Backstage Pass #19 (Patreon)

On this edition of Backstage Pass, I'll be talking about…

What I do during hiatuses! Considering I just came out of one, this might provide some interesting insight on what goes on while I'm away from the comic.

So the bane of all comic-making existence is the hiatus, and I imagine they’re especially frustrating for readers that don’t get a glimpse behind the scenes when they happen. Typically for me, there’s 3 reasons I will have gone on hiatus:
1. More focus on IRL life events

2. Wanting to focus on other art (such as commissions or Patreon rewards)

3. Simply forgetting to work on my comic and oh no the deadline is here already oh god now I’m behind and now I need to compensate by making a bunch of pages and i CAN’T release my comic if I don’t have enough pages in buffer because i don’t wanna fall behind again aaaa

… And this most recent hiatus stems from a combination of number 1 and 3! More or less, I didn’t complete a buffer before working on several IRL events (finishing construction on my office, house sitting, travelling, unexpected family issues), and everything I had scheduled suddenly lined up all at once and I kinda got swept away. Luckily for me though it was a much shorter hiatus than usual!

Believe it or not though, I actually think about my comic a lot while I’m away from the tablet. I talk about it nearly daily with my partner, doodle drawings in notebooks while working on grocery lists, and work on summaries and scripting right before bed. So even if I’m not actively making headway the way I want to, I still get to be productive in some form or another. Just not in any ways that are visible to the public eye. This hiatus alone I actually managed to crank out summaries for 5 chapters of OBT!

Other hiatuses I may focus on art-related aspects of the comic. That’s where Rune’s design development came from! It all just depends on what format of hyperfixation I’m experiencing that particular hiatus. The best part of a hiatus for me though is coming out of it and showing everyone what I’ve done for it, whether by showing off newly minted art skills or getting to build a beefier buffer since I don’t have to spend as much time writing!