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I won't lie, back when I first scrawled that first page of Riley Advanced sometime in the middle of 2015, I had only the vaguest of ideas as to where I was going to go with the series. Since then, we've seen jetpacks, giants, explosions, corrupt cops, hammer-wielding Luddites, biopunks, dedicated restaurateurs, many-legged automata and hamatoes! If those haven't made for a long, strange trip, well then... trust me, it can and will get stranger from here!
To you, my wonderful readers, I give most of the credit for my continuation of this series. I love doing it, regardless, but if not for your views and comments I would have trouble finding this much passion and enthusiasm for regularly providing new material.
Therefore, I am sorry to inform you all that I will be going on hiatus from writing Riley Advanced for the remainder of this year. I am tentatively planning on resuming the series promptly on Monday, January 1st of 2018. Until then, please check out RA's brand-new Twitter feed @Riley_Advanced for updates, work-in-progress pics, potential sideprojects and general insight.
Yes, as much as I love doing this comic, it's been taking a lot out of me lately. Way back in Chapter 01, it only took me a few days to complete a page, and I was easily able to work ahead. But since the pages have become more elaborate, I've found myself just barely able to keep up with the one-page-a-week schedule. For the last year or so, drawing has taken up the vast majority of my spare time. I need to free up some resources for taking care of my offline affairs, namely, striving to get a promotion at my regular job. In the meantime, even though my drawing skills continue to improve, you may have noticed that the overall quality of each page has suffered, both in writing and in attention to detail.
Though the 'AdvanceTeam' here consists of many 'departments', unfortunately they all consist of just little ol' me. You may remember that I briefly had a separate background artist at the beginning of Chapter 02, but unfortunately that didn't last. As much as I like having full creative control over this series, in all honesty I would love to have a team of artists to help me with the production, and maybe even some co-writers... Yeah, not likely. I'm not even sure how to go about seeking that kind of assistance. Maybe an expanded presence on social media will help, although I plan to stick to Twitter for now.
I ask that you please continue to comment, either here or on Twitter. I need the input, but I also just love to hear from you all, personally! Let me know that you're out there! I'll do my best to reply. Feel free to make suggestions as to what you'd like to see in the future for Riley and his crew, and also what kind of things you'd like to see from me. Facebook presence? DeviantArt presence? Youtube appearances? I'm all ears. It's highly satisfying to me, doing cartoons, but at the end of the day, there's something far more important: Pleasing YOU, the reader!
Thank you all so very much for keeping me going, and I look forward to kicking out more adventures for you in the near future!
Peace 'n woof,
~Al Kuhn
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Darn... Riley Advanced was one of only two webcomics I bothered to regularly follow over the last couple of months (three if you count "The Ballad Of Adler Young" as a webcomic, which it really isn't). But if it's going to continue at the present quality, then waiting half a year for more is certainly worth it...
ReplyDeleteI certainly hope that it does return, as I've seen plenty of webcomics over the years go on "temporary" hiatus they never returned from. But, granted, most of those had schedule issues before failing.
As social networks are concerned, I never used any, so I really don't have any advice there either way, though, if you do post anything on Facebook or Twitter, I most likely won't see in. I did find your DeviantArt account, and you have a couple of interesting art pieces there, of which I wouldn't mind seeing more of. As for Youtube (if you posted anything already, I haven't found it yet), it might be interesting to see your drawing process, or maybe other comic-related videos (I'm guessing that Riley animations are not likely to happen?)
I wish you luck in getting that promotion, though, if your workplace practices the "Peter principle", you should be careful. And if it practices the "Dilbert principle" (Yes, those are real economic principles), and you get a promotion, it should set up a red flag somewhere.
Oh, well, I'm definitely looking forward to more Riley in half a year.
Torchfire, thank you very much for chiming in :) Sorry it's taken me so long to respond.
DeleteFirst of all, I'm curious as to what the other webcomic is taht you've been following. I gave Adler Young a look, and it looks really interesting! I may very well read some of that during my hiatus. Lately the only webcomics I've been reading have been Homestuck and The Inexplicable Adventures of Bob... I really need to read some more material... as when it comes to fiction, it doesn't really seem healthy to always create and rarely consume!
ALSO! I'm really, truly obliged that my comic is one of such a small selection of which you enjoy. So again, thank you so much for your continued readership!
I know what you mean about online series popping out of existence like that. There are lots of webcomics out there with spectacular quality and potential, that only publish a page when the artist has the time to do one properly. I notice that series like that are very likely to dry up and go silent, indeffinitely, as life events take their course. The reason I've been adhering so strictly to the one-page-every-monday regimen is because I really don't want to be one of those. I look at the most successful and long-running webcomics, and a thing they have in common is, they are always there. Even if it means having some pages that are less entertaining than others, at least they're always there for their fans. That's what I've wanted to be, even though a lot of my friends have been urging me to take a break. I wanted to be consistant for you :) It's just been getting harder and harder. Maybe refining my methods will help that.
As for social media, I only use it sparingly. I find that Twitter is best for simple, all-purpose updates and the occasional picture, as it's less bloated than facebook. Yes, I do have a DeviantArt page, but I almost never check it as I find their interface to be horribly awkward! But if that's where people want to see me, I'll consider doing some more things there. And as for YouTube, there's a good chance I may establish a Riley Advanced channel at some point, maybe as early as this fall. I'm not sure what kinds of things I'll be uploading, maybe some speedpaints, etc. And I do like the idea of doing some animations. I'm not very experienced in animation at all, and the vast amount of time involved in doing solo projects in that medium kinda keep me away from it. However! I do have a few short little animation ideas that I just might devote some time to. If so, I'll probably post links to them right here on the blog. So please stay tuned!
Also, thank you very much for the well-wishes. I've been taking on some new duties at work, and if I am not offered a pay increase, I'll probably request one directly from my boss. I'll have to look up the Peter and Dilbert principles though, I've never heard of them - which is funny, since I actually minored in economics in college (I have a bachelors' degreen in Accounting)!
Anyway, thank you again for chiming in and letting me know that you're out there. I'm always happy to hear from you, and I look forward to entertaining you with more canines and chaos in the future!
Well, first of all, I do actually read more webcomics. It's just that I tend to read most of them sporadically and not regularly.
DeleteOther than Riley , I regularly follow DMFA, and now that I noticed that they came out of hiatus, I also returned to regularly reading "Our World" and "Professor Amazing and the Incredible Golden Fox".
But every couple of months I do read other webcomics, such as "Twokinds" and "Crimson Flag" (though the latter often has sporadic updates, due to the author suffering from a debilitating chronic wrist condition).
There are many other webcomics that I read over the years, and there are a number that I stopped reading, only to return to them after a while, such as "Freefall", "Kevin and Kell", "Shifters Redux", "Kaerwyn", "Skin Deep" or "CRFH!!!". I actually mean to start reading some of those again, but I just never seem to bring myself to it...
Riley, however, is the only webcomic that I regularly commented on. (Well, other than Zandar's Saga, but that one was hosted on Furaffinity, and first went on a few years of hiatus, and then became patreon only - And until I get a steady job I'm not subscribing to it. The pre-patreon archives are still on FA, if you're interested. And its author is the same person who's behind the Ballad of Adler Young.) And if you do decide to read the ballad, a piece of advice: The Tumblr archive contains just the main story (most of which was originally hosted an a now defunct forum), while the Eagle time forum also has some side story material, so you probably should switch to there when you reach that part of the story.
The two principles, as I understand them are:
- The Peter principle states that an employee who is good at their job is likely going to keep getting promoted, until they land in a position that they are no longer good at. That way, the whole company eventually becomes incompetent, as most of their employees do work that they are not good at.
- The Dilbert principle sates that the most problematic and incapable individuals tend to get promoted to lower management, so that they can't do any serious damage to the company.
I really didn't realize that my comments had that much effect... As stated above, RA is the only webcomic that I regularly comment on. I'm not really sure why I started, but I know now that I shouldn't stop.
Heh, "Canines and Chaos"... Sounds like a good name for a tabletop RPG...
(Sorry about the lengthy delay x3)
DeleteA good selection of webcomics, Torchfire! I looked through them briefly, I remember Freefall and Kevin & Kell from my youth, and I believe I'll definitely want to check into Crimson Flag in particular! And possibly Kaerwyn. And I'm exactly the same way with keeping up on things, despite the tiny collection of series I actually read. To tell you the truth, I've probably just barely gotten through 100 pages of Homestuck, and the last time I read it was months ago! It's something I'd like to change about myself.
I know that feeling, when something that used to be free goes Patreon-only... I still have had nothing to do with Patreon, even as far as paying other content-producers. I'm not against it, I just find it to be an extra layer of complication. Remember when artists used to just set up a tip-jar widget, through paypal or such? I've considered doing such things, but if I were to do it through Patreon, I fear that readers might think I'm going pay-only. And I don't intend on doing that any time soon!
The Dilbert Principle looks the most like what we do at my place of business. We've had a few old-timers who were amazing salespeople who got promoted to management, only to cause massive problems because they were all practice and no theory, if that makes any sense. They didn't grasp the logistics of operating a business according to rules. So they got shuffled around in the organization until they were able to do their thing without interfering with other departments.
And yes, my friend, I'm truly glad to have you as an avid commenter! I always appreciate the feedback, even if it's criticism, as it's not always easy to come by. And if you are willing, I greatly look forward to more questions and comments in the future as I get back to uploading. Also, since you're not on Twitter, let me take the opportunity to tell you that I am also available via email at riley.advanced@gmail.com .
Speaking of Canines and Chaos, I told the folks over at Tails and Tactics I'd give them a shout-out. They're a tabletop RPG of sorts!
After I initially commented I appear to have clicked on the -Notify me
ReplyDeletewhen new comments are added- checkbox and from now on each time a comment is
added I recieve four emails with the exact same comment.
Perhaps there is an easy method you are able to
remove me from that service? Cheers!
I couldn't seem to find any such setting, but I've rejiggered some of the other comment-related settings so hopefully that will work :3
DeleteHowdy just wanted to give you a quick heads up. The words in your
ReplyDeletearticle seem to be running off the screen in Safari. I'm not sure if this is a formatting issue or
something to do with internet browser compatibility but
I thought I'd post to let you know. The style and design look great though!
Hope you get the problem resolved soon. Thanks
I'll look into it. Thanks for the heads up!
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