Demon House is DONE! (Ask Me Anything)

[joannekwan]

After 5 years, my first foray into webcomics is finished! The final episode of Demon House is scheduled to go live in several hours along with a fairly long goodbye letter in regards to the series. Now DH isn't the first webcomic I completed, that goes to Erie Waters, but it was the first serial webcomic I ever started and boy has a great weight lifted off my shoulders!

I altered this meme specifically for my mood

It was a long process, but I've learned a lot, particularly about my own limits when it came to a bad health situation last year.
So, if any of you have questions about anything, feel free to ask here!

[KoreanTacos]

what's your plan now, I'm a little behind on the comic itself right now, and congrats on coming to a closure.

[Penni]

I am thrilled for you that's complete but I will miss it so much. It was your first comic I read!

My question is: What was the inspiration/thought process for the angels? It's was such an interesting twist on them and I loved it.

[JRHoch]

I respect anyone who can do anything for five years, including maintain a marriage.

[ratique]

Wow, congratulations Joanne!! That's such a huge accomplishment, 5 years is such a long time to work on one comic consistently. Not many have done that.

I just completed my 2 year long running comic and after it went live I felt so oddly lost afterwards.

Onto the next great things, whatever they may be!

[joannekwan]

@KoreanTacos: Thanks! Currently my immediate plan is to focus on finishing my remaining on-going comics, Heavy Horns and Sarota Springs, which will be a while yet before they're done. But now that Demon House is complete and my health is on the up and up, I can also finally get to some other obligations.

@Penni: The angels were largely inspired by Peter Mohrbacher's Angelarium pieces, as well as Hiroyuki Takei's angels from Shaman King! And I had seen a few tumblr posts pointing out that angels are pretty scary beings, so I thought, why not go the extreme and make the angels the monstrosities en lieu of the demons? And that led me to the thought process that demons are born from human conscious so they appear more like things we are familiar with (all the animal and humanoid undertones) and angels are beyond human and more akin to eldritch horrors.

A Mohrbacher angel:

An angel from Shaman King:

[joannekwan]

@JRHoch: Actually my husband and I are getting into our fourth year of marriage so I'm approaching that front as well ;D

@ratique: Thank you!! Yeah, 5 years was a LOT. I probably won't do this ever again after my other comics wrap up. It's such an investment.
I'll most likely keep to shorter comic works, things feasibly done in like 3 years or less orz
Anything longer, I'll novelize!

[snowy]

Just started reading. This is FUN ! Weeeee !!!
Congrats on finishing and thanks for making it.

[TAMAnnoying]

Ahhhhhh it’s been five years?! What the hell happened? What is time and why is it scary?

It was a good ride tho! I’m so happy you where able to stick with it and finish the story! So many web comics go unfinished and it’s a wonderful journey to see someone start and get to the finish line! <3

[Rhonder]

Wow, big congrats! That's a huge undertaking (and now accomplishment!). As someone aspiring to work their way up to longer projects, but still a long ways off, some questions that come to mind:

• When planning this comic, is ~5 years roughly what you were anticipating the working length to be? Or was it significantly longer or shorter than anticipated?
• I'm admittedly not familiar with your series, but were scheduled extended breaks (like weeks-months off) something you integrated from time to time? If so when did you find useful to take them? If not did you wish you did? xD
• Related to the above question, what does a buffer look like for a project of that length?
• Lastly, any misc. tips/advice/warnings for a project of this scope that you might have given yourself 5 years ago, now being on the other end of the tunnel?

Congrats again, I'll have to give it a look one of these days~

[Cavechan]

That is amazing! CONGRATS!!!! Everybody hopes to be in this position one day but only few ever make it.

[snowy]

Binged it. That was GREAT !!! Love the characters, the demon designs, and just the general sitcommy atmosphere of the whole thing. Your drawing and writing style made it a real smooth read as well.

Will you being doing more with these characters ? Hope so, cuz they're fun, and you seem to have set up a lot more than you could fit into the five year run.

[joannekwan]

Thanks guys! <3

@Rhonder

• Well, going in I knew I had something of considerable length, since the original script in dialogue alone was about 75 pages in MS Word. But I didn't think it'd take 5 years exactly!

• I never planned for breaks, but I took them as needed. Especially since I'm not contracted to produce anything on time, I felt a bit better taking a week off every now and then if I had interfering plans. My updates were really spotty the latter half of 2019, due to health problems compounded with general burn-out. But definitely consider your own well-being first especially since the comic is not writing you a monthly paycheck. Heck even proper employers give out sick days.

• I actually never had a buffer for Demon House xD I somehow managed to deliver 80% of the comic on time drawing on a weekly basis. In the early years I even managed to squeeze in drawing an update a week ahead of time if I knew I'd be gone the following week.
• Some advice: "It'll be a hard and bumpy road, but you will get it done. Don't take on more projects than you feel comfortable with, especially ones that don't pay right away upon delivery of the finished product or before hand."

@snowy: Heh heh, you're not done yet! The proper last episode is due to drop in 8 hours! And I don't have plans to do much more with them in the immediate future, aside from some illustrations on Patreon. Right now all my ideas for them have burnt up.

[UzukiCheverie]

lmao you had me checking my reading list like "where is it, WHERE IS IT"

I'm so proud of you <3 And I can't wait for it to (actually) show up in my reading list, aauaugh <3 It's gonna be so weird not to see it show up in my notifications every week T_T

as for a question uhhh what advice would you have to others who have been working on their comics for a long time (with possibly no end in sight?) xD

[joannekwan]

My advice would be to stick with a road map. Have a goal in sight, whether that be an end goal at the finish line of your story, or just plotting through the next few episodes. One is less likely to feel lost or unmotivated if there is a destination (no matter how near) in sight.

I'll be the first to admit there were times I just didn't feel like drawing a comic page, and I took a break to heal my mental health. Don't be afraid to take care of yourself! It's not worth working yourself to death! But what motivated me to pick that stylus back up again was I had the end of Demon House sitting right there in a word doc as a script, waiting to get visualized and published. I was in this deep already, might as well finish what I started!

I've also had plenty of other projects I've shelved production on over the years that I'm unlikely to pick up again. The one common factor between them all is that their storylines went nowhere.

So yeah, definitely have a plan and set goals. Big goals like finish this project, little ones like finish this arc, or minute ones like finish this panel.

[snowy]

Just read the last one. Maybe I'm not as engaged with the characters since I binged it, instead of reading it over the course of 5 years, but that still made me smile all over.

Question : Can I borrow Ghost for a small cameo appearance in my comic ? (It's ok to say "nope!". I'm very protective of my characters as well)

[CodeMonkeyArts]

@Penni: The angels were largely inspired by Peter Mohrbacher's Angelarium pieces, as well as Hiroyuki Takei's angels from Shaman King! And I had seen a few tumblr posts pointing out that angels are pretty scary beings, so I thought, why not go the extreme and make the angels the monstrosities en lieu of the demons? And that led me to the thought process that demons are born from human conscious so they appear more like things we are familiar with (all the animal and humanoid undertones) and angels are beyond human and more akin to eldritch horrors.

A Mohrbacher angel:

I really like how you define Angels as more akin to eldritch horrors! Since they are meant to be 'above' human concern and understanding and angels have a hierarchy that seems more akin to philosophical concepts than actual titles (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hierarchy_of_angels), I think you're onto something there.

Personally, I also like the weird, abstract angels from Evangelion as well:

[azzy-m]

Hey congrats man! I wish for the day TSAU finishes in four years... and that I can actually update weekly one day

Did you ever worry about your story changing while you were working on the comic? Since comics are a long process that take years to finish, I've heard that some creators having this issue while working on their comics. Sometimes they retcon stuff.

Since you make more than comic how do you like... actually handle it? I've wanted to do two comics for a while now (coughs even though mine barely has 10 episodes)

[kip]

wow, amazing! i follow some of your comics but not demon house specifically. it might be a good opportunity to binge it now that it’s done

it being such a huge comic, do you have any goals you strives to achieve when starting it you’ve found you haven’t?

[joannekwan]

@snowy Yeah of course you can use him in a cameo!
@CodeMonkeyArts Funnily enough, I just started watching Evangelion for the first time ever a few days ago on Netflix.

@azzy-m Thank you! The story hadn't changed too much from my original script that was pretty much done 5 months after the first page went live. Of course I had over half of the script solidified before drawing the first parts and publishing them though. Having the script done ahead of time allows plenty of time to edit and adjust for audience reaction. I added a couple things in when readers reacted positively to certain characters. I took a whole arc out and rewrote it significantly because I deemed it not in line with the rest of the story and because of current events at the time.
But I kept key elements established from the get-go as canon and I stayed true to precedent. That's one thing I personally like to abide by because I hate inconsistencies in story logic haha.

And I handle multiple series by 1. not having a real 9 to 5 job (I don't recommend this unless you're in a stable financial situation that can support this of course) and 2. keeping to a schedule. I always worked on DH Mondays and Tuesdays, then the remaining weekdays are allotted for my other series. The novel however is wonderful, as I can write that anytime and, with my ipad, nearly anywhere.

@kip Haha, really my only goals when starting were to 1. finish it and 2. get better with colors, particularly picking them straight from the palette without using layer effects. And both I can say I've achieved!