Patreon as a Tip Jar & other Plans

My first year of Patreon is over!! Time for a recap:

I am so thankful for every single one of you and everyone who used to support me throughout this year. Without you Breakfast in Bed wouldn't have happened. And I'm incredibly happy it did :^))

But after 50 weeks worth of uploads I've come to the conclusion, I won't go on like this in 2021. I won't start another comic right away, or even in the foreseeable future next year.

There are multiple reasons for that:

This comic was so much work. Even before Patreon I had it in my mind for a whole year and I planned it out, wrote it and sketched it. This took way longer than it sounds and than I expected initially.

And then I started drawing, which involved finding good references or shooting them myself, getting the anatomy right, getting the characters right, learning how to draw food, learning how to draw fast but still with shading so it is 3-dimensional (and hopefully appealing), planning out the color scheme, learning about panelling and pacing, and testing around so, so much ... 

Can only speak for myself, but a comic page is SO much more work than just a commission of the same size and complexity. 

And it drained so much of my energy. Plus, knowing I had to deliver ever Wednesday put me in a lot of stress mentally.

Ultimatively I am happy I did it this way, via Patreon, because otherwise I'd have abandonned it early on. And I'm glad I got through with it!! But I need a break now.

There's so much more I like to draw and explore and I couldn't find the energy to do it this year. And I'd really love to start doing it in 2021. I'd like to build my painting skills and learn about landscapes and environments, and how to get more use out of my brushes, how to get better shapes and just get my drawing more ... on point? There's lots to learn and I want to really get into it and make some bigger steps forward.

Plus, and I am again really thankful for every support I got, but it's financially not viable at this point. Roughly 1/3 of my working hours went into this the last year and I can't do this for ~250$ a month. 

So I will remodel Patreon. I will turn it into a tip jar. For at least the next six months I won't post anything here. Instead I'll post my sketches, practices and whatever to FA & twitter. (And comms of course.) I won't pick up another big project, I won't do extra sketches for higher tiers, so nothing new to see here basically.

And I totally understand (and expect) that most of you will leave. And that's okay. I appreciate the support so far! But in case that whoever has the money and don't mind pledging two or even ten dollars a month, know that this is still my main gig and I can always use the support. 

And after that I'll see how it goes. Probably make another update then :^)