[Feed] Serious Concerns (UPDATE #1) (Patreon)

Just a quick update. A few months ago, I expressed concern about my grandfather's health.

His health has been noticeably poor lately, especially last night. I could be wrong, but I don't expect he has much left in him. With that being said, if he were to die, the circumstances of my living arrangement will be disrupted. I'm not financially stable and if that continues, I will be forced to look for a job at the expense of my art. 

So I have to be especially proactive in generating income -- immediately. I can't wait for things to get worse. I should be making twice what I'm earning right now.

It's uncomfortable because I recently made it a point to relax more often.

Anyway, I'll update this post later when I have more thoughts to share.

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UPDATE #1 - 2/20/20

I need to make $2000 - $3000 dollars each month, and there is no simple way of doubling my income. I'm not a prolific enough artist, and I can only do so much work each month. But I need to continue living, and I have a family that I will likely be the sole provider for.

My work needs to shift in a direction that makes it significantly easier to care about & support. Like characters that people want to see more of, and building narrative-based content. We've talked about moving in this direction already, but I think we'll need to jump into that much sooner than expected. 

Probably much sooner than I am realistically prepared for.

So here are a few obvious directions:

• Commissions
• Explicit NSFW Content
• Focus on Comics
• Game Development - Dreams (not yet featured in this post)

Commissions

I will probably need to take commissions again, much to my dismay.

If I'm able to maintain at least $1000 from Patreon, and I offer commissions at their current price point of $48.25, then I will need to take on 21 commissions each month to earn an additional $1000 outside of Patreon. That means I'd need to take 5 commissions each week. Which is a lot, assuming I could reliably receive that many each month.

Explicit NSFW Content

We have been doing a lot of high-quality illustrative work, so perhaps it is time that we start focusing a lot of that energy towards more pornographic content and indulging in fetishes more often. Though we might have to be real mindful with what Patreon might not want us posting on their website.

Although we dabble in NSFW quite regularly, it's never quite to the same extent as some of my peers, who are much more prolific as NSFW Illustrators, and probably generating more money because of it.

Focus on Comics

Focusing my energy on creating comics provides a strong reason for support. My work schedule also becomes simpler as I work towards a single goal with each work session. Anyway, we have two major directions for narrative work.

Elayne Beaumont

• Pros: Original property & indulgent erotic content (sex sells).
• Cons: The grim tone risks alienating readers, and Elayne is already relatively unpopular.

Being an original idea (albeit inspired), I have more room for creativity, allowing me to freely explore concepts without the fear of messing something up. The intellectual stakes are relatively low, but I don't know if Beaumont could reliably generate interest & income.

Legend of Zelda

• Pros: Popular subject matter, much more accessible tone.
• Cons: Can Nintendo kill me for creating this?

It will be nice to see my Link having adventures, showing value beyond being a simple pin up character. But I do worry about perfectionism, since I don't want to do a bad job with this beloved property. It is the most recognizable content I produce, however, which means there's a great deal of interest in this kind of project.

Now, both are worth doing… And they provide diversity. Should I work on both then? What about publication? If I just post on itch.io when a story has been finished, the general populace has to wait a long time between updates. 

What about web hosting, which provides regular updates, but costs money and is a system I'm not educated on. I just don't know what I should do logistically.

I don't even know if I'm ready or skilled enough to accomplish these goals.

I will update this post again when I have more thoughts. This stuff requires a lot of time to think about.