00:00:18.27

Star

Hello and welcome to Bob, where we talk anything and everything webcomics. Today we're going to be talking about extras and side content. I'm Star, my pronouns are she, her, and I make the webcomic cast off.

00:00:30.73

Bob

I'm Bob, my pronouns are anything and everything, and I make the webcomics Into the Smoke and Demon of the Underground.

00:00:37.96

Claire

I'm Claire, also known as Clam. My pronouns are she, her. I make the webcomic Phantomarine.

00:00:43.80

Star

Excellent. So, we all know that making the webcomic pages themselves is the main course of our webcomic offerings, but there's lots of reasons why you might make extra side content too. Whether it's little bonus treats for your most loyal fans or ways to rope new folks in, the options are endless.

00:01:01.30

Star

Sometimes too endless. So let's dive in. Our first question in our lineup is what kind of bonus or side content have you done related to your webcomic and what's your intended purpose for it? So tell us about your experiences and strategy. And I've got a football and I'm throwing it at Bob. Yeet.

00:01:19.59

Bob

I am not good at football. Okay. Well, my strategy is that I am drowning in bonus content. I have too much of it. I have so much of it.

00:01:31.80

Bob

I need an intervention. I love bonus content so much. It is like my joy, my passion. I mean, my webcomic is my joy, my passion, but also so is bonus content. So my reasons for making bonus content basically fall into three categories. So the number one most pressing category is that I just have to tell some sort of story or make some sort of thing and it can't fit into the actual webcomic so I have to share it some other way. It's a compulsion. I gotta do it. It's gonna come out somewhere and if it doesn't come out in bonus content then it is gonna infiltrate the actual webcomic and probably derail it and we don't want that to happen. So it's gonna come out in side content.

00:02:17.02

Bob

And that's kind of true of most of my side content. That's the driving force behind most of it. But there are two other reasons why I do it too. And they're a little more practical. One is because, you know, I like groceries.

00:02:34.17

Bob

I like heat and... housing and all that stuff. And so I sometimes need, yes, yes, I like money.

00:02:38.20

Star

You like money. here

00:02:42.09

Bob

I didn't want to say it so crudely, but, but yes, I do like money. And I like to have funding for my webcomic so I can make more of it. And so, you know, those extras that I can't help but make, I try to make them in a way that will help me make some money. And then if it can't do that, or maybe if it doesn't do it enough, or maybe if it just isn't that type of extra, then I use it for purpose number three, which is to engage with my audience, just to keep people entertained because

00:03:15.67

Bob

You know, especially for Into the Smoke, it's an episode-based comic, and I'm doing a reduced schedule right now because I have a contracted graphic novel I'm working on, and that means sometimes there's a long wait between episodes. I want to make sure my readers know that I'm still around, that I haven't forgotten about them, and so I try to put out stuff just...

00:03:37.65

Bob

to stay out there, to give them something that hopefully they'll enjoy, and you know to also try to reach new readers because sometimes the webcomic page itself doesn't do that as effectively as a standalone bonus.

00:03:51.48

Bob

So in terms of what types of... Oh no, dry mouth, dry mouth, one second.

00:03:58.83

Star

Intermission music.

00:03:59.86

Bob

Yes.

00:03:59.99

Star

dee d dede dooo-oo

00:04:02.46

Bob

Okay, in terms of what types of extras I've done, well, okay, this is a longer list. This is more than three, but I'll keep it quick and snappy. So I have done extended versions of my Into the Smoke episodes. Like if I have a deleted scene, something that I did in thumbnails, but it didn't really work out and I don't want to post it, sometimes it's still good as bonus content. Or sometimes I snip a few panels to make things move more efficiently. Like there was one scene in episode one where I had a little bit of extra exposition and it was nice exposition. It was fun. It was good stuff to know, but it just kind of bogged down the episode a little. So I cut them out and then I just offered that as an extra to my patrons.

00:04:47.70

Bob

Aside from that, my love of my life is side stories. So prose short stories, pros, long stories, uh, mini comics, visual novels. I have done a card game because Demon of the Underground has a card game in Canon. And so I just made the real thing because of course I did. I put out world building extras, fact sheets, character bios, concept art,

00:05:14.71

Bob

I mentioned I made visual novels. Well, I repurposed those visual novel sprites and had them answer character questions from my patrons. So did little interviews where they chatted and interacted and answered questions. I do original sketches. Sometimes I do standalone illustrations. That's not really my passion. And then my lesser used categories that aren't as successful for me, but I have a feeling are successful for some other people. You know, when I don't have the energy to do something brand new, that's when I turn to, you know, showing my process work, showing wips and stuff like that. um And then my least frequented category is merch because I used to do that as a day job making collectibles. And so I do not enjoy that as much, but I think it's a nice category for people who do enjoy it.

00:06:05.69

Bob

And that is a roundup of what I have done.

00:06:09.98

Star

I love that you and I have pure opposite stuff, but we're going to circle back to that.

00:06:14.23

Bob

Well, that's what makes this a full well-rounded episode is that you get to cover the stuff that I'm allergic to for my own work.

00:06:22.26

Star

We will get there because like most of what I do is work in progress and merch, but we'll circle back to it because I want to hear from Clam next.

00:06:31.05

Claire

Clam is here. Clam is also kind of different from both of you we've got a variety going on

00:06:36.59

Star

Oh, let's go.

00:06:38.13

Bob

Oh no. This is going to be a four hour episode.

00:06:39.93

Star

Good podcast. We yap forever. They can't keep us down.

00:06:50.10

Star

Yay!

00:06:50.28

Claire

Godspeed, we're very sorry. We are full of knowledge.

00:06:53.10

Star

i'm not he

00:06:54.23

Claire

But yeah, I find that the things that I do fall into two categories. One is stupid memes, because I love my comic, but it does tend to be a little bit more serious most of the time.

00:07:10.48

Claire

It doesn't get into truly silly stuff very often, but when it does, it does hit hard. But most of the time, it's me coming up with a stupid idea and just being like, I have to do this, I have to exorcise it from my body. And it serves several purposes in that way. One is it makes me feel like, oh, I've had some extra fun with these characters. It's low effort.

00:07:37.88

Claire

Most of the time, sometimes some memes are actually pretty complicated to do but it also serves as marketing in the end. And I found that I kind of fell into this pattern of, I made these things because they're fun. But a meme is a really, really easy way of saying, this is why my work applies to this meme. Do you understand this meme? Then you might understand part of my work. And there's been lots of little things that I've done where, it creates kind of a good stepping stone into my world where if I just post my characters, you might be like, cool character designs, maybe a scene of them interacting. OK, but if I can contextualize it with a meme.

00:08:22.84

Claire

I find that people are like, OK, I get it and I want to see more because this automatically kind of bridges a gap for people. And not every not every meme is going to do that sort of thing. But there have been some where I get an influx of new readers and I'm like, hi everyone, are you all doing? And it's funny when the response is usually like, I came here because of a silly meme, but now I've just I'm really sad or I'm really thoughtful and I'm full of theories.

00:08:51.83

Star

Was this the Reese's Puffs one?

00:08:54.22

Claire

I'm going to get, oh god, yep, that's part of category 1.5 slash 2, which is animations. And sometimes the animations are also memes. And look, I'm an animator for my day job.

00:09:11.29

Claire

I see these characters moving. They haunt my dreams. I have had a few dreams where I can actually see them animated and I'm like, I have to do that. I have to actually be able to see them on my iPad. So I'm usually kind of possessed by an idea and I hash it out very, very quickly. And thank goodness for page buffers, because sometimes the animations take three weeks, but I'm working on one that's taken a much longer period of time, but, if it's an animated meme, oh no. If it works perfectly for one of my characters, it basically is like the world stops and I'm like, hang on hold on let mama cook. And I disappear for like three weeks. And then I come out with like, behold, this thing. And I post it and people are like, okay

00:10:03.13

Claire

This is ridiculous. How do you have the time to do this? But also, where is your comic? I need to read it. So Reese's Puffs, if you know me for anything, you probably know me because of this one Reese's Puffs animated meme that I did with my characters, which I have now heard people refer to me as, oh, is that the Reese's Puffs girl? And I'm like, yes, yes, I am the Reese's Puffs girl.

00:10:26.55

Claire

It's me

00:10:27.89

Star

That's your legacy now. I feel like you have to rename your webcomic now, I think. It's Reese's Marine.

00:10:39.00

Claire

Oh God, just people have people have made jokes of like, is the ocean full of Reese's Puffs, Claire? And I'm like, yes, totally. Look, look at all the brown, all the brown in my very blue comic.

00:10:49.11

Star

Yes. Yes, blue and sometimes red.

00:10:53.34

Claire

Oh no, that's when the Reese's Puffs are angry. No.

00:10:56.57

Star

no!

00:10:57.94

Claire

But yeah, I find that I've tried to monetize some things that I've done, but I usually find that it's more valuable out in the field, sort of. It'll bring people in who then, if they want to throw me a couple bucks, then they can do that and be like, hey, I liked your Reese's Puffs thing. It was very silly. Here's $2 for making it. And I'm like, Solid. That's awesome.

00:11:26.74

Claire

But in general, I don't monetize very many things. I think I tried it for a little bit and I was like, eh. These are silly, fun little things. They bring people in. I don't feel good putting them behind a paywall. And it's not like they're full on extra stories or side content in that traditional sense of, here's more explanations about the comic itself. Like, the comic will explain everything about the comic. The rest of it is just kind of social media fun-ness. So yeah, I have kind of the silly version of all of this, and then I have the overachieving, I need to make my characters dance version of this. And they're very, very diametrically opposite, but then sometimes they combine and I have a dancing dinosaur singing about Reese's Puffs.

00:12:22.01

Claire

And that's my life.

00:12:23.35

Star

And we love that for you.

00:12:28.44

Star

Okay, so I guess in terms of my answer, so I, you make a webcomic for so long, I have things that I used to do more frequently, and now I have kind of the stuff that I do more often now, because I used to do a lot more bonus comics. I've done a couple that were like, this scene was in the script, but I decided to take it out, but I still think it's cute, and so it's just kind of little deleted scene that's like three or four pages,

00:12:54.94

Star

I've done a handful of Christmas bonus comics. The first one I did because I was invited to like a tapas thing way back in the day, back when it was still called Tapastic.

00:13:08.18

Star

And then I was just like, I have ideas for other characters. Yippee. And so I did a couple more. And those are just all on my website. Those were behind a paywall for a little bit, but I went ahead and published them

00:13:21.69

Star

for public consumption because the people dig it. There was one comic I did for a Spider Forest anthology that is still behind a paywall just because it is an anthology. But I would not consider it canon because it focuses on Rory, but I drew it before she was even in the comic. And so it doesn't perfectly line up with my vision for her as she exists now, but it's fine. It's whatever. It's still fun and cute.

00:13:50.68

Star

The main stuff I do right now is largely for Patreon, but it's not necessarily paywall stuff, most of it.

00:14:02.07

Star

So one thing I do is the main way that I earn money on Patreon is early pages. And so I post pages on Patreon

00:14:13.75

Star

about a month in advance of when they go on the main site. And so I can shout on my main site, it's like, hey if y'all want to see pages early, you can just join my Patreon and you can read it a month early if this cliffhanger is driving you crazy. And it's surprisingly effective because I love a cliffhanger and it drives my audience crazy, but I need to pay rent. So...

00:14:35.29

Star

But so instead of just posting the exact pages as I would post them on my website, I actually do high res comic pages on Patreon so people can see them a little bit bigger and in more detail.

00:14:48.27

Star

And then people will use the Patreon screenshots to make memes for me. Ha ha. My audience does it for me. A lot of the times they're like, I want to make a meme. Here's a high res version of this, this panel.

00:15:00.60

Star

And then another thing that I do is I like to tell people that the best bonus content, the bonus content that's going to drive you the least amount of crazy is kind of the byproducts of comic creation.

00:15:17.05

Star

And so what I do is along with each page that I post on Patreon, I'll also post... a little graphic I make that shows the six stages of the work in progress comic. And so I have thumbnails, sketch, inks, flat color, the base render, and then my final render, just all in one image. And I post those alongside every single page because people really like being able to see the process of the comic. It's like, okay, here's Star's dumb little stick figures. And then here's how it kind of changed before.

00:16:26.23

Star

But we're talking about cats. Bonus content cat pics. That graphic will take me about five minutes to make, usually even less because I have a Photoshop action that makes it for me.

00:16:43.48

Star

And that's just a real simple little thing, but people really enjoy it. And I put it behind a paywall and it's like, you're not missing anything, but it's just a cool bonus for those people who are willing to throw me a couple bucks a month, you know?

00:16:56.41

Star

So I also, you know, I have a YouTube channel and that is another part of my job. And I have made several videos about Castoff. And I would say that those are mostly twofold.

00:17:12.28

Star

One is to draw in new fans, but then two is also to get new people interested in the comic because YouTube is a great platform for growing an audience if you have the patience and time to make long-winded videos blathering about your OCs in an interesting way.

00:17:29.98

Star

But actually, one of my main ways that I, you know, use those videos is i'll kind of I'll make the video about something else And then I'll just kind shoe horn in a mention of my comic and then be like, Hey, if you want to learn about this comic, castoff hyphen comic dot com, you can read the entire thing for free. Let's go.

00:17:50.90

Star

I've also made Q&A videos. I've made videos kind of introducing the comic. I have a video where I talked about, these are some things from the cutting room floor. These are like characters that didn't make it in. These are ways that the characters have changed. And that's just mostly just fun for me, interesting for my audience and does sometimes drag in new people.

00:18:13.82

Star

And so that's kind of like a three-way street. And then the last thing is the mail club. And this is where the merch part comes in. Because, again, the comic is one of the many pillars of income in my full-time job. So when I started doing art freelance, I was like, I need some new ways to make money from this thing.

00:18:38.61

Star

And I also want an excuse to draw these characters outside of the comic. Yeah. And so that's what spawned the Mail Club was that combination of those two ideas. So every month I draw a print and two stickers that I then mail out to everyone in those tiers on my Patreon.

00:18:56.06

Star

And I'll make a video kind of talking about the process. I'll show people work in progress shots. And also patrons can vote on the theme for each month. I either do like holidays or I do seasonal themes.

00:19:08.54

Star

I do a lot of AUs and like crossovers with other media. It's a lot. And people keep asking me how I come up with themes. And the answer is I'm just crazy. And I like drawing my blorbos in all sorts of circumstances.

00:19:21.05

Star

The next one, the one that I just finished drawing, if we're going to date this episode, I just finished drawing all the stuff for our May one, which is mermaids because merMay, haha, drew the characters as fish.

00:19:35.90

Star

But yeah, so between all of that, that's most of what I do. I don't do bonus comics as much these days just because my brain is focused elsewhere, but I do enjoy seeing other people do them.

00:19:52.47

Star

But that is actually going to lead us into our second question, which is, where is the balance between making the comic and making the side content for it? And how do you decide where to budget your time? And I am once again going to yeet the football at Bob.

00:20:10.57

Bob

Ooh, okay. So I should start by saying that when I deciding where to budget my time, I am probably the most in debt person when it comes to overindulging in the bonuses. But I do have some level of a method for deciding, you know, making sure that I'm not too irresponsible with it because, you know, I am fortunate enough that I have patrons who are supporting the work that I do.

00:20:38.78

Bob

And that means that they really want to see the next page or the next episode. And I want to make sure they're not waiting for it forever because I'm off working on something that, you know, that I think is fun that they are not particularly invested in.

00:20:55.51

Bob

So I have a little bit of a hierarchy. And for me, number one, because I am in a position where, you know, my webcomic is funded, it's crowdfunded, I take the stance that paid work always comes first. By paid work, I mean, if there is something that I have promised will happen every month for a particular Patreon tier, a specific reward that people are expecting to get, that is always my number one.

00:21:26.55

Bob

because people have agreed to give me money for it. And I take that very seriously. They know that there might be a couple of days fluctuation, but they know roughly when it's coming and they know that it is going to be every single month.

00:21:41.50

Bob

And for me, that's really only two things. That's my secret gallery. That's my $10 and one cent tier. I do one extra a month for that tear and then I do one extra a month for my $5 bonus tier. and

00:22:11.47

Bob

That's very manageable for me and it never really sets back a webcomic update because those are things that I know I can get done in a day or less than a day. And so I'm not going to be derailed on some six month long side project and pushing my webcomic updates further and further out.

00:22:33.85

Bob

After that next priority is the buffer. So I want to make sure that I have a healthy chunk of webcomic coming up so that I can get the next episodes out or the next pages out whenever I've promised them. And that is also important because the people who are paying me to get those Patreon extras, technically they're really paying me to get the comic. So I don't want to forget that.

00:23:03.90

Bob

And then the third category, the third level of prioritization is I prioritize my joy. What is it that's really driving me? What is it that I want to work on? Because yeah, a lot of the time what I want to work on and what brings me my joy is the webcomic itself. But when you've been doing it for like 13 years, you know it's not always gonna be the most exciting thing in the world to you. And my philosophy is that if I have something that I'm going to be spending extra time on outside of my obligations, it better be something that I'm really excited about.

00:23:43.74

Bob

And, you know, I consider what am I going to do with it? But, for example, is it something that I'm going to put on Patreon? Is it something that I'm going to put out on social media to bring in new readers? Is it something that I'm going to release as a standalone to buy in my shop?

00:24:00.73

Bob

And those are things I have in my mind as I'm deciding what to work on next. And, you know, if I have a pressing need for something, for example, if there is suddenly a financial need, or if I have a big event coming up, and I want to make sure I have extras that are bringing in new audience in time for that event, then I might prioritize a project that serves those ends.

00:24:23.58

Bob

But what it comes down to is whatever that extra is going to be, it has to be something that I'm excited about. Because if I'm not excited, there's no .. no point in investing in something that you don't know is going to do anything for you if it's also not something that you at least enjoy.

00:24:42.74

Bob

So, yep, that's what I think about in terms of budgeting.

00:24:50.62

Star

Radical. Alright, I have the football once again. I am yeeting it to Claire. Explain your time budgeting. Yeet!

00:24:58.90

Claire

I am running down the field and I trip over my own ankles and the ball hits me in the head, but I give a big thumbs up because I don't play football, but I make comics.

00:25:06.38

Star

Oh!

00:25:09.32

Claire

Yay!

00:25:10.26

Star

Listen, I don't either. I probably didn't throw it very far.

00:25:14.83

Claire

We're all good. But yeah, in terms of budgeting my time, it's sad to think that the comic itself is also a side gig to my day job.

00:25:30.17

Claire

When you're an animator in the Vancouver animation industry, sometimes you do a lot of overtime and you have to prioritize your own health and your own primary source of income first. So above anything else, I'm usually like, if there are times where day job or life is just too hard, you have to step back, like kind of like what Bob was saying.

00:25:58.36

Claire

If the comic itself is kind of this culmination of joy that I'm putting out into the world, a project that I want to work on, if I'm not doing so hot and I'm working on that, people are going to be able to tell. I will be able to tell, looking back on pages. So even in some sort of sense, like the comic itself does have to play second fiddle to other bigger things as it does with everybody. But I was thinking, I was just like, I'm the only one here that I think does a whole other day job, which is actually kind of rare for webcomics. It's interesting. But I think for the side content associated with the webcomic itself, I always kind of have a ticker in my head of like, okay, how badly do I want to do this silly idea? What kind of time do I have? What kind of buffer do I have? Because ultimately, like nobody's reading my comic for the memes.

00:27:00.98

Claire

That's going to be something that brings people in, but it doesn't keep them reading. It doesn't keep them coming back. People are there for the comic, and that's something I've learned over the years, too. That's going to be kind of the locus around which all other things spin. And I'm happy with that. A lot of people, they find that their side content blows up instead of the comic. And I'm like, good, I'm glad that that's not happening. Thank goodness. But I do have to kind of...

00:27:30.74

Claire

look at what amount of time I can afford to allocate to certain other things. And I usually once per week or once every two weeks, I do end up doing some sort of extra thing, whether it's a drawing or a bit of animating or even writing down the idea of a side story or anything. I find that there has to be that little sense of okay you've got the main project but you need to have some other thing that kind of gives you life on the side if the main project is still difficult to do. It can still be really fun but if you have that little brain worm you should

00:28:19.03

Claire

Pay attention to the brain worm, I think. And I think the power of a big buffer is that you can chase those brain worms a little bit more and you can afford to take that little detour and say, okay, I'm on this big long hike, but this is a beautiful little overlook and I'm going to plop down here and have a sandwich. And that's kind of what it feels like. It's a refresher for me. And I find that sometimes there are times where I literally can't stop. Like right now I'm doing pre-press on my second book and I'm like, there's no time you can rest when it's done. But I really want to stop at that overlook right now.

00:28:58.97

Star

Something I'm kind of curious about is you were talking about, you know, you have a big buffer and then you use that buffer and you kind of cash it in to work on side content. I'm curious, how you build. Do you just spend a lot of time working just on the comic to build up that buffer so you can to use your word stop at the overlook when you have something that draws you in?

00:29:23.38

Claire

Yeah, I do it for many reasons. I worked for the longest time with No Buffer, and it was awful, and I felt bad about it.

00:29:29.48

Star

Oof.

00:29:30.82

Claire

But over time, I take huge hiatuses between chapters, like six, seven, eight months, however long it feels like I need to get a good head start on the next chapter.

00:29:43.58

Claire

Partially because I just like having a buffer for all reasons, but also, yeah, over the years I have learned that working just nine to five on that comic itself…I love it, but it's always going to feel better if I do a little something else along the side.

00:30:05.58

Claire

It almost feels like I'm kind of slingshotting myself. Like, the energy kind of slows down if I'm going through a scene and I'm like, oh, God, there are six characters in each panel and I'm dying.

00:30:16.62

Claire

I just want to draw something silly. So then I go and I draw that something silly. And then that kind of pushes me forward where, like, okay, actually six characters, not that bad.

00:30:26.73

Claire

It doesn't make sense because it's still six characters, but it gives you that little bit of a break on the marathon. And I think that that just works for me.

00:30:38.74

Claire

I think a buffer, a buffer solves all of my problems and I, I have a very small buffer right now and I'm hoping to kind of get it back to where it was.

00:30:48.76

Claire

I do the thing where I won't draw... page one, page two, page three, like in order, I'll jump around a little bit. So I have a gap of two pages where I'm like, I have to do these two or else my buffer is going to run out. So I do weird math sometimes, but, even with that,

00:31:07.38

Claire

I'm constantly trying to chase things that give me that energy back to keep going on that marathon. So maybe that's the way it would work for other people. I know not everybody's like that. Some people are just like comic all the way. And I used to be like that. And then I was like, I want to have fun. I'm going to have some fun. I'm going to take a little bit. And it feels healthy.

00:31:32.89

Star

That's so interesting. I've considered doing the I don't want to draw this page right now. I want to skip ahead to the fun page before, but I've never actually done it because I'm just like, no, I don't want my buffer to get any smaller.

00:31:44.22

Claire

Really?

00:31:45.08

Star

yeah

00:31:46.17

Claire

Bob, do you also go like A to B to C? Or does anybody jump around here?

00:31:49.79

Bob

Oh, I don't jump around at all because I feel like if I jump and do like the scene that's really exciting to me, then I don't have the incentive to do the scenes that are not as exciting to me.

00:32:01.55

Bob

And then that'll feel like such a big slog to have to get through it. It's like, I don't want to lose the excitement of what I'm aiming for.

00:32:05.13

Claire

Oh, wow.

00:32:10.52

Bob

So I just, I always go in order except for sometimes I will do the cover last or I will do like the opening scene later. last or at least come back to it so it doesn't look as dated and bad compared to the later pages.

00:32:25.02

Claire

This is so interesting. Huh. Yeah, I jump around partially because sometimes I'm just like, I'm in a mood to draw backgrounds and not people. Sometimes I'm in a mood to draw people and not backgrounds or like this expression.

00:32:38.63

Claire

i don't know. It's interesting. Yeah.

00:32:42.07

Star

I'm fascinated by this because I could never.

00:32:45.71

Star

S o for me, you know, I do the comic as part of my day job. I have a pretty strict routine I try to stick to for the sake of keeping my brain in order. So Thursday and Friday are my comic days. And so Thursday, you know, I post two pages a week. And so I finish two pages a week. where Thursday I'll sketch the comics and then I'll also try to ink them.

00:33:09.56

Star

And then Friday is finish inking if I didn't finish the day before and then render both pages for that week. And I have a buffer, but it's not huge right now. It's sitting at about six pages.

00:33:21.21

Star

I try to keep it in like the six to eight range, which is about a month for me. And so it's kind of similar to what Bob was saying. If I skip around, then I'm going to lose my, it's like, oh, I don't want to draw this page, but it's kind of like eating your vegetables. It's like, if I skipped straight to the fun page right now and have my dessert early, then I'm really not going to want to do the boring page later. And then that's just going to throw the whole train off the track.

00:33:49.86

Claire

That's so interesting. Huh, I have things to think about.

00:33:54.17

Star

Different methods. Take it from us, listeners.

00:33:57.45

Star

Take it from this conversation. You can do whatever you want forever, and you should.

00:34:02.07

Claire

There are no rules! Make a comic!

00:34:03.48

Star

There's no rules.

00:34:04.03

Claire

Make it however you want.

00:34:07.35

Star

Do what works for you. You just have to be willing to experiment and figure out what it is that works for you.

00:34:13.66

Claire

But how do you balance things, Star?

00:34:14.22

Star

Well, I'm so glad you asked.

00:34:15.94

Claire

Apart from the schedule.

00:34:20.29

Star

Yeah, so for me, like I said, I don't have a huge kind of… This is going to sound so bleak. And it's not.

00:34:30.96

Star

I just, you know... It's gotten to the point where I draw these characters as my job. I still love my comic. I adore my comic. If I didn't do it, if I didn't love it, I wouldn't do it. But, you know, I've kind of settled into this routine now. It's like the honeymoon phase after you get married versus you've been married for like 10 years. And so stuff, you know, you still love your partner, but things are maybe a little bit less fresh and interesting. I'm definitely kind of on that latter half where it's like, Yeah, I don't necessarily have a lot of motivation to do bonus content, but I'm real good at keeping up with the commitments. I'll make a video every now and again.

00:35:10.04

Star

I just recently started making monthly mail club videos because I used to do shorts where I would just show the time lapse for each piece for the mail club and just talk about it. And I've started making full videos of it as well. Just because it lets me yap more. I'm like a professional yapper at this point. I just like to talk about my Bloorbees.

00:35:31.86

Star

But I managed to work that in because it's for YouTube. It's also part of my job. And that's also something that I have to keep up with because that is one of my sources of income. And also my main marketing strategy is posting stuff on YouTube.

00:35:45.98

Star

And so while I don't really do like bonus comics anymore, The stuff that I do do is stuff that's, like I said, kind of like byproducts of comic creation. I post the early pages. I post the little work in progress shots. I will occasionally just throw early panels into my Patreon discord chat to feed the piranhas because it's really funny to watch them wriggle.

00:36:12.00

Star

Whenever I'm just like, Hey, who wants to guess? Like, here's a silly little panel from a thumbnail. And it's just a face on a circle. Guess which character this is and what context it is. It's not coming out for another three weeks. Okay, bye.

00:36:26.42

Star

and that's enough for me sometimes. To that end, for me, a lot of the times my, you know, I need to take a break from the comic and work on something else. A lot of times that's not bonus content for the comic for me. That recently has been just working on the novel that I'm working on, which is an entirely separate thing, or thinking about my other Blorbos from my other projects, because I have multiple of them kind of running all at the same time. And so there's less of a mental budget for Castoff specifically, But, you know, when I do have ideas for it, I try to find time for it. But a lot of the times it's kind of lower on my priority list. So I don't do it so much anymore.

00:37:07.51

Star

But I enjoy seeing other people's bonus content and it makes me happy. And like there is some stuff that I would like to do for Castoff eventually. I've got some story like little bonus comics that are just kind of sitting in the back of my head.

00:37:20.47

Star

But some of them I'm trying to figure out if maybe I can squeeze them into the actual comic itself. Actually, yeah, I have a perfectly good example. Sometimes if there's like a scene or something that I really, I'm originally thinking, oh man, this would make a great bonus comic, but I don't know if I'll have time to do it as a bonus comic.

00:37:40.54

Star

I just figure out a way to put it in the actual comic. There's a flashback at the beginning of chapter 14, which is the chapter that's coming out as we record this, where it's a conversation between Ariana and her mentor.

00:37:54.58

Star

And that was originally going to be a bonus comic. And I'm like, no, wait, I can put this in the actual comic and use it for sads. Let's go.

00:38:04.76

Star

And then there's a couple stories that I might end up doing as prose just because bonus comics take so long and I have no time and I die. But that's all very much back burner projects. It's stuff that I would like to circle back to eventually, but it's not super duper high on my priorities list right now.

00:38:22.94

Star

But speaking of that, it's time for our third and final question, which is what is your advice to someone who's looking to be more strategic about side or bonus content? And we can take this in a couple of different directions as far as like,

00:38:41.08

Star

Time strategy, like how you're balancing your time versus what do you do for marketing? What do you do for Patreon, et cetera? What's worked for you and what advice would you give to others on things they should or should not do? Bob, yeet.

00:38:56.25

Bob

Okay, I'm gonna yeet. All right. So I would say, first of all, expect a lot of trial and error because if you are new to bonus content, you don't necessarily know what is going to quote unquote work. And you also need to consider like, what does it mean for a piece of bonus content to work or to not work? What are you actually trying to get out of this piece of bonus content? What's the purpose for it? Is it just to bring you joy? Is it something that you want to learn from? Is it an experiment or is it that you want to come out of this with a tangible experience piece of something finished. So I would say, whatever your purpose is for your bonus content, before you go into it, you're not necessarily going to know how well it's going to work for you. So I would say choose a type of bonus where you know you'll get something you want out of it, whether it is just the gratification of having done it or like the learning opportunity of seeing how it does or having that tangible portion of story that you can package and give out and so or sell on its own.

00:40:04.47

Bob

Since we know that long form web comics take a really long time to finish. So sometimes having something that you can finish a lot quicker and hand out that way is kind of nice to have in the meantime.

00:40:18.90

Bob

So that's one thing I would say. Another thing I'd say is consider where to share your stuff for maximum impact. Different types of work will function better in different types of spaces and for different goals. For example, you know I mentioned that I had done prose novels. Star is working on prose novels. So you know, my most popular extra was a Demon of the Underground prose side novel series. And it's like, actually like a bigger story than Demon of the Underground itself.

00:40:55.23

Bob

But the thing about that extra is that it faces all of the same barriers as Demon of the Underground itself, which is that you have to convince people to read it. And then it's not going to bring in a bunch of quick audience. You know, it's not something I can just plop on social media and have people discover it and be like, oh, I wonder what else is there. That, I have to market that thing in and of itself. It doesn't really market my webcomic for me. I wrote that story just because I needed to write that story but on the other hand memes are very fun to make or to draw and that is the kind of thing that you can just plop on social media and I love mini comics for that too. I love posting like humor mini comics, like tumblr humor mini comics are like my jam.

00:41:41.11

Bob

And that's a great kind of thing for just bringing in a quick audience and giving people an idea of what you're about. And on that note, I would say also consider the timing. Do you have a big event coming up, like a convention appearance or like a Kickstarter or a book release? Or have you just been offline a lot lately and you need to remind your readers that you're there. These are great times to use extras to drum up extra excitement. And I think that extras are especially useful when a webcomic is new, because there aren't a lot of pages out there yet to

00:42:24.25

Bob

get people to understand what your story is all about. And I think we're in an era right now where people just have such an abundance of choices where they, you know, they're a lot more judicious in what type of story they even give a chance. And so there's a much higher barrier for getting someone to click on your link. You can post a little preview of your latest page or you could post the full page. But that has all this context that is not going on the social media platform that isn't going in front of the reader. It's not really a standalone. So a piece of bonus content or an extra, a lot of times you can put that out there and it'll give readers an idea of, you know, for example, for me, when I do humor and a mini comic..

00:43:13.59

Bob

For one thing, it'll make people laugh. It gives people an idea of my sense of humor. sets the tone of the project I have. It shows a little bit of some character dynamics. Like, it's really great if you can get people to be intrigued by a character or by, like, a relationship dynamic or by something like that. And especially when you don't have a lot of your comic out yet and you want to give people that extra nudge to actually give your comic a chance. And then...

00:43:42.42

Bob

The last thing I would say is something to keep in mind, which is consider the crossover appeal between your bonus stuff and your main project. And the reason I say this is, again, I mentioned my prose novel series being my most popular extra. At the same time, even though it is the thing that the most people were the most passionate about, one of my biggest struggles with that is that a lot of webcomic readers are not prose readers and a lot of prose readers are not webcomic readers. So sometimes you'll have an extra that doesn't actually have a one-to-one audience crossover with your webcomic. I've also had people... who read my webcomic who didn't necessarily want to download and play a visual novel. But when I recorded excerpts, or like I did a playthrough later on, a joint playthrough of the visual novel with my patrons, and there were people who didn't want to download and play the visual novel who liked jumping in on the joint playthroughs and watching the videos. So my point there is just that sometimes...

00:45:02.46

Bob

Well, actually not even sometimes, always you kind of have to have the expectation that not every single person who likes your webcomic is going to like every extra you make. And, you know, the extras you make, sometimes they might have their own demands when it comes to marketing them or getting them out there. So that's just something to keep in mind when you're deciding what you're going to do and how you're going to use it.

00:45:33.67

Star

Hell yeah, love that.

00:46:33.66

Star

I think that it's a good point that like, you know, not every person who reads your comic is going to be interested in the bonus comic, but a lot of times the bonus content that you post can be what drags people in because, you know, reading a simple little gag comic is a lot less of a commitment than sitting down and reading an entire comic. And so it's like a little teaser. The first one's free. It's like handing out the samples in front of the pretzel store. It's like, hey, if you like this small piece of pretzel, would you like a bigger pretzel?.

00:47:03.96

Star

And so I think that definitely those are good ways to draw people in. But yes, I want to hear from Clam now. Tell us your advice.

00:47:12.38

Claire

Clam has much less advice, but I oh my gosh, I was writing down everything Bob was saying. I was just like, I need to know all of this. I am learning.

00:47:22.05

Star

Researching. Is like all this advice for free.

00:47:25.50

Claire

It's so good.

00:47:29.24

Claire

But yeah, advice that I have, a lot of it comes down to just kind of gauging what do you want to do with your free time, quote unquote, that's not webcomic time. Like, I've gone through a fair amount of guilt because I do so little compared to other people for, like, Patreon stuff or, I do marketing, but it's like,

00:47:56.97

Claire

I'll repost random things. I'll make little memes. I'll do a big marketing thing every so often. But a lot of it really is just me looking at the comic and being like, you are very complicated and you are going to take the most time out of anything. And anything that I'm going to do outside of that, like again, like Bob was saying, you kind of have to have it be something that...

00:48:23.74

Claire

brings you joy or refills your batteries, but also has to be something reasonable for you to do. I resisted getting a Patreon for the longest time.

00:48:34.40

Claire

I was just like, nope, I have a day job. I'm not gonna do it. I don't need it. And then the economy started kind of going bad, and I'm like, maybe, maybe I should do this. So I open a Patreon and like, what do you do with it? It's a tip jar, but then also what do you provide that makes it worth having a Patreon? And I think there's no big brain blast thing about it. Just open a Patreon and make it a tip jar and then add little things as you go along. I remember at the beginning being like, okay, do I want to do like sticker club? Do I want to do commissions? Do I want to do all this other stuff? And then I was just like, I'm tired.

00:49:17.56

Claire

I just kind of want it to be a few little things here and there, but the majority of things that I make that are side content worthy, again, like I said, I'm not putting it behind a paywall. I put it out into the world and then people are like, here, here's tips. But I find that that's worked for me. I'm happy with that. I imagine other scenarios where like I would try to do extra projects, printing merchandise, very specific, like once a month. And I remember talking with a friend about this because she does a sticker club and she was like, oh yeah, it's super easy and you can just set up you know one thing every month and I was like, oh, how do you ship them all out? She's like, oh, I do it by hand. I take basically an entire day and I ship out like 100 stickers. And I'm like, ah, I can't do that. And I don't think there's any shame in that either. Like, that's just the scope of my life. I have basically from six o'clock.

00:50:22.24

Claire

p.m. to like 10 o'clock p.m. where that's comic time, that's art time and i don't really have merch time. I don't have recording time apart from this every so often, maybe once a month or once every couple months. I think my advice is don't bite off more than you can chew. And also, you don't have to. If other people are doing the merch grind, that's great. You don't have to do that. That's not necessarily how everybody makes money. There are many ways to the same end. And again, like, it doesn't have to be about making money. It can just be about getting readers, which might translate into money.

00:51:07.26

Claire

The point being, there are many, many ways to do it, and there's not just one way. Don't feel bad that you can't do it exactly the way somebody else does.

00:51:19.74

Bob

Yeah, I did want to mention really quickly one very important thing that I don't know if any of us really mentioned until you kind of brought it up, which is that all of this stuff is so extremely optional. It is extras.

00:51:29.81

Claire

Mm-hmm.

00:51:30.78

Bob

That's why they're called extras. You don't have to do literally any of it.

00:51:36.22

Claire

Exactly. But I think so many people do do that, that it kind of has become maybe an accepted norm or like if you're a brand new creator and you're looking and seeing, what does my favorite creator do? And if they're doing 10 different things, you're like, I have to do that. And you don't. It's fine. It's fine if you don't.

00:51:57.30

Star

Yeah, I feel a little bit guilty sometimes because, you know, I'll get baby comic artists in my inbox being like, hey, how do you manage to find time for all of that? Because I'm working, I'm going to school and I have a job and I don't know, I can barely make time to make the comic. How do you do all this extra stuff? And I'm like...

00:52:16.47

Star

I don't have a full-time job. This is my full-time job. Our circumstances are quite different. I don't have any advice for you. I'm sorry. You don't have to do it. And it's like, go to school, get more knowledge.

00:52:26.12

Claire

Go to school, keep going to school.

00:52:31.32

Claire

The comic can always come later. Bonus stuff can always come later. I think the other thing that I wanted to mention, it's something that I haven't, experienced because I have like a one track brain in terms of, the comic just keeps going. I don't have any other story ideas. I don't have any extra Blorbos encroaching on my mental space. It's just this one. But I have found that there are a few people that, they do side content and then...

00:52:58.42

Claire

Either the side content blows up and they're like, uh-oh, now I have to do this side content thing forever to make money or remain relevant, or they actually really like the side content that they did and suddenly, I can imagine somebody is making a comic and then suddenly they make a thing that kind of makes them happier. And suddenly all the people that are paying their Patreon for this comic are like, wait, come back. I'm paying for this comic. Oh no. I don't know if there's necessarily a lesson to learn there. It's more just be aware of how, how your mind works in terms of chasing little bunnies

00:53:40.79

Claire

All of my side content is related to my comic, I don't really do anything else so it all is kind of this self-contained thing but if you are the type to potentially get distracted in such a way that you can't get back on track maybe at least have that in the back of your mind like I am susceptible to this It doesn't necessarily mean that I don't have freedom to do side content, but I have seen some people actually lament it. They're like, oh no, I did a different thing and now what do I do? Like, do I change my entire trajectory? And

00:54:19.00

Claire

That's a whole other conversation for another episode. But in terms of like tying it to side content, just kind of follow your heart, my child. You should be having fun and you should not be hurting yourself. And if something's not making you happy to do, you don't have to do it again. And you don't have to try something if you're looking at somebody else doing that. And you're like, eh, not my thing. Not really.

00:54:49.03

Claire

Yes.

00:54:50.84

Star

Yeah, I think adding to that is not everything has to be a commitment. And this is something I learned a couple years ago when I first started my Patreon and I was kind of, you know, experimenting with what stuff worked well.

00:54:58.10

Claire

yes

00:55:07.26

Star

And specifically for like bonus content, what I like to say for stuff like Patreon, where people are expecting, you know, like monthly things to be delivered, I would say,

00:55:18.26

Star

Be very cautious what you commit to on a regular basis.

00:55:22.13

Claire

Mm-hmm.

00:55:23.78

Star

Because there was one point where I was like, oh man, wouldn't it be cool if I made desktop wallpapers every month? That would be cool. And it's like, I wouldn't necessarily have to draw new stuff for it.

00:55:35.38

Star

I could just take the stuff that I was already drawing and reformat it a little bit and turn it into a desktop wallpaper. And I could do that every month. But then I started doing that every month and it got really boring and annoying really fast.

00:55:48.86

Star

And I was just like, I don't want to do this anymore cause you know, I could make a wallpaper once and then that's fine. But then once it became like a Patreon thing, I was like, I'm going to do this every month. And then suddenly you have so many things you have to do every month. And it's really, really easy to overdo it.

00:56:08.22

Bob

Yeah. And one thing I'd say about that is that a lot of times patrons are really happy when you say, I'm actually going to do something different every month instead of the thing that I have been doing every month for two years or for eight years or for however long, because they want to see something new too a lot of the time.

00:56:25.79

Star

Yeah, shake it up. There's no laws. You can do whatever you want forever.

00:56:31.89

Claire

It's free real estate.

00:56:33.47

Star

It's free real estate. When's that animation meme coming out, Claire?

00:56:37.56

Claire

Oh god,

00:56:40.25

Star

Which character?

00:56:40.52

Claire

I'm working on a book! Help me!

00:56:43.90

Star

Screw your book.

00:56:43.93

Claire

oh

00:56:45.59

Star

I need memes in my bloodstream. My blood memes.

00:56:49.88

Claire

Okay, honey.

00:56:50.87

Star

Get back to the mines.

00:56:51.09

Claire

I'm off to the mines.

00:56:57.24

Star

But yeah, I think my last piece of advice would be don't be afraid to experiment. Because like we've said several times throughout this episode is, you know, sometimes there's stuff that works for us, but there's no guarantee that the stuff that works for us is going to also be what works for you. And the stuff that works for you might not be stuff that works for us. I think a willingness to experiment and play around and see what you enjoy and see what people respond well to and see if you can find that perfect little Venn diagram overlap is

00:57:32.28

Star

And then lean into that more, you know, but you have to be willing to put yourself out there, try new things is like, oh, did I enjoy doing this? Could I potentially do this more often? Do I want to commit to doing this once a month? Or do I want to have this is like a little just an occasional thing that I do for funsies. I think, you know.

00:57:52.26

Star

Balancing out how much fun you're having versus how much of a commitment it is is a good idea for doing stuff like bonus content. And figuring out what you can do and within the boundaries of your own personal circumstances on top of doing the webcomic is also important. Because like we've said a couple times, people will love bonus content, but there's only so much they can do with just bonus content. And I think that the webcomic should...

00:58:20.66

Star

in most cases, take priority. It's like, hey, you're making this bonus comic for this comic. you know, make sure that there's still a comic for people to read. You know, don't get too distracted by side stuff.

00:58:32.95

Star

But I don't know. Maybe your view on it is different. You don't have to agree with me. It's whatever. We're just here saying what works for us, but what works for us might be different from what works for you. And there is value in joy and fun and whimsy and experimentation.

00:58:48.15

Star

And if it's something that you think you want to do, but no one's ever done before, you could be the first one to do it. You just got to step out of your comfort zone and do the thing and have fun and be whimsical and do whatever you want forever.

00:59:09.94

Star

And with all that said, I do believe that that is a chicken Caesar salad wrap. Thank you so much, everybody for listening. I've been Star. You can check out my work at castoff-comic.com.

00:59:30.14

Bob

And I've been Bob, and you can find my work at intothesmokecomic.com and demonoftheunderground.com.

00:59:37.66

Claire

And I've been Claire/Clam. You can find my work at phantomarine.com.

00:59:42.94

Star

Excellent. And with that, we will see you later. Slappers.

00:59:48.76

Bob

Oh, I want to slap someone. No, that's not how we should end this.

00:59:51.52

Star

Oh, keep that in. Keep that in. Keep that in.

00:59:52.92

Bob

No, no, edit it out.

00:59:53.53

Star

but Violence.

00:59:55.13

Claire

We heard that.

00:59:55.89

Star

Incredible acts of violence live on our podcast.

00:59:56.20

Claire

It's

01:00:02.06

Star

Yippee.

01:00:02.22

Bob

Oh no. Should I head stop?

01:00:06.20

Star

Yeah.

01:00:06.86

Bob

Okay.