updates on patric
dear blog,
first off, i'm not having a halloween party. i just don't know what kind of state of repair my house will be in that weekend. there may be holes in the walls, there may not be. i don't know. but, my friend kelly is having a halloween party that night instead. so, she said anyone who would have come to mine is welcomed at hers. she lives in minneapolis. i'll be going. email me if interested.
it's been one week since i quit fun factory. i'm actually doing pretty well. freaks n squeeks is going really well. i took all of last week off of FNS too, and right now i'm actually ahead! i haven't been more than a day ahead in years, so this feels good. i've also been putting more energy into advertising FNS, so i'm seeing an upswing in hits currently. i find it interesting that most of my big days come on weekends, which is typically slow for webcomics. of course, the majority of my audience is also apparently women and children, which is also very strange for comics.
i'm thinking of submitting to syndicates again. i like to get the official rejection at least once a year. it re-establishes my indy street cred.
the reason i'm ahead on fns, though, is because i've been working less at the day job. grrr. i went from working close to 40 hours a week to like 27 hours a week. if i had some freelance work to do, this wouldn't be an issue, but it is. and, let's face it, FNS don't pay. in theory, my work schedule may change again in a few weeks when my arch-nemesis is supposedly leaving, but i don't have a definite date on that. so, i called some temp agencies today and i'll go in and fill out some applications. however, they gave me the impression that finding temp positions to fit in around my normal work schedule will be very difficult. d'oh. still, i'm going to try and see what happens. i want the least amount of responsibility possible. my ideal job these days actually is picking fly shit out of pepper, but i don't think that's going to happen.
because i'm ahead on FNS and feeling really good about my cartooning, i'm looking ahead to Zuda. yes, Zuda. Yes, they get a lot of ownership rights and stuff, but they also pay. basically, i think a strip format is really best for Zuda at this point, and if i look at it that way, i figure i could put 2 strips on one of their "screen" formats. which means I basically would get paid $13,000 for drawing 104 strips. or, $125 per strip. assuming i can do two strips a day, i would make $250 a day with zuda. while not the best, it's a pretty good rate. of course, that one day would be for the week, so it'd be $250 a week in reality. still, it's better than i make with FNS, which is about $0 per day.
stylistically, i'm looking to do something similar to FNS for zuda. i'm at the point where drawing an FNS comic seems so natural and easy. I'm looking to adapt that feeling to other comics. a lot of how comics feel when i draw them informed my decision to quit fun factory. it felt so hard to draw. maybe it's because a "page" is psychologically bigger than a "strip". maybe it's the color. i don't know. a lot of what i'm doing right now is trying to find what works best for me as a cartoonist. this burnout thing is weird. still, i'm not going to just plow into anything. when i start my zuda comic, it will be because i'm ready and i feel confident i can keep it up.
charles schulz is my master now.
first off, i'm not having a halloween party. i just don't know what kind of state of repair my house will be in that weekend. there may be holes in the walls, there may not be. i don't know. but, my friend kelly is having a halloween party that night instead. so, she said anyone who would have come to mine is welcomed at hers. she lives in minneapolis. i'll be going. email me if interested.
it's been one week since i quit fun factory. i'm actually doing pretty well. freaks n squeeks is going really well. i took all of last week off of FNS too, and right now i'm actually ahead! i haven't been more than a day ahead in years, so this feels good. i've also been putting more energy into advertising FNS, so i'm seeing an upswing in hits currently. i find it interesting that most of my big days come on weekends, which is typically slow for webcomics. of course, the majority of my audience is also apparently women and children, which is also very strange for comics.
i'm thinking of submitting to syndicates again. i like to get the official rejection at least once a year. it re-establishes my indy street cred.
the reason i'm ahead on fns, though, is because i've been working less at the day job. grrr. i went from working close to 40 hours a week to like 27 hours a week. if i had some freelance work to do, this wouldn't be an issue, but it is. and, let's face it, FNS don't pay. in theory, my work schedule may change again in a few weeks when my arch-nemesis is supposedly leaving, but i don't have a definite date on that. so, i called some temp agencies today and i'll go in and fill out some applications. however, they gave me the impression that finding temp positions to fit in around my normal work schedule will be very difficult. d'oh. still, i'm going to try and see what happens. i want the least amount of responsibility possible. my ideal job these days actually is picking fly shit out of pepper, but i don't think that's going to happen.
because i'm ahead on FNS and feeling really good about my cartooning, i'm looking ahead to Zuda. yes, Zuda. Yes, they get a lot of ownership rights and stuff, but they also pay. basically, i think a strip format is really best for Zuda at this point, and if i look at it that way, i figure i could put 2 strips on one of their "screen" formats. which means I basically would get paid $13,000 for drawing 104 strips. or, $125 per strip. assuming i can do two strips a day, i would make $250 a day with zuda. while not the best, it's a pretty good rate. of course, that one day would be for the week, so it'd be $250 a week in reality. still, it's better than i make with FNS, which is about $0 per day.
stylistically, i'm looking to do something similar to FNS for zuda. i'm at the point where drawing an FNS comic seems so natural and easy. I'm looking to adapt that feeling to other comics. a lot of how comics feel when i draw them informed my decision to quit fun factory. it felt so hard to draw. maybe it's because a "page" is psychologically bigger than a "strip". maybe it's the color. i don't know. a lot of what i'm doing right now is trying to find what works best for me as a cartoonist. this burnout thing is weird. still, i'm not going to just plow into anything. when i start my zuda comic, it will be because i'm ready and i feel confident i can keep it up.
charles schulz is my master now.