Count me in on the people that think it’s got a good start. I don’t mind the home-taught illustrations, either. I kind of like them. I believe you may need a co-writer or two, though. You may find a niche or a zone when you get things more in order, though.
I would like to see more when you get them up and running.
Just curious, why not hand coloring then? You can color anyway you like and scan the whole thing in.
I have and used a drawing board or Tablet with MS Paint pretty successfully. The board cost me about $100 5 or 6 years ago. It is far quicker than using a mouse for filling in colors. The tablet is something like this one
There is also a way to use the Eraser tool in Paint to color the white areas only in a section. Select white as the primary color and the color you want as the replacement color and draw over the area while holding the right mouse button. This might help you in the meantime. I have used it to good effect in drawing large expanses of woods and fixing up some other errors where I want to avoid the pixel by pixel cure.
Jim
You ever just have one of those Mondays at work where you just can’t goof off uninteruppted like you’re accustomed to?
Thanks! I’ll be open to the idea of collaborations later on, and for now I’m just trying to hone in my idea of what’s a good feel for the strip. There are certain technical issues like coloring, scanning, hosting and finding the right combination of software-assisted illustrating techniques. In time, I honestly feel I’ll find the right voice and tone, pursuing the elusive all-ages comic audience, in a medium I’ve always loved.
I’m going to refine that technique in Paint, the way you suggested it. My marginal cartooning skills are gargantuan next to my skills as a painter. It’s easier to unerase or undo and just go back and re-try with a paint program; no such safety net with actual paints.
Getting a wacom Tablet is my number three priority.
Also I own no scanner large enough to scan my original artwork, which at 9x12, is juuuust a bit large for most scanners. Worse are my Sunday strips, which at 11x17 are much too large too. Currently I have to go reduce them, THEN scan them, THEN color them. I concerned what that’s doing to my artwork.
Makes sense, this is why I went digital with my drawings and maps. The tablet was really valuable when I was doing a lot of work. Now, I would have to blow the dust off of it.
I liked the cartoons, it really looks like a very good beginning.
Jim
That’s encouraging. I am my harshest critic. All I see are the mistakes, disproportions, scratchy handwriting, weird compositions, dry humor. Now that I’m working on my second batch of thirty cartoons things are going a little smoother. I expect the next batch to go smoother than that.
Anyone know of any hosting alternatives to Comics Genesis or Keenspot?
Okay… Looks like I have to go, but before I do I need to ask a few other questions related to webcomics in general and “Season’s Greetings”…
I want to do this, not just because I think I finally want to make a go at cartooning but to supplement my income. How many of you webcomics fans out there have actually donated or purchased merchandise from webcomics sites?
Do any of you have a preference for webcomics sites? Do you prefer to go to those portal sites with dozens of selections, standalone sites, or no preference, or what?
Beyond general encouragement of telling me about “Season’s Greetings” (which I thoroughly appreciate-- thanks) are there any specific likes or concerns you’d like to convey to me, about style, characters, humor, artwork? E-mail me privately at moe.cartoonist@yahoo.com if you feel so moved to completely crush my spir-- I mean, be totally honest.
Can anyone give me any up-to-date information re: bandwidth?
Finally, moderators: Do I need to switch forums now that I’ve hijacked my own thread and started polling? 
I want to do this, not just because I think I finally want to make a go at cartooning but to supplement my income. How many of you webcomics fans out there have actually donated or purchased merchandise from webcomics sites?
Only Userfriendly.org
Do any of you have a preference for webcomics sites? Do you prefer to go to those portal sites with dozens of selections, standalone sites, or no preference, or what?
I just keep links to the ones I like to read. No portals that I like or dislike. I prefer the Userfriendly.org navigation. It is, well, User Friendly.
Jim
I’ve bought t-shirts from Questionable Content, Something Positive, and Sore Thumbs. (I don’t even like Sore Thumbs, but it was a great t-shirt.) I’ve also bought collections of Narbonic and Girl Genius.
I’m more interested in the quality of the comic, than who hosts it. Which reminds me, on the subject of where to host your comic, have you considered LiveJournal? I recently discovered Get Medieval, which is posted to the artists LiveJournal account. Not the most elegant presentation, but it’s cheap and works well enough.
Can’t really help on the other three questions, except to make noises of a generally supportive and complimentary nature on the comics you’ve already posted.
Do you have a title for it yet?
From the OP:
So I guess the answer is, “Yes.”
Thanks to Miller, What Exit, BrainGlutton for the replies so far.
To those who have e-mailed me privately at moe.cartoonist@yahoo.com – thank you for the comments.
Anyone else who wants to comment, knock yourselves out.
My wife and I have paid money to: Reallife comic, PvP, AlienLovesPredator, OrderoftheStick, Elijah&azuu and Akira. I usually give when the author asks for it specifically or when they have something for sale I really like.
All my bookmarks go directly to the comic’s page. The portal means nothing to me. (I read over twenty comics and I’ve been reading webcomics for about six years).
Regular updates will do more to hold an audience than a great comic everytime. I’m not suggesting you throw out any old crap to keep your updates going. But don’t delay just be a perfectionist. You already know you’re your own worst critic.
Not I.
To the Mods: I like this comic so please be nice.
Have you considered ComicGenesis, a free webcomic host?
http://www.comicgenesis.com/
Ah, you have. Okay, and you’re waiting to hear back. Hm. Since Walky left, I don’t think I know anyone in the administration. Well, I’ll see what I can do.
essell,
That’s impressive. See, if I can count on you to be an annual patron, and 49,999 more folks like you, I can totally afford to quit my current full-time job – the one where I spend all day looking for a full-time job.
Thank you. Makes sense. Here’s a follow-up: how often do you read other non-bookmarked webcomics?
My current plan is to do at least six weeks worth of webcomic updates in advance to permit me the room to develop my strips leisurely.
I need SOMEONE to give me information on bandwidth costs. Maybe I should just call my ISP…
Mods, I must reluctantly agree.
Please do. I had planned to launch this strip June 1st-- – I have 35 days of fully drawn strips set aside (including the 18 I posted here, and four Sunday strips you haven’t seen yet) but I didn’t plan on this hitch of waiting for a website around like this… I may have to take wasson up on that “free space” offer…
Oh! Here’s a few more important questions for **Miller ** and essell. But anyone can answer, too:
I’m only moderately interested in merchandising, preferring as I do to concentrate on improving my online cartooning and soliciting reader patronage. Do you think my lack of interest doing T-shirts and coffee mugs and even printed books will present a problem getting financial support?
Right now, I can only accept check and money order donations sent to my mail drop in Atlanta. Would you prefer using Paypal or some other means of sending funds electronically?
OK, I don’t have a lot to input on this, but one thing: don’t use MS Paint, it won’t look good. There are a couple different programs you can use to speed up the colouring time. One is, obviously, Photoshop, which you can find online for free fairly easily, but since that’s not legal I wouldn’t suggest it. Secondly, and what I would recommend most, is The GIMP. It’s a free, open source alternative to Photoshop, and for web publishing it works wonders. Finally, you could try paint.NET (whose address is not http://www.paint.net/), another open source program that is made on the .NET platform for MS Windows. Either way, it’s free, offers many advanced blending effects that you can’t get in Paint, and in the case of The GIMP has a great online community that you can ask questions to regarding techniques and troubleshooting.
Good luck with the webcomic!
1point618, THANK YOU. These are precisely the kinds of suggestions and answers I was hoping to get when I started this thread.
Now if I can just get some answers to my hosting questions…
I’d say it’d be pretty close to impossible. 99% of all webcomics are free, and the other 1% are part of pay sites that grant you access to a large selection of comics from different artists, like GraphicSmash. A subscription model just isn’t going to work for individual webcomics, particularly if you’re a freshman artist just starting out. If you’re talking about begging for donations, there is an outside chance of making it that way. Randy Milholland did it with Something Positive, when he offered to work on the comic full time if people would give him the equivalent of one year’s salary at his current job. But I don’t think he’s been using that model to support himself ever since then. Rather, I think he leveraged that into a sustainable advertising revenue that’s supported him since then. But I could be wrong. And the problem with that is, you’re no Randy Milholland. It took him (IIRC) three years of writing one of the very best webcomics ever to get that supportive a readership. Most people will not be willing to give you money with nothing more in return than more of the comic that you’ve already given them for free. (And what SP readers were buying was actually something they’d never had from Milholland: regular updates.) The vast majority of professional webcomic artists support themselves through merchandising, to the extent that when Jeffrey Rowland decided to end his very popular Wigu strip, the drop in merch sales almost ruined him and forced him to offer new Wigu material at a premium cost, until his Overcompensating stuff got popular enough.
If you want to do this as your full time job, you’re going to need to either crank out as much merch as possible, or get popular enough that advertisers will give you enough money to live on for showing their banners. And the easist way to do that is to show them a big list of people who liked your comic enough to buy a fifteen dollar t-shirt from Cafe Press.
The lack of PayPal or credit card purchase options would probably prevent me from buying from you at all. You’re business model is going to rely pretty much entirely on impulse buys. If I have to write out a check, put it in an envelope, and walk it down to the mailbox to buy a shirt from your site, I’m probably going to decide I don’t really need the t-shirt that badly. If I can get it with a PayPal account and a couple of mouse clicks without having to shift my fat ass out of my office chair, you’re going to get a sale.
I’d also recommend checking out some of Scott Kurtz’s articles/rants on PvP. He’s written a few times about the difficulty of getting started as a professional webcartoonist, and IIRC, has offered advice on what to do and not to do while you’re getting established.