Back to the grind.
I'd like to thank my Patreon and Subscribstar supporters for as long as I continue to have them. Lord knows the credit companies will be coming down on those platforms increasingly over the next few months in the same way they're presumably doing to Etsy now. Still, it's deeply appreciated. Whether you're an old hand or a new member, your support means the world to me.
PARISHIONERS
Sir FancySwank
Unformed
Ver min
Dr.Portal 455
FluffyWolf117
Vulpinator
JustCallMeFaux
DuskyLycanroc
Karakuri
BovineMage
The Fool
AmanCalledDominik
Sypher597
C. Archive
Warwolf416
FOLLOWERS
Mariusz Lewandowski
Martin Nilsson
EkhonACT9
Eric Johnson
Let's start out with a deeper explanation of where I've been for the past few weeks. As I said in "Where the heck are you?", I was on a bit of a forced vacation. Really I needed it, both for the purely social contact, and my own mental health. Honestly, I should have announced it before it happened as it wasn't a 'surprise visit'. But I spent the week before the 13th making sure the house was as spic and span as I could get it, which ended up getting in the way of some pending stuff I wanted to get out right before KarakuriCentral arrived. I have a full-color pic I was writing a mini story for, and I didn't have time to finish it. I'll be clearing that out in the next few days. It'll be going up 'as is', so there will be no editing but my own. I'd rather Kara edit my bigger projects than spare time on this one.
I've also got a few sketchbook things I'll be tossing up on Patreon that were done during the vacation. A lot of which was just getting down character designs for some long-standing OCs I had ideas for (Mostly Pokegals), as well as some cell-shaded stuff that is nearly finished. One is a commission from Kara that I'm waiting on final approval on before it goes up on Patreon and Substar. The other is at the flats stage, and is an original thing you've already all seen the sketch of. These all go up on Patreon and Substar a month before public release, so if you're interested in 'in-progress updates' and early releases, consider becoming a member. The five-dollar tier includes Discord access which gets the most 'play-by-play' of WIP and other projects in progress. So please consider it.
Before moving on, I will say I had a great time on my forced vacation, and I miss Kara already. He's a great guy, and it was nice to get away from everything...well, maybe not fully, but mostly. Some things in life you...just can't get away from fully.
Next, Etsy. Big shock, Etsy rolled out new, more restrictive rules on 'adult art'. It went into effect today, and I've already seen some work delisted. It seems...unless I've read this wrong, nudity is still okay, but not sexually suggestive posing? That's vague enough to get everything ripped down. I'm just going to leave what is up...well, up. At least until Etsy takes it down.
As for where to go? Well, I'll still sell clean stuff on Etsy. Kofi seems to let you sell adult merch, so I'll probably move the adult stuff there. Also, I'm going to fall back on private sales like I had done previously. By that I mean I'll be offering my prints and stickers on my art pages. You can DM me and we can set up a 'vaguely labeled' PayPal transaction. Of course, this means I won't get nearly as much engagement, and I'll have to go back to calculating shipping on my own. But that's the way it is I guess...until this crusade by payment providers ends, or a new NSFW-friendly payment provider manages to break through the duopoly and gain a foothold, I'm just going to be skittering from safe haven to safe haven like a roach caught in the light and waiting for whatever new site to get popular enough for Payment Processors to crack down on it and fleeing to the next niche site.
It's nice to have reoccurring income, something you can lean on a bit when commissions are scarce or you need downtime (Which with my health can be often). And I get the fear of minors easily being able to find your stuff and buy it, which believe me I don't want. But fuck, it's hard enough to make a living as is, and I stupidly chose to be a starving artist. As much as I love my work, I'd also love to be doing well enough with it to survive comfortably. But I suppose that's part of the goal of my art schooling, to get good enough to not only at least...sort of satisfy the insanely high standards I place upon myself, and to encourage more folks to seek out me and my work.
Incidentally, I'm also still working on balancing out my daily art school lessons to the best of my abilities. With Kara's visit here and gone, I'm hoping I'll be able to slip into a pretty regular schedule soon enough, so I can still give enough time to commissions, story work, and personal projects while studying and improving.
I guess to wrap up, I'll talk about the fact I'll be opening commissions soon. I'm preparing a revised cost sheet with a lovely selection of previews, catagories, rules, restrictions and so on. Something easier to access than Furaffinities 'Commission tab', along with being able to post it on multiple sites. I may see myself overwhelmed due to it...but I guess we'll see...as long as people are willing to wait on my queue, (Since I won't take payment until I get close to working on that person's piece), I should be able to handle it.
That's all for now. Once again, special thanks to all my awesome backers! And thank you to my general fans!
-WT
My Etsy Shop
https://www.etsy.com/shop/WastedTimesArtShoppe
My Patreon
https://www.patreon.com/wastedtimeee
My Substar
https://subscribestar.adult/wastedtimeee
My Newgrounds
https://wastedtimeee.newgrounds.com/
-Wasty