About the art upgrade, and it's effects on the comic

[Nemeean_lion]

I am starting to wonder if the art upgrade was beneficial from a long term perspective. Sure, it looks nice, but we've noticed from the beginning that it had an effect on the frequency of the comic updates, and it has recently been confirmed by Rich in the "Has the forum gone too far" thread that the art plays a major role in slowing up the comic updates.

I know we're not supposed to make threads to talk about the update schedule specifically, but I'm trying to make the main subject of this thread the art upgrade's effects on the comic and the readers. From my point of view, this comic has already estabilished it's readership over the long years, and I'd say most, if not all the people reading keep coming back because of the story and it's execution. The quality of the art plays little to no role in hooking the readers, as the fact of the matter remains that this is after all a stick figure comic. Nothing will change this, and people who consider fancy graphics to be a major selling point will have already left the building long ago.

That being said, if adding a bunch of effects to make the comic look better is a piece of cake, then there's no reason not to add them. If however that takes up time and energy, I think that time and energy might be a bit wasted, because it almost certainly won't drive new people to come (because it's in the end still a stick figure comic) , but it might in the long run have the effect of driving people away because the updates become even slower. I think if there were to be a poll asking the current readers what they'd prefer: "a complete remake of the comic's graphics, with anime level effects" or "20% increase in comic update frequency" , at least 90% would choose the latter option.

This forum used to be brimming with threads, and now you can barely see threads created in the day you're watching.

What I'm saying is it's still not too late. Most people will probably not become judgemental if the details of the graphics were to be decreased in the middle of the graphics update. Toning down on some of the work heavy effects might be a good decision for both sides, and it probably won't even be noticed by the majority of actual readers.

What do you guys think?

[Buckethead]

I love the new art style, sometimes with the old black line arms and legs things got tangled and hard to tell whats what. It still updates pretty regularly, and once the stories done it's done, so who cares how long he takes to make it?

[TinyMushroom]

In my opinion the new style is gorgeous and definitely worth the wait.

Yeah, the slower updates are a shame but I'm glad Rich is trying new things and putting so much effort in giving us the best he can.

(Though I don't really know if it's that much slower than before? Maybe my perception is distorted because of the Thumb incident and then the post-BRitF hiatus...)

[Murk]

I love what the Giant is doing with backgrounds and "special effects". I think it fits with the way the story goes now.
I should look it up in the index, but I'm pretty sure the Noodle arms aren't any harder to draw, so don't take up more time.

[Nemeean_lion]

Hmm... I guess when people talk about the new art style they most often refer to the noodle arms, but that's not what I was referring to.

I was mostly talking about effects using different layers of transparency that weren't used before the art upgrade, and that seem like they might be taking up a lot of time to implement.

The best example would be this strip. That cone of cold is really detailed, and if you take a close look at the rain , and then compare it to the one in this strip , you can tell that there's been a lot more work put into it.

The fact that people think about the noodle arms and not these effects when thinking about the art upgrade sort of emphasizes my point that a lot of the really time demanding graphical upgrades will go unnoticed in this crowd. They are nice to have, but a lot of the people here won't really be able to tell the difference, because if they would, they probably wouldn't have stuck around for so long.

You could argue that the difference between the rain in strip 200 and strip 950 lies just in Rich's experience that he accumulated, but even so, I think the amount of work put into it might be a bit higher than needed, given the circumstances.

[The Giant]

Since one of my volunteer moderators saw fit to lock this thread based on the discussion of the comic's schedule (and I have no reason to countermand that decision), I'm going to simply post through the lock rather than reopen it:

That being said, if adding a bunch of effects to make the comic look better is a piece of cake, then there's no reason not to add them. If however that takes up time and energy, I think that time and energy might be a bit wasted, because it almost certainly won't drive new people to come (because it's in the end still a stick figure comic) , but it might in the long run have the effect of driving people away because the updates become even slower. I think if there were to be a poll asking the current readers what they'd prefer: "a complete remake of the comic's graphics, with anime level effects" or "20% increase in comic update frequency" , at least 90% would choose the latter option.

That's why I didn't ask anyone.

The art upgrade isn't for you, it's for me. It's what I needed to keep going after 11 years of the same story by way of challenging myself, while still trying to stay within the initial parameters of the comic's signature look. If it slows the comic down in the process, then so be it. Instead of comparing it to the speed the comic would update if I hadn't upgraded, instead compare it to the speed the comic would update if I had lost all joy in creating it because I was unsatisfied with the finished product. (Hint: It would have been even slower.)

More to the point, OOTS is my creative work, not a service provided for you to which you can request changes. I don't make decisions about OOTS based on what readers ask for, I make decisions based on what I think is best—knowing that every such decision will alienate some readers. Maybe even most readers. I certainly don't spend any energy worrying about attracting new readers at this point, given that the start of the comic is an ugly impenetrable mess of references to D&D rules that have been replaced twice. So questions like this are not up for a vote; this is what OOTS looks like now, and you can talk about whether you like it or not, but it's not changing back.

And maybe that's bad for my business, but the nice thing about my business is that it's none of anyone else's business. If there are any financial repercussions regarding the art change, I'll worry about them. All you need to do is keep reading the comic (or not reading, if that's what you choose).