A Few Important Announcements

First, the end of the year is drawing near. As I mentioned earlier this year, I'm taking some time off commissions starting in January. This includes sketches/color commission rewards on Patreon. So if you're in a higher tier reward slot (beyond $5) that includes sketches or color commissions, please remember to change/delete your pledge at the end of December! I'd appreciate your continued support without the additional reward, but I totally understand if you'd rather delete your pledge entirely. I'm going to be making changes to the reward tiers shortly (probably this evening) to reflect my time off, so if you get some sort of notification or something that would be why.

I'm not sure how long my commission break will last, it could be a month or two. Maybe longer, depending on how I feel after I've had some time off. I'm also uncertain whether or not I will offer monthly sketch/commission rewards on here again. It's something I need to think about, but I'll keep y'all posted. 

Outside of Patreon I'll be making some changes to my commission prices and what's on offer. Pencil Sketches will be replaced with digital monochrome sketches like this:

And I'm going to break up prices based on how much of the character is in the finished image (bust, to the mid thigh, full body etc.) Prices won't be changing a lot, as always patrons and previous commissioners will get a discount.

On the subject of sketches, I've stopped drawing pencil sketches almost entirely now because I've just got too many floating around the house and nowhere to put them all! Since going fully digital, I haven't had sketch dumps to share with $5+ patrons which was part of your reward. I'd really like to offer something else, but I just don't know what. So I'm open to suggestions if you've got 'em.

In other news, there's a possibility I may be taking an extended break from comics sometime next year. This isn't a decision I'm making lightly, I've felt pretty torn about it over the past year. There's a lot of factors going on, which I'll try to sum up below.

I've been really trying over the past few years to make a living off of my comics. Despite my efforts, I've just not been able to get my Patreon up much beyond about $200 a month. This isn't chump change by any means (and really, thank you all so much for your support!) but it isn't nearly close to the amount of work I'm putting into my comics every month. I've also had a tough time getting into any local conventions over the past few years which has meant that I have nowhere to sell my books. It's pretty rare that I make any online sales, so conventions are really my only option. As such, I haven't run any new Kickstarters despite having enough content for another Devil Spy book or an initial Chunky Skunk book. I'd just have nowhere to move the books afterwards.

I've been struggling with depression over the past year and a half or so which has also made working on my comics every week difficult. I feel disheartened a lot of the time and disconnected from my characters. Just generally overworked and burned out. I'm hoping that taking some time off commissions might help me feel a little better over the next few months, but I really can't predict how it's going to go or how I'll be feeling. Unless my income from comics were to drastically change in some way, there just isn't an option for me where I could take an indefinite time off from commissions (or give up commissions entirely) as that's where the majority of my income comes from. 

Something I don't normally talk about here (but I really can't skirt around the issue much while trying to explain this part of my decision to possibly take some time off comics) is that the majority of my income comes from kink art commissions. As such, opening a second Patreon for my side art has been something on my mind for a little over a year. Somewhere I could offer more sketch and commission rewards as well as other additional content for those of you who follow me for my side content outside of comics. The thing that's been holding me back has been that I'm currently pretty maxed out work-wise so I've been struggling with the balance between comics and commissions. Opening another Patreon would mean more income but also more work, I don't know if I could feasibly do both.  

After Tumblr's announcement this morning, I have a lot to consider and business decisions to make. While the kink art I draw isn't explicit and it's unlikely my side blog will be purged from the site (for the time being anyway), it still affects me as I'll be losing a lot of the community I've built up over there with other artists and commissioners and the ability to get my art seen by other potential commissioners. This is a huge blow for me and a lot of my artist friends. We're all sorta reeling right now and trying to figure out what to do and where to go. Tumblr has been a huge source of income for a lot of us so a secondary Patreon may be my best option right now. 

Whatever decision I make about this I will be sure to give you all a very lengthy heads up beforehand. If any of you have any ideas or suggestions for me regarding any of this, please comment or DM me. As always, thank you all so much for your continued support! I know a lot of us are really bummed out about the news today, hang in there my friends. I hope the rest of your day is better.

TL;DR: My hiatus from commissions starts soon. I may take some time off comics next year. I may start a side Patreon for my kink art. Tumblr sucks.