(Continued from yesterday's commentary)

See, the issue I only recently remembered about my seemingly sky-high production speed back in 2013 during this climactic story is that, despite the deceptive numbers in terms of pagecount, I probably wasn't all that much faster back then strictly in terms of how quickly I can write and draw comic pages. On closer analysis, I worked then, and still do now, at a pretty much fixed rate of production; for example, laying out and dialoguing a page usually takes me about an hour or so, and I sincerely doubt I was any faster at that task back in 2013.

I have two ways that I can seemingly work faster.

Speed hack #1: Shortcuts!

Yeahp, I can kinda-sorta increase production speed by "taking shortcuts"—by leaving things out of the comics page, whether that's eschewing backgrounds or crowd scenes or complicated dialogue or complex perspective shots or detail in general. The earliest Empowered pages—especially the first-draft pages that predated the ones you've seen here—were cranked-out, sketchy doodles featuring just enough artwork to get the jokes (and cheesecake) across. Hence, early on I could easily hack my way through 2-4 throwaway proto-Emp pages in a workday, or fraction thereof.

However, I can tell you that I was taking no shortcuts whatsoever as I was racing through Empowered vol. 8's feverish finale. So what was 2013 Me's secret?

(Continued tomorrow!)

Today’s Patreon update: In an attempt to scratch out more worktime to complete the long-gestating Empowered vol. 12, I've switched over to a Monday/ Wednesday/ Friday Patreon posting schedule that won't feature the fixed content format I previously used. However, my vast archive of years of Patreon posts—extensive Empowered previews, vintage con sketches, work stages on covers, "damsel in distress" commissions, life drawings & much, much more—remains available for Patrons' perusal.

-Adam Warren