I can see a buffer not being as important when cartooning is your full-time job. You're going to be working on your strip every day anyway. But when you have a day-job (like most webcomics creators), and when your job and other responsibilities mean not being able to work on your comic some days (and sometimes entire weeks too), a buffer is a good way of making sure your comic gets posted on time anyway.

That said, Scott, you're doing a great job. Don't worry about.

When I have a buffer my heart is light, my steps bouncing, and my demeanor sunny. I love my children and my wife, and I have time for everyone.

When I don't every minute of the day feels like an hour, my limbs encased in lead. I hate everyone, my family especially, and I want to die and kill everyone.

And yet usually I don't have one. Because I only do work when I have to.

Perhaps it's something psychological, part of your childhood desire to see your comic strip in newspapers. Newspaper comic strips HAVE to been ahead of schedule so they can be sent out on time and printed and all that. Maybe it's something in the back of your telling you that working ahead on your comic strip is simply the way it's suppose to be done.

And Bill Watterson missed A LOT of days. He took two rather long sabbaticals during which the newspapers ran Calvin & Hobbes reruns.

As it happens, I wrote a column on this topic two weeks ago ( http://floatinglightbulb.blogspot.com/2008/10/some-comics-shouldnt-sweat-buffers.html ) that might spare some people nervous breakdowns. I argued that buffers come at the expense of frequency (a significant element of successful comics), and they also drain the muse and hurt currency with fans. I suggested that substitute material, drawn from a different creative place and not time sensitive, could be used in episodes of illness and emergency. Alternately, if you update six times a week, change it to "five times and most Saturdays" and pull your Saturday material forward if you are stricken. Clock slavery is a by-product of over-commercialization. The reason you pursued cartooning is probably partly because you value independence. Why surrender it now when there are options? As for comparing buffers, anyone playing that game wins if they make you feel bad. Why give a victory to someone who thinks that little of their colleagues, let alone their friends? Life's too short.

It works for Penny Arcade because of the nature of their strips which is basically commentary on games and the gaming industry in my opinion. The need for a buffer is not really that important in their case the same way that we don't really plan what we're going to say a minute, an hour, a day from now. We just respond to the situation as it arises.
The Penny Arcade guys is basically having a running conversation with their audience through the comic strips.
PVPOnline on the other hand is story and character driven. A story is something that needs to be planned and thus necessitating the need for a buffer.
God, I hope I just made sense right there.

Personally, I don't think Buffers are the issue, it's what buffers allow you to do, and that's putting out a strip when you say you will.

"I dunno, I think ultimately it comes back to the fact that part of what we’re doing as cartoonists is building relationships with our readers. The biggest part of that relationship is delivering the goods as promised."

Exactly.

I disagree that being a story based strip requires a buffer. Planning ahead is not the same as having a buffer. Knowing your characters and how they would react to a situation is also not the same as a buffer. I am happiest with my work when I have only a one or two strip buffer. I got into doing web comics because I wanted to do something that would force me to draw daily because I had fallen out of that habit since art school, and when I have had a large buffer that easily falls apart. It's too easy to skip a day of drawing when I have two plus weeks worth of strips lined up. Most of the time I have no buffer at all, but I also never miss an update, and that is what is really important here.

If you are the type of person that misses deadlines, you should probably have a buffer, but if you aren't, then its not as big an issue as most people seem to make it out to be.

I think the best buffer is the one that you can maintain. You should work out your emotional hangups and forget the buffer-braggs and find a buffer that feels comfortable.
I have fairly bad sesonal depression, I know that October, February, and June are bad months to be alive. So I try to push my buffer (when I have one) to cover those months. The rest of the time the buffer depends on how well I write that day, or wether I can write at all.

I guess at best don't sweat it. Stress just makes writers block worse.

Then theres the question: Can you miss a day and see a noticeable drop in readership?
Do people send you Dear John letters stateing that "Since you missed one day to go to your graet uncle spurgus's funeral, I have choosen to stop reading your comic..."?

I they do, then I bet it's a rare accurance.

5) So I can plan vacations/time off.
6) So I can better manage the rest of my duties (business/store/etc.)
7) Working ahead will help me write better strips.

those are the only reason why I would want to have a buffer, but as of yet, I dont think it bothers. to me, if a daily strip misses a day or 2 out of the week it doesnt bother me because I dont read daily strips, I just wait every week or 2 to read them because I dont have the time to check them daily. why do people like daily strips anyway?

and what kind of person sends emails like that? I dont even bother if an artist hasnt posted for over a month, and longer still if I see they are posting other work. So long as they are continuing at art, it doesnt bother me when it comes to some thing that is free in the first place. But I might be bias since I am an artist too. If I was just a reader... well dont know.

I feel a little weird saying this to someone who has 80 times my readership, but I always considered keeping to an update schedule absolutely necessary for building and maintaining readers. You want readers to make coming to your site every day a habit, and if you miss days, some portion of them will break the habit.

But maybe I'm rationalizing. I've always lived in dread of being late, of missing some golden opportunity because I hit "snooze" on the alarm one too many times. But like you, I'm still happier if I have a buffer that will keep the web-comic on schedule even if I get sick or my computer blows up or any variety of calamity throws off my work schedule. Life is too short to live it being stressed out. Keep a buffer if it makes you happy. (Right now I'm -- gasp -- 7 weeks ahead on ODYSSEUS THE REBEL and 8 weeks ahead on ESCAPE FROM TERRA.)

By the way, that hand-buffer graphic made me giggle.

I can't see how having a buffer has ANYTHING to do with update schedule. Surely a buffer is a cartoonist convenience, and the point is keeping the update schedule?

I do everything the day it goes up on purpose and have NO current-events content at all- but I'm not really satisfied if I'm doing the joke I thought of the previous day. I'll sleep easier and get up before 7 more happily if I think I know what I'm going to do, but if I can't take the first hour thinking up something funnier than I woke up with, I'm really not happy. This morning I woke up knowing that a guy was going to watch movies and be studied as a 'control' naive guy, but I wasn't sure what he was going to say. Then it turned out he didn't say anything and the gag was more about a researcher distressed that the guy (offscreen) was 'clamoring for popcorn, tits and violence', which I think is the movie audience in a nutshell ;) but I didn't have that scripted last night.

I don't want a buffer because I don't want any excuse to NOT draw that day. I still have too much to learn, to manufacture reasons not to cartoon... and when it's every day, I'm prepared to write off a day as 'oops' and move on. I want the ability to feel like I can be really spontaneous within a cast-iron update schedule. If I have a wild idea that changes the whole plot, I can jump on it and go, and hopefully some of that spontaneity can be conveyed in a comic. I don't think it would be the same if I had weeks to second-guess everything.

It's just more exciting not to have a buffer. It's like going on (a very very tiny) stage every day and performing, rather than manufacturing stuff to be sold later.

I decided to just write a response blog entry ( http://lastres0rt.blogspot.com/2008/11/what-everybody-ought-to-know-about.html ) than to put it all here.

Basically, it's something that each comic artist needs to figure out for themselves based on what sort of comic they're doing, but it helps to have at least the next couple of updates in your pocket if nothing else. Maintaining a consistent update schedule should be a priority for every artist, but a buffer is only a means to that.

I think you're being too hard on yourself about it. A good example of a professional webcomic is PhD comics, and their archive is a testament to being a professional webcomic artist and still leading a normal, deadline-missing life. At the beginning, new panels are far and in between, but as time goes on, interest develops, revenue comes in, time is afforded you see the entries piling up more and more per week and month.
There's something to be said about being timely but I wouldn't go so far to say that your professionalism suffers because of it.

I don't like having a buffer, because I demand the instant gratification of working on the internet. I draw it, I want to post it and talk about it with people immediately. I hate having this comic that I can't show anybody. On the days I do work ahead, I put the comics in a secret folder online so I can still share them with people. It's very backwards.

I need to work on a buffer this time, because I'm expecting my first child in February, and I need to be prepared. But like Scott said, it's not going to matter. If this kid is going to buck me off my horse, it'll happen, buffer or no.

With web comics, I tend to go with the idea that it's really up to your own comfort zone depending upon what your goals are. Many web comics exist just because the creator wishes to make them, so do it the way that makes you happy. Some want very badly to make a living doing it, to that end they need to do what makes them feel comfortable within the structure they seek to abide in.

For me, personally, two experiences affected my decision to create a giant buffer before I even start. One was eons ago when I was 15 years old, I sold a comic to the local weekly paper. I was doing it mostly because I loved doing it and I dreamed of being a professional some day... and I was getting TEN BUCKS a week for it TOO! What I found was very soon I was rushing at the last minute to come up with an idea and get it to the paper just under the wire. The panic I felt was just awful, but I was doing it for fun... so who cares.? When the newspaper eventually closed its doors I received a great deal of feedback about how much readers missed the strip. I hadn't really considered how it affected OTHER people. I just liked doing it and I got paid, cool. Now I thought about the magnitude of that information and was both joyous and burdened with the idea. The second, zooming ahead another 15 yrs or so, was getting the opportunity to work on United Features "Nancy" doing backgrounds and color. They worked two weeks ahead on dailies, minimum and 4-6 weeks on the Sundays. This was not the artist's buffer, it was the deadline needed to process the work, but it put me in a mind set of "working ahead". So, because of that, I have a giant buffer to start. It's insurance for me in case I get sick or busy, just writing, family or other things... no doubt it'll get whittled down a bit, but that's what it's there for and that gives me a little peace of mind.

P.S.: I just wanted to say what a great site this is, I've been to other cartoon forums/blogs and it seems like cartooning is hardly discussed. Here, the topics are really informative and immediately relevant. Everybody seems like they just want to share experiences and ideas about cartooning and I really appreciate that.

I think a buffer is a great idea, but I haven't had one since about 3 weeks in on Wandering Ones. Working a full time day job, and requiring at least 4-6 hours to draw and ink a page, I'd literally have to sacrifice all my spare time to get ahead. After 8 years, I realize that the rewards of doing my comic are nice, but they're not even remotely worth giving my entire life to.

Well...I can see the view from the other side.

Plant-Man.com right now has a SEVEN MONTH buffer. It updates three times a week and there's enough strips to keep the site going until the middle of June next year. I could be putting my feet up and relaxing but I'm still making three pages a week and sometimes more if I have wind assistance. So the buffer is just getting bigger...

You would think I'd be happy about it - but it's quite the opposite. I want people to see the new stuff! Every artist thinks their old stuff sucks, right? I want people to see that the feedback they've given me in the last few months IS having an effect - but instead they're seeing the old stuff I did ages ago.

My daily comic - funnywebcomic.com - has a two week buffer and I think that's the 'sweet spot'. It's enough of a buffer so you know the strip will run on time if anything unforeseen happens, and it's close enough to 'now' that you can put current stuff in or show your audience you're responding to their feedback.

We try not to get too far ahead. We seem to perform better under pressure! A buffer of two or three comics is all we ever have. Sometimes, we'll be on track to get a much bigger buffer, but we slow ourselves down to keep the quality of work as high as possible.
www.utopiatheory.com

Guys, it's not that I'm against having a buffer. I frequently get myself a buffer of 2-3 days and maintain it. Sometimes that buffer is not enough to keep me from missing a midnight post (i.e. this last week)

But I feel this guilt about not having a HUGE buffer all the time. Like, it's not enough that I have a buffer of 3-4 days. I get asked all the time if my buffer is up to 2 weeks-1 month yet. And I feel guilty when I have to answer "no."

For some people buffers are not a need, but rather a product of their work process. I've read of some artists that like to crank out several strips in a row when they get in a writing mood and the buffer happens by itself.

I'm rather curious as to who asks people "hey, how big is your buffer?" Sounds like a cheesy line at a webcomics bar (hmm...strip idea). Do they come from a print background where it seems buffers are mandatory rather than an option?

Eh, I put Buffers down to personal process. There's several reasons for and against but ultimately it's down to working style. Hell look at how Hollbrook handles his process.

Here's the worst part. I don't know how to make my brain work to maintain one.

I hear people like Howard Taylor say things like he doesn't believe in writers block. Kris has commented on how he never feels like he's run out of ideas. I know that even Aaron Diaz recently commented in his strip that his problem is TOO many ideas.

This is not a problem I'm saddled with.

Sometimes, I have a hard time being satisfied enough with an idea to make it into a strip that I will actually post. Sometimes, it's hard to decide what I want to do next because I want to do something next that EXCITES me.

I wish I could say it's a result of PvP having been around for 10 years but that's not the case. I felt this way the first year. If anything, I think I'm better at this than 10 years ago. But it still happens.

How can a buffer ever survive the moment where I have an idea I could crap out and put up JUST SO I'M NOT LATE, but I don't have the idea that's SUPPOSED to be what happens next in PvP?

blerg.

It's incredibly tough for me to create a buffer. Like many cartoonists, I'm juggling a million things at once (comics, family, day job, etc.) I live on the edge every week, just like many cartoonists do. I've gotten used to it, but it's always terrifying when I feel under the gun to 'make the funny' happen.

For longer storylines, I feel having a buffer gives the cartoonist more opportunity to craft a solid story (rather than winging it). For topical items, like Penny Arcade's subject matter, not having a buffer makes sense.

I'm a professional web designer. I have leeway when I come in to work -- it can be anywhere from 6 AM to 9:30 AM, unless I have a good reason (e.g. dentist appointment) in which case I can come in later. I'm also allowed a few weeks worth of sick days per year. If I am sick or otherwise don't feel up for work, I can just call in and miss a day.

I'm also, I guess, a semi-professional web cartoonist. My strip normally goes up every weekday at midnight. Sometimes it goes up a few hours after that, and sometimes if I have a good reason, it goes up in the late morning. Once in a while if I'm unable to do a strip, and I need to miss a day, I put up a note to my readers and point them to a strip from the archives they might not have seen in a while.

Professionals get days off, and professionals get to be late sometimes. I only consider myself semi-pro at cartooning because I don't make very much money from it yet.