october 2019

hi again everybody... it's a new month so another update.
there's no autumn weather here because it's the desert, but i honestly just like how the colors of the leaves changing looks a lot.

i spent a lot of time on commissions during the tail end of the month. i have about 12 more -- which sounds like a lot, but about 6 of them are halfway done, and 2 of the others are on hold at the commissioners' requests.
i've been streaming a lot of my work on commissions and various art not related to the comic pages themselves off-schedule just because it's something extra... i'm very disenchanted with commissions and i'd like to not take many more of them for a while after these are done, but i'm torn between wanting a break and wanting a new (-ish... thrifted) mattress.
i've been sleeping on the floor since i moved here in march and it gives me a lot of migraines, and now the bedding i use that can't really be washed has been causing some kind of allergic reaction again because it's several years old (before refeeding i had never had allergies before because i guess it was too much energy to waste). i guess i might hike the prices by like $5 each, but keep them the same for patrons as a bonus.
i'm highly considering only taking commissions via streams so that i at least don't have a queue again. i don't see the point in being habituated to streaming art and working fast enough that i can complete multiple images on stream and still letting a queue of work pile up anyway.
meanwhile, my wife has finally gotten past the evaluation and planning part of the vocational rehab facility she's been working with to see if she can find a job that isn't so stressful for her. today she met with a career coach who laid out a plan for this month where they'd be meeting at different job locations to interview 10 times. it sounds really exhausting, but it means she might find some work soon i guess. if she does, it will extremely change where my work output is going in terms of commissions vs. patreon.

in spite of everything, i had a lot of fun with the tutorial streams last month. it'll be a little challenging to think of what options to have for this poll, but i'll think of something, probably not as work-intensive as the tutorials.

the other thing is that fresh meat is, upon looking at the script again, over halfway done. what i've been doing is scripting scene-by-scene so that the script is at least always ahead of what i'm drawing by one scene. then when i start illustrating i usually give it another read and edit the dialogue, followed by the tweaks that happen during the drawing process. it's not a perfect method but it's better than going in with only a vague outline. i've been cutting and merging a lot of scenes. the script current just ended the scene that was numbered 25, while the total number in the story is 46, but for this reason it's very likely going to be an even smaller total by the end.
what this also means is that after fresh meat ends i should probably at least have another script skeletally structured and well on its way to being ready to start turning into an actual comic. ideally, that should happen sooner rather than later.
i have three larger comic scripts in the works -- drawing a blank, felix's comic currently titled catharsis, and eat your heart out -- and none of them feels more ready to move forward than the others.
if i had to describe what part of the creation process they're all on it would be "themes and general scope of plot pretty nailed down, ideas of skeleton formed, but still hammering out issues in the chronological presentation and fleshing out the narratives with subplots."
what i'm thinking of doing is throwing up a poll with these three options, and the option of a shorter filler arc with the trouple to experiment with how an episodic would work -- so, say, 2 or 3 "episodes" of a comic with the trio instead of a long form comic first. then i'll re-assess my priorities there and focus on what won the poll (maybe the runner-up as well). i'm not sold on the idea of having this poll be for patrons only because this is going to be another comic that gets public weekly updates, meaning a lot of people who aren't patrons will be reading it pretty immediately too. i'd just give patron votes a tiny bit more weight in the poll if patreon would allow it, but alas. i do feel like free reader engagement in the comics is still a big part of the enjoyment factor even for patrons.
this might also mean i'll be posting more about writing as i start to dedicate larger chunks of my daylight hours to writing instead of just drawing, which would be the first time i've actually chronicled the actual work that goes into the writing in more detail (it's kind of messy as a process for me anyway though because of symptoms)... oftentimes i'll explain where the gears and cogs are in the writing with commentary, but i don't say much of how i got from point A to point B in the first place.

anyway, i'm not sure i have much else i can think of off of the top of my head. i'm on three hours of sleep today, and we've been low on food and needing to ration for about a week now, so i'm not super thoughtful at the moment. sorry for not splitting up those walls of text a little bit more.

thanks for the patience and generosity as always.