Is anyone actually actively pursuing a career in cartooning?

i am in the process of pursuing a career in cartooning- specifically a manga-styled series
but i know it can be rather difficult to live off of just making art, so i plan to make several different forms of my story.. i personally am doing this because 1: working on artwork- or really just anything- can become very tedious and stressful after awhile, especially when working on it non-stop. 2: some days are better than others, some days i have all sorts of inspiration and ideas for drawing, some days i just want to stay in bed and not do anything. 3: i want to give the world a variety of ways to hear the story i've created. not everyone can access the internet or buy super expensive collector's edition full series sets. heck some people can't even afford special premium memberships of sorts to get to see specific extras for stories they absolutely love
basically, art alone can only go so far.. and there's more than one way to tell a story
that's why i'm wanting to learn all these different ways of creating my characters and making my story more accessible. it really seems like a far-away fantasy, but you never know how far a story can go- or how popular it could become- without trying to make it known
that's why i'm starting out with Tapastic and Wattpad.. i may move to other things like Tumblr, DeviantArt, Patreon, etc to really get my story out there
The point of my rambling is: art alone isn't enough, but it's still worth it to try and make something out of the art that you create

I decided a long time ago that my priority isn't Getting An Art Job, but creating the work I want to create, and that I'd be content to work a basic retail or fast food job that gives me the opportunity to focus on my Comic That I Publish On The Internet For Free when I get home. The way I look at it is, I want to grow my art as a business, but I know it might never be my sole income2, and that's okay! I actually enjoy working as a server, and a part time fast food job for the rest of my life once I get back into the working world doesn't actually sound terrible to me, as long as I have the time to create.

For some people, it would be horrible and motivation draining to work a job that doesn't ask anything of them creatively, but for me, that's much better, because you don't have to take that kind of work home. This whole thread by paperbeatsscissors is a really good talk about recognising good clients vs bad clients2, but this bit rang very true to me:

But heck, what do I know, I'm only 29! Maybe I'll change my mind someday and realise that freelancing for clients will be a better fit for me. But for now, I'd rather concentrate on the work I want to make than on getting a job that Technically Involves Creative Skills.

Right now I do comics mostly for myself, and do storyboarding for various clients as my career. I also earn money from commissions, selling at conventions, running an accessories side-business, and a teeny bit of ad revenue, so my income is all over the place right now.

I don't aspire to only make an income off of comics.To do that, I'd have to devote a lot of time to other people's ideas, and I burn out fast if I'm doing comics for someone else unless it's truly a collaborative effort and a small project.

You can definitely make a good living as an artist if you work at a studio, but you'll be devoting a lot of time and energy to someone else's vision. Now supporting yourself off just your own creations, that's really hard. Like you mention, it can take 10 years before you've built up enough of a following to achieve that level of stability. But if you can achieve it, that's awesome. :>

Hmmm... not to be controversial. But I firmly believe we can make a good income from being comic artists. And yes, it is my dream. Or rather I should say, goal. And I too have been dreaming of creating comics since I was 7.

However let me explain what I believe it requires.

Firstly, you need to have something worthwhile. I don't believe it needs to be the uber best thing that is going to revolutionise graphic novels and change a generation, but it does have to be good. By that I mean it has to be professional. A reasonable number of people have to appreciate what you are doing. This means we need:
(1) Good art - of whatever genre you are in
(2) A worthwhile message - that fits the medium, whether slice of life or long form
(3) Persistence
(4) Communication skills

I would say read books like How to Ignore Everybody and 39 other ways to be creative, for some inspiration.

I think some realistic expectations and numbers are also very key. We live in a world where it is even easier to be a cartoonist than ever before. We have platforms like Patreon, Kickstarter, Amazon, etc which allows us to bypass the former gate controllers (i.e. large distribution houses such as Marvel, newspapers, etc) to connect directly to a fanbase. The game has changed.

Now for some numbers. Your living costs are of course going to be different from mine but that's fine. I pin my idea of US$4000/month a pretty decent starting point for anyone. It takes most people a good 3-5 years of quality and consistent work, to gain a paying fan base that can earn them that. Those years are spent looking for the TRUE fan. The one who will pay money for your work. The magic number (and I attest this to be true by simply observing numbers on Patreon) is 1000. Okay okay, it could be a little more and in some cases a little less, but that's where it sits. 1000 true fans. And that's a good number. It's not small, but as I read on a blog article, you can count to 1000. It's not 1 million or even half a million. It's 1000. That is very achievable.

So the next question is how are we going to survive the 3-5 years of quality output to get there? That's something you need to strategise for. Yes, it certainly means for a lot of us a part time job. Some times a part time job we don't particularly enjoy. If you're a single, young person (I am a husband with a son and a mortgage) then it means you can be careful with your living expenses. Etc etc etc. The important thing to remember, is you've got a goal now (not just a dream). And because it is a goal, you can plan, structure, and build towards it. You can gauge how much work (and suffering, that's why its called passion) you need to get through it.

I wish you the best. Keep your feet on the ground but your head in the skies.

The problem is even when all the other requirements are met, dedicating 5+ years of your life into making comics does not guarantee success. To me, this is something you can AIM for, but cannot PLAN for.

Aim I agree, as I've said. Plan I don't. Raising a child, for example. You can plan for some aspects of it, but you can't plan something like "I'm gonna have a baby next year, and he/she's gonna be an astronaut."

Being a successful pro webcomic creator is not something you can plan for IMO, not the same way you can plan to get a bachelor's degree in something. You can plan your strategies, such as going to a con or how you're going to lay out your kickstarter, sure, but it's unrealistic to pile on success contingencies on success contingencies. (We may very well be arguing semantics here, which I'm not entirely opposed against.)

personally, I have no idea if my comics are going to ever become my career. like @keii4ii said, you never know what's going to happen - good or bad.
right now, i work a part time job and also work on my comic at home, but i'm slowly looking to transfer over to freelance illustration, which i'd love to be my career. whether this'll be successful or not i have no idea - only time will tell. i'm 19 - so i have a loooong time to wait and see!
tl;dr, things come slowly. it's not bad to work a fulltime/part time job to bring in the money while you draw in your free time - and don't stress about not having 'made it' within whatever timeline you give yourself. we don't know what's going to happen in the future.

I'm trying! But it's a rough road. Right now the majority of my income is from freelance comics, but it's not enough to live on so I have to work a part time job as well. I'm already proud of myself that most of my income is from art and the goal is to like ween myself off of my part time job eventually... or to get a better part time job, like teaching at a university or something.

But I will note that most of the money I make is from freelance gigs I was hired to do, not from my webcomic. I make a little bit of money from ad rev, patreon, and merch... but certainly not a lot.

While I wanted to be a cartoonist as a child and teen, I decided to switch over to doing animation instead. The only problem was my parents would only pay for a school which had a barebone program which did not teach me what I needed to learn for the job. I currently do video editing, because that was the one thing the school did teach me.

While I think cartooning as a job seems cool, I have no plans right now to make that my main job.

I really love cartooning, and would love to be paid more than a dollar a month one day. I know the odds of ever being able to retire doing this are astronomically small, but at the same time, I get a lot of fun out of just drawing and sharing with people! So even if I make less than $100 for a lifetime of drawing, I'll do it! I just need to be sure to keep earning money through OTHER lines of work!

Nah, I'm just doing it for a hobby and maybe a little money on the side

Hey there, Sandra Molina here. I'm a Spaniard working professionally as a colorist for American editorials such as DC Comics (Batman and Robin Eternal, Supergirl), Dark Horse (Tarzan on the planet of the Apes), Blizzard (Nova: the Keep) among many, many others. I've also worked in videogame illustration, and I've had the chance to work on a couple of scripts (and hey! webcomics!)
I'd always wanted to become an artist. I'd always sucked at it (I kept failing art all throughout my school life). Buuuuut I wanted to be an artist, because, that was the one thing I liked doing, even though I had the best grades in my school in everything else. I just wanted to work in "art" as a concept. I thought animation may be my thing, but there were no animation colleges around at the time, and by the end of 12th grade, I was EXHAUSTED of studying under the watch of my incredibly strict parents, being forced to follow a path I didn't want.
So I decided NOT to go to college, as thankfully, I was aware of one thing: fine arts degree are worth nothing. At all. So I just began contacting artists asking for B&W pictures to begin practising, as I knew lots and lots of comic authors and I was sure that I could make a portfolio and get and agent to get a job. I began working when I was 17 in some random Spanish editorial where I wasn't paid a dime. I arrived to the American market in Dynamite's Game of Thrones when I was 18. I began working in DC last year, when I was 19. I'm 20 now (21 in exactly a week, yay!).
So, in my experience, the two things you need to make it in the art world are:
1) contacts. 2) Skill.
You can make the first attending cons, talking to all sorts of artists in the sector you want to get into and making lots, lots of friends. Networking, ho!
And the second comes from practice. Nobody is born being the very best like no one ever was. And if they are, and they don't practise, they'll be quickly surpassed. Show you have the will to practise and improve, and people will be all over you.

And last but not least, and this is my own advice: be flexible. The important part is your goal; the path will take you from one place to another. I'd always wanted to work in videogames, and thanks to my job, I just recently worked in Blizzard, and I got to meet lots of people with whom I'd work on videogames later on! You never know where the path will take you, so enjoy the ride.

Hope that helped some of you!

My original goal was to work in animation (ok I admit, I was a weaboo and wanted to become I manga artist. Naive, but aren't all kids), but as time went on I realized I preferred doing comics over animation. It was met with some opposition when I was younger mainly people questioning (more like getting angry with me) over what my plan b was going to be, which frankly, what thirteen year old is going to know their plan b at that age.

Still I pursued and I am still pursuing a career in what I want to do, which is draw. So here I am! Nice to meet you btw. ^-^

I want to work at Pixar or Cartoon Network one day, and maybe produce my own TV show or movie