions.
Wanna join?