Situation is normal, just no comic. Above are things still yet to come. Comicking “comic+making” (I know it’s not a real word…) is some fun stuff 😉 really.  The overall comic is laid out, I ran into a bit of trouble adding more detail line work. Finding myself getting stuck in two panels and couldn’t move around to pulling together the other parts of the comic.  By “getting stuck” I mean looking at not-so-blank page with scribbles for characters and placement of dialogue.  Ah the creative process.

Recently Faith Erin Hicks  gave some much needed (for me) advice + pep talk about finding an audience for your webcomic.  Be sure to head over to her page to get the full detail on the points made below.  

1) Update regularly

1)b. Pick an update schedule that works for the type of comic you’re doing.

2) Do the social media thing.

3) Have a professional, easy to navigate website with your contact info prominently displayed, because you never know who’s looking at your website.

4) Strive to make what you put online good, then make it better. 

More or less I am hitting on all points, with some misses here and there.  I especially found her closing remarks quite insightful.

Sometimes I’m asked to give talks on comics at schools to burgoning professionals eager to break into the creative industries. There’s a statistic I like to give at the start of each talk:

“I started drawing comics and putting them online in 1999. Since 1999 I have drawn over 1800 pages of comics. Of those comics, I have been paid for 550 pages. I have been paid a living wage for 350 pages.”

Do comics because you love them. Improve your work. With time, the right people will notice. Even if you are a super-shy turtle artist with nary a self-promotional bone in your body.

There is a followup post on this subject from Faith which also links to Colleen Doran’s thoughts on what work some might not work for others. 

Thank you for your reading, back to making comics.

Regards,

DGC