What's your workspeed?

[arbiterswake]

Just doing a workspeed questionnaire as I'm curious on how people progress through their workflow as I currently feel as though my pacing is very slow compared to others.

How long does it take you to complete an episode or chapter?

How long do you spend on each of the processes that are a part of creating your comic or novel?

Do you have a deadline for what you do, and if so what are some things you do to meet your deadline? Do you cut any corners?

What part of your process do you wish you were faster at?

[WillowTree]

I'm a novelist -

I can complete a chapter in less than an hour, but I originally didn't start posting until the story was finished. In terms of a polished final chapter, it's a little harder to pin down how long it takes exactly, but a 600-1200 word chapter I can do in about an hour, not including another pass through for edits.

I spend a little bit of time on plotting. I know the BIG parts that I'm working towards, but I leave all the inbetween up to what I feel like writing. I'd estimate maybe a week for how I usually plot. With Nano I spent about a month plotting in more detail so I would sit down and know exactly what I was wanting to write that day.

I don't have a deadline (except with Nano!). I write at my own speed. Sometimes it's really fast (10k+ word days) and sometimes it's slower (400 word days). To meet my Nano deadline, I made sure I knew what I was wanting to write that day when I had time to write.

I wish I was faster at editing. I get bored re-reading what I've already written so it can sometimes take me a while to run through my edits.

[paracosmosfiction]

I may not be the best one to answer this question as I'm not so much doing a lot of writing as I am editing. Technically, my story is already complete. I'm just doing edits and making additions along the way.

I will say though. A lot of people have been harping on me not to stress too much about work speed and how quickly you get your story out there. And I feel like that's a good mindset to have. It's tough, I know. Especially for someone as neurotic and impatient as me. But I feel like even if you're a little slower than some, you're still probably okay. Just keep going at the best pace you can.

[domisotto]

I usually write about 5K a week. But no matter how much I try to edit, I feel that i am writing too fast, and should stop writing new material, and instead focus on polishing a single manuscript until it reaches the quality that agents can’t reject or people can’t put down.

[arbiterswake]

That's a good way of thinking of things.

Just worried because I have 2 very pesky auto-immune disorders that cause flare ups in my joints. (Especially hands.) I have little control over this and some times I try to push though the pain but I don't want to associate something positive like working on my comic with something painful.

I REALLY want to stick to a schedule because as your said, the neurotic and impatient traits, but at this point I don't know how realistic that is.

[DelythThomasArt]

For me typical life factors n events can screw things but It takes roughly 1-2 weeks per Episode for Mythic Mayhem. Which includes researching the subject (1-2 days), scripting (1 day), draft (2-5 days), ink (2-3 days), flats (1-2 days), shade (1 day), text n effects (1 day).

I used to post biweekly but I was doing much shorter episodes. Over time they've seemed to have crept up in length so I had to move to monthly as I also need to do commissions and Patreon rewards to pay for bills ect. I hope with my next project to move to a page a week format for my health and sanity XD

[DelythThomasArt]

A good thing is to create a decent buffer, try and have 1-2 months of comic ready before you start posting so that if you get a flare or just...life happens you're covered.

[therosesword]

Novelist here. Once I get going I'm pretty fast but... that's partially training. I don't think I've answered any of your questions before so, in a nutshell... I was a staff writer for a professional audio drama company for 12 years. It wasn't unusual for the boss to walk in the office on Friday and say they needed a 25 minute script by Monday to record. He might throw an idea to you but most likely not.

As a result I pretty much learned to write on demand (also have an advertising copy-writer background, again, write on demand).

So.... when it comes to my own stuff, sometimes I can pump it out like the dam broke other times it's total constipation of the brain. I'm a pantser so I don't do any plotting. I also don't post anything until the whole story is completed, edited and officially copyrighted (again, all that background comes to play, force of habit)

So, yeah, did three chapters of the new piece this morning and edited four chapters of the piece I finished yesterday but who knows what will happen tomorrow. I don't have a deadline although I do want to get the newest piece that I'm editing up on the site by mid-december.

Although I can work fast, you can really ruin something if you don't work well it's that old "quality over quantity" idea. So I do make sure to take the time to let things settle before I put them up. And, because I schedule things over a period of time I will go in and check the next chapter that's posting to see if I want to tweak it.

Write hard, write true.

[therosesword]

You might want to (although I'm sure you've thought of this already) have enough work done so that you can schedule ahead to take you over those rough periods when your hands are acting up. You don't want to push it to the point where you make it impossible to work for a big chunk of time.

I know, sometimes I sound like someone's mother.

[Tanako]

in 4 months I have drawn 201 pages in sketches, I have illustrated 112 and have colored 94
I plan to finish the story in December. at least the sketches then, I hope to finish the coloring and editing in March 2021. I never use to set goals for my self however, something happened to me in my life that made me began to set them. at least, it gives me a sense of direction so we'll see. but for the most part. I am very excited about my progress.

[Rhonder]

SLOW

How long does it take you to complete an episode or chapter?

For my new project, each episode has been taking ~3-4 weeks to complete. The length per episode is roughly 15-25 panels. The first 3 episodes actually were pretty quick, they were a bit shorter and took about a week or a week and a half to complete... but after those I started adding more and more panels and detail and now they take forever to complete lol

How long do you spend on each of the processes that are a part of creating your comic or novel?

Thumbnailing and sketching takes a week and a half or so, inking takes about the same amount, and then coloring I'm a bit faster at so that's usually done in a few days. My lettering is done during the sketch phase and sound effects and such get lumped into coloring.

Do you have a deadline for what you do, and if so what are some things you do to meet your deadline? Do you cut any corners?

Not yet as I'm still in pre-production, so I'm just completing episodes for buffer at the moment. Speaking from my last comic (was a page a week type upload) I didn't really end up cutting corners to meet deadlines. Most of the time I would meet them fine, and if I didn't I would simply delay the update by a few days.

For my current comic I've started to look more critically at where I can get away with fewer or less detailed backgrounds though. I have a habit of going overboard with them, which looks good often, but eats up drastically more time than if you can get away with some gradient panels or something >u>;;

What part of your process do you wish you were faster at?

Probably sketching tbh. It often takes me forever to figure out how I want to compose each panel and so it takes me ages to lock down a sketch. I've also recently noticed that I've been skimping on bringing the sketch up to an appropriate level of detail to ink from easily (because once I become conscious that it's taking a long time, I start rushing).

Inking is a close 2nd but I think in that case it's not so much that I wish I was faster at it, but just that I found it more enjoyable lol.

[VibrantFox]

Comic artist and overall it's slow especially on days with low motivation or energy. As to the pointed questions

• one episode can take up to a few hours to a few days to months depending on level of details or just overall motivation (i burn out easier as of late)
• i try to keep the parts i'm good at short so sketching and coloring tend to be quickest while lineart takes the most amount of time (scripting and dialogue is done beforehand with a bit of ad lib when i'm sketching)
• I've kind of abandoned setting deadlines since I can never really stick to em and it tends to make working on stuff harder and less fun (rather pace myself for free work than kill myself stressing over due dates)
• as mentioned in an earlier answer lineart. Characters aren't too much of a hassle but when there's a lot of them or there's backgrounds involved it can take a lot longer so to be able to do so quicker would be awesome. I consider ppl who can turn their sketches into lineart too be the most powerful because mine are way to messy for that

[Caro]

I do a lot in a week BUT I need to clarify that I work full time in comics and have years of practice dealing very specifically with streamlining my process and making sure I can maintain my output. I’m in a very specific position of waking up everyday at 6am just to draw comics until late evening.

How long does it take you to complete an episode or chapter?

I don’t work in episodes or chapters specifically right now because my main gig is print comics but in the past I’ve done weekly work for a major periodical that was six (maybe five I cant remember) per week and I used to have a featured Webtoon but lord knows I don’t remember how many panels I drew for them because this was a few years ago. Now, I’m a lot faster and more familiar with my process so I’m inking approx. 17 or so pages of comics a week right now. Haven’t gotten into color with these projects yet but that’ll be another story when I get to that. Right now my schedule is pencil and ink 2 pages of comic #1 Monday - Friday and ink at least one page of comic #2 once a day every day and then any spare time I have between those two goes to comic #3.

How long do you spend on each of the processes that are a part of creating your comic or novel?

It really depends. Some stories take me months to break, some take days. I’ll spend a day or two on designing characters and then another few days actually writing and thumbnailing. Then the rest of the speed of which things gets done is entirely determined by the project. Two of them I draw larger and one I draw pretty small to save time and inking usually takes me maybe an hour or two per page at the most depending. Coloring is a lot faster for me but I hate doing it.

Do you have a deadline for what you do, and if so what are some things you do to meet your deadline? Do you cut any corners?

I’m currently on a deadline for a graphic novel right now and my shortcut for that is just drawing it smaller. I usually pencil and ink four of those pages a day (right now I’m trying to ease back into 2 a day instead so I can work on other projects). I also have found that I work infinitely faster when I work traditionally and it’s well worth taking the time to have to scan them even if I hate scanning. I think if I still worked completely digital I would only MAYBE be able to draw one or two pages total per day and I couldn’t sustain what I’m trying to sustain like that.

What part of your process do you wish you were faster at?

I guess the only thing I wish I were faster at was coloring because the sooner its done the sooner I can stop looking at a screen! I’ve actually been thinking of hiring an assistant before I start coloring my current projects. Right now I have 140+ pages of the comic I’m on deadline for, 20 pages into a new comic I started to hopefully pitch around next year, and 60 pages of another ongoing comic and I just realized...... eventually I have to color those oh god oh no.......

[ghostmaya]

I can Finish 1 episode on 1 day~ 30-40 panels~ Though I sacrifice the details on color in order to achieve it~

Oh My Ghost

[arbiterswake]

I FEEL you on the coloring parts.

It's also my least favorite process. Thanks for sharing.

[cherrystark]

I'm a novelist. IF I am not distracted, I can finish a chapter and do minor corrections on it in a day. Right now, I'm not focusing on 2nd or 3rd drafts before I post. Once I feel like the chapter has said what it needs to, I post it. This way also keeps my momentum up so I've written more in 2020 that I have in the last 5+ years combined.

[likhoradka]

Last time I timed myself it took me about 15 hours for an episode (about 30 panels for the one I timed) from sketch to final file. 4 hours for coloring, so that was the biggest chunk out of all the steps I do. It's usually about 1-2 hours for every other step (layout, sketch, solid sketch, ink & panels, prep color layer, color, shade, text & bubbles, arrange in final layout). If I have more background work to do or have to come up with a background character design, then it takes me longer. I'm not worried about any solid deadline since I've got a 4 episode buffer, but I do try to get it done within a week.

I cut lots of corners. I do minimal shading compared to my normal shading style, quick inking, readability over worrying if it's perfect, and use Sketchup backgrounds I've built to trace over. I used to hand letter, but went with just making my own font this time around. I went into this with a mind of just 'spit it out.'

[rajillustration]

For my last comic I could do a page comic in 2-4 hours, but it was really simplified. My current comic is scroll-format with more panels, full color, and lots of clipping layers for the shading, so it takes about a week-week and a half to finish an episode because I only work on it for a little bit each day I work, and I don't work on it every day.

So how I work it is each episode is split up to 2-3 parts (sometimes 4), and each part has 5-6 panels. I draw the panels of one part one day, then I flat and color in the panels the next day--so in about 4-6 days I have the parts finished. Then, I have to assemble them into the long long episode, and that takes about a session to do because I add little pieces of flair to it.

One of these days I'll have to time it with Toggl or something to see exactly how long I take to do an episode, but because I'm usaully a little distracted listening to Twitch or Podcasts, it's not like...my most focused work like I do for paying jobs. I could probably go faster...I just...I'm being really chill right now because I haven't actually started posting that comic, just doing buffer. Just keeping my mind off the stuff in the world right now honestly so it's kind of my escapism work.

[BrambleberrySquirrel]

It takes me 1-3 days to make an episode of my comic. I’d like to cut that time in half. I have a hard deadline to publish 1 episode a week. Right now I have 1 month of buffer built up. The most time consuming part right now is the line art for characters. If I can master line art I think I can triple my backlog. That’s my goal for starting patreon. I want to offer really good and substantial material for patroons.

[imagineemmajun]

I am super slow. My first novel took 4 years and my second novel took five years to do the first draft. However it was around University and work. I have a lot of responsibilities outside writing and I only get to write for a few minutes a day sometimes. I hate being so slow. especially as I have lots of new ideas all the time. I'm often down about it because I'm not going to be able to write everything I want to and it will be hard to build a following with so long between novels.