How much buffer do you have for your comic?

[Bishmuth]

I often hear a lot about building up a buffer for your webcomic. That it's good to keep scheduling consistent and such.

Do you have a buffer for your comic? If so, how many pages/episodes?

I post a page a week and have about a month's worth of buffer at the moment! Though it will probably be a month and a half or two months by next week.

[DualDragons]

Normally, zero :')

But since i went on hiatus about a month ago i've built up a buffer of almost two episodes (7 pages). Planning to finish my 7th page this evening.

[magnavarra]

I tried to make a buffer for the time i was out of country so there was no hiatus. But now I oly have 1 chapter buffer or less...

[sekabead]

Zero, hehe.

I used to have about 40 episodes of buffer, but they are all ugly

[Bishmuth]

I'm sure they're not ugly!! Even if you don't think they're your best work, you should still post them, because I'm sure someone would appreciate them! 40 episodes is a lot of work!!

[Bishmuth]

Good luck with finishing off your page!
I've found that continuously working on my comic has made me faster, so hopefully I can have as much buffer as you soon (or more!)

[Random_Guy]

I've got a buffer about a month out. Updating weekly that means I've got at least three uploads scheduled ahead of time.

[Bishmuth]

I haven't even finished the first chapter of my comic, so you're a lot further than me!

[AbelDraws]

Right now I don't have any c': That's because I'm on a scheduled hiatus to build it up tho. What I usually do is:
- Sketch the whole chapter.
- Finish the first couple pages of the chapter.
- publish a page per week for as long as the chapter lasts, trying to keep up. Since I have all the pages already sketched it's not too hard - since I know exactly what I have to do next I won't find myself cornered because I have trouble designing a page layout and all that.
- When the chapter ends I go on hiatus until I get to sketch the next chapter.
- Repeat.

It's been working for me pretty neatly. I dislike having to be on hiatus but a scheduled hiatus inbetween chapters is way better than a sudden hiatus in the middle of the action x'D

[magnavarra]

when I started I had 3 chapters and post them in same time - because it's after 3 chapters when you got that subsribe pop-up button/ so you should have at least 3.

[Bishmuth]

I'm thinking that I'll do that for my next chapter too, actually!
For this first chapter, I just wanted to jump in and finally start my webcomic after about 2 years of putting it off (which I'm somewhat glad I did. I've improved a lot with anatomy and perspective in the last 2 years and I think I probably would have got way too frustrated with my skills if I had started 2 years ago. My skills still aren't where I'd like them to be, but think they're decent enough to tell a story and not put someone off too much with the visuals)
Further into the chapter, I planned out 8 pages which I'm working on right now. I agree that it's much easier to work on page when they're already planned out a bit.

How long do you usually take with your hiatus in order to sketch out the pages for the chapter? Do you ever notice a drop in engagement when you start back up?

[Bishmuth]

Ah, are you talking about episodes rather than chapters?

In that case I have 11 episodes up and 3 scheduled

[magnavarra]

Oh yes I mean episodes. For me it's the same tbh I mean chapter is a part of book. but chapters in book has no partitions otherwise it just don't work. episodes are more like scenes in book. still need to figure it out though

[Bishmuth]

Each episode for me is just a page I'd like it to be more, so that it could actually be more like an episode, but unfortunately I'm just not fast enough to do that! Maybe some day I'll be faster so that I can post more.

[sushy00]

None. I live dangerously

[AbelDraws]

I just finished Chapter 2, so I haven't done this enough times to make any solid statements but I'll tell you what I can.

I posted the last page of ch 1 on August 9th last year. Then, on Sept 16th, with a little extra episode inbetween. I kinda cheated here tho, since I had chapter 1 already drawn before I started posting it x'D I was lazy and didn't have much free time at the time, so it took me a looong while before I even started sketching. If I recall correctly tho, I did most of the sketching in that hiatus month :3c (sooo around 20 pages in a month).

I was in no hurry because not many people were reading the comic anyway x'D I was pretty discouraged at the time. I was excited, yes, but I didn't have anything to lose if it took me a bit. I had more or less the same engagement as I did before the hiatus when I got back to posting pages.

Shortly after I started posting chapter two tho (after the hiatus) I got into the "new and noteworthy" section in the front page tho, and I gained a lot of subs there c: that was super neat (for reference, I had around... 9 subs? Or so before that. I gained around 50 subs then, it was a big help but one you can't count on, since it's kind of a matter of luck).

Atm, I finished ch 3 on March 26th, but I haven't been able to even start sketching yet :C college is being even harder than usual now that we have to stay home and it's been hard to do much else. I really don't want the hiatus to take much longer than a month tho, so we'll see what I can do x'D

As a final note regarding subs (even tho it's not the topic of the thread) I gotta say that the subs I got from interacting with other creators/mutuals in the forums and all that are the best thing that could have happened to me and the comic as a whole. They're the ones that give me that final boost of determination I need some weeks to finish the pages c: Try to have as much fun as you can and interact with peers whose work you find cool, you'll meet amazing people along the way <3

[phoenixrenaissance]

Almost one week's worth, because I post three pages a week across four projects.
(I lost my buffer when I was working on some bonus content)
I try to draw four pages a week but it still makes for a slowly building buffer. It's something though.

[JRHoch]

Since my updates have incorporated more panels as of late, my buffer is gone. I've also reached the end or Book One of my comic, so it feels like a natural resting place and a good time to take up knitting and wood carving.

[Bishmuth]

I just finished reading up to chapter two and I'm so excited for more! Your art style is adorable <3

[Kelheor]

I had a buffer for 1 full episode (2 pages), but then Webtoons contest came and here I am, wild and free of everything