First the obligatory poll announcements:
You can also start submitting nominations for June. And the May stream recordings are uploaded for those interested!
PATREON NEWS
★ Alright boys, hear me out. I've been chewing on this for months, and I think it's about time to move it from "idea" to "serious consideration". Basically, it's a structure update for the campaign. The goal is to help & modernize growth while keeping everyone happy.
All of these proposed changes are tentative, all could go forward or none of them could. That's why I'm consulting you about 'em before I make any moves. Please let me know any thoughts you have on any of them, even if it's just "X bad" or "Y good". Gauging interest or the lack-thereof will help greatly with these decisions.
PROPOSED CHANGES
- Remove the Sketch content poll
The original idea behind the sketch poll served 2 purposes. It was meant to allow you guys to push content you want to see from beginning to end (IE being chosen as a sketch, and then later being turned into a finished image via the color poll), and it was also to give the lads who like my sketches but not my color to have something to play with. However between animation and color, the thing is clearly outclassed. Therefor, I'm proposing we just drop it, and move the efforts involved to fresher pastures, which you'll find in another change below.
(Some of you might be wondering why the 3D poll isn't looking at the same treatment since it's not much of a challenger to the big 2 either. The answer is simply I think what I'm planning for the genre will raise some eyebrows in the not-too-distant future. You'll see. Huehuehue.)
People have suggested adding more higher tiers several times in the past, but there's a fine line of balance to consider; I don't want to just chuck up tiers without rewards for your patronage, and I also don't want to offer too many or too sizable rewards overall because the resulting overload could threaten my already packed schedule and endeavors, and thus hamper work on the larger projects.
So what I'm proposing is another high tier - $15, where the reward is a private sketch nomination/poll. I figure if you're supporting me with that much, you must have pretty similar deviant tastes to me, which means the voter base would be generally cohesive and everyone would be able to enjoy the inevitable fetishes this smaller pool would produce at least to some degree without anyone feeling left out.
There's also the possibility of a $20 tier, with the same idea, but to me right now it's not a serious consideration. Additionally, there's the idea to make the results of this poll stay in the elevated tier 3 early access queue with the large project WIPs to give that tier set more meat, but I'm not yet sold on that idea.
- Rework all Patreon tier graphics to have that sleek 80's theme like I used in this shitpost.
Nice aesthetic, eye catching, more interesting than the current little black Melo cutout graphics. Also possibly change the tier names to something more verbose.
- Change the $1 tier (super tentative, just putting the idea out there)
I'm sure by now you've heard about the Patreon creator videocast that revealed a $1 pledge gets gibbed down to $0.40~$0.60 for the creator because Patreon is Patreon, and they suggest everyone move their lowest tier to $2 or a higher number to account for this. The whole thing's dumb, but I calculated it out, and the "take-home" difference is actually a couple hundred bucks, which is a lot of groceries; so it's worth considering. Having $2 as the lowest number on the campaign may be beneficial for the long-term health of it as new pledges come in and "supporter/creator culture" grows.
However that's not to say we can just shaft the current group of $1 lads. We have the benefit of running this whole show through the gallery, which runs on pledge amount rather than Patreon's actual registered tier. A $1 pledge could still enable all of the current rewards, or I could simply add a flag to the pre-change supporters on the site which would still give them access for their dollar.
So basically if everything went through the new structure would look like this:
Tier 1 ($2, but everyone currently pledged can still access for $1) - Voting and nomination, source file access
Tier 2 ($5) - Early access, +2 poll weight, stream recordings, bonus poll
Tier 3 ($10) - Elevated early access, +3 poll weight
Tier 4 ($15) - Sketch poll
(Possible: Tier 5 ($20) - Another sketch or bonus poll? +4 poll weight?)
If you have any comments or suggestions, throw 'em over. It takes a lot of secondary viewpoints to work out what's best for everyone!
SITE NEWS
★ The gallery has been redesigned - if you haven't seen it yet, you can learn more from the announcement video.
★ For you lads who have been chomping at the bit on commissions, the commission system I've been working on is nearly ready and will probably show up next month; though when it'll be open I'm not sure.
ADDITIONAL NEWS
★ I'm going to be out of town the week of the 5th, so be aware I won't be around.
Thanks, everyone! I love you guys (◡ ‿ ◡ ♪ ) .
<3!
