How do you guys go about building your universes?

[Zetsubonii]

Just curious because I myself want to build my own universe using Jim's Days as a platform for now, hoping to continue it with other newer series, but, how do you guys build yours? Like do you make new stories, stick with your main one, etc. I'm curious ^^

Feel free to advertise as well I wanna see your universe too ^^

[Chopythes]

for both my comics, Beyond the Ordinary and Heritage, I've set those fantasy stories to our (paralel) world. But there's magic in it which has its own set rules.
But on the world building part, I begin with what I want the world to be like, desert, forest et cetera and begin to think about the religion. What would they believe in? What would trademarks be of said religion?
And then onwards to think about where and when to set the story, what would be suitable for it? Once I know that, it's easy to get to know what kind of world you'd want.

One comic idea I've got is about a demon, who lived their whole life as a slave. The world itself have their own technology but it's not electrical, but more rather steam and whole lot of luck. The world doesn't see value in money but rather in the slaves work, the more you own, the wealthier you are. There are different races, with their own beliefs in gods and justice. (and they mostly stick to eachother so there have barely been any wars. One race likes to put themselves on fire, so that they can be closer to their god).

I'm sure that there are other artists and writers who love to indulge in world building, but for me it's mostly: "what do I need to get this to work and how would that have been gotten here in the first place"- kind of thinking xD I do wish I was more able to think about other countries wealth, and all that, but it'll come to me if it's needed for the story. Atm, it's not ;D

[Monomania]

Me and the co-creator of my thing have been thinking about the world of it forever...like a decade+. We have so many plans, but its a slow build.
The whole thing is just absurd, and almost serves as a release from thinking about more serious projects. Ours is just like....big dumb hippies trying to save the world, but they are incredibly stupid. There are a lot of lewd jokes. Sex humor. Bad puns. At some point we will have a cacti army fighting for water conservation. A steam room made with a characters sweat. Time-traveling converse shoes. Talking Monkey's....but to answer your question.....We don't have any rules. Right now anything that has to do with water conservation or liberal issues.....and just turn it into silliness....as if you are writing a hanna barbara cartoon for non-children. Anything goes as long as its fun to keep making!

[shazzbaa]

When you ask about "building your universe," do you mean like, coming up with ideas and how you invent it? Or do you mean like, how do you introduce that universe to your readers?

I try to keep most of the world-building for my comic in the story itself. Like, I'm sure someday I'll make maps and extra information about the different countries and cultures and types of magic, and I like chatting about extra details when people ask me, but I think it's fun to kind of uncover the world as you travel through it rather than getting all the lore separately.

I don't think I would make another story just to explore another part of the world. Like, making a new story that takes place in a different country in the same world would certainly be a way to explore and develop that country, but I'm more interested in my story than in fully exploring the world -- if there are some spaces that never come up in that story, then they'll just never come up, and that's okay with me! I'd make a new story if the story idea interested me, not as a way to build the world.

As far as inventing it goes.... it's little bits of everything, honestly. Sometimes I know I need a specific kind of place or group of people for plot reasons, and then I build from that to figure out how that part of the world would function and what could make that part of the world interesting and specific. Other times I have an idea for a place or culture or society based on something I read or saw, and I look to see if that kind of thing could have a space in my story somewhere. Sometimes I'm researching details I'll need on purpose; sometimes I'm inventing factoids about my world for fun and then they just happen to come up and affect the story or the visuals in an interesting way.

[mariusthered]

first of all i made myself the mayor... (yes it looks like me)
then i thought about how i wanted to run a city my way.

[AnnaLandin]

I make new universes all the time

I'm a worldbuilding-nutjob.

I tend to start simple and scale up towards complexity. Sometimes, I come up with the story-concept ("I want to tell a story about necromancers!"), sometimes I start with a visual or basic concept ("I want this to be a world with islands floating in the sky!"), and then build from there. I add necessary details first - how does necromancy work? How do those islands float? Is there anything below them? etc., - and bit by bit I add layers of detail. Political systems, religions, trade routes, currencies, history, agriculture, level of technology, magic systems, the state of civil rights, etc., etc.

I have more fictional worlds in my brain than you can shake a stick at. ^_^; When on earth am I going to have time to do anything with them all? D:

[Evan]

While building a universe, something to keep in mind is if you're ever going to show anyone this universe, you want to keep it generally simple. Too much jargon can be a huge turn off for many readers, so most universes you create should be closely related to the real world. Not everything has to have an explanation, it's okay to call something magic and leave it at that, but your universe still has to have rules and defined mechanics. It's generally a good idea to use our current working universe as a model and add changes as desired.

Basically, start with our real world and make it your own with whatever you want.

[Merle]

The comics I have released here so far are all in a semi- realistic universe. Patterns in Snow even plays in a specific place being a fictive little town in Bavaria, Germany.
Honestly, this still suprises me as I am originally an Fantasy Author.
The next Comic I will release, Grades Hope is a gigantic world I have been building on for all my teen years. Whilst the main story resolves around a certain trio of main characters, there are ideas of spin offs playing in the very same world
When I try to model phantastic worlds, I try to apply the usual to the unknown. Make different races with diferent customs, that still are similar or at least known in our world. I guess what is the most unusual about my stories is some of the characters inherit psychic traits from their race...
Wich isn´t unusal as well.

[Moonshade]

I start from a question: "what is the most fun / interesting things I want draw/tell?".
When I decided I start to research and collect a MOUNTAINS of informations about all. Is important know "How the characters can find water? Build the home, work, travel...". At the end I don't use all informations, but can be useful for future things.
If is a fantasy story, with wizard or magical creatures I pick a rules on their powers, and I choose a real historical moment for determinate the possibile know-how level on agricolture, economy, society, houses, relationships, dishes, arms, business trade... Business trade are very important!

In a Fantasy I prefer create a new animals and plants, and I usually use details I discovered see National Geographic's documentaries and photos, or used a dinosaurs and ancient tetrapods for a creature designs, specially for the dragons and all creature with 4+ paws. I draw gryphons in this months, and I used a harpy eagle for the head, not a european eagle. Because my gryphons are big cat, funny and awkard, european eagle seem so serious.
I hope to write clearly, my english is not so good D:

[redsblueyoungster]

For I Work Part-time...IN HELL! I'm still in the process of building how Heaven and Hell have built themselves as a society. The two societies will look similar to ours such as buildings an fashion but their ethics and item usage will be different.

[VermillionWorks]

I suck at world building, which is why I usually stick to our world or something very similar.
I've been working on a dark fantasy novel in a unique world and it's a pain in the ass to me for some reason. I mean, don't get me wrong, part of it IS fun, otherwise I would've dropped it already, plus I've always wanted to write a fantasy story, but DANG I don't know how people pull whole universes out of their butts like this on a regular basis. XD

I've just been....putting things together piece by piece, and trying not to overthink some of the fantasy aspects too much (I think that's my biggest issue right there).

I'm also trying to decide if a world where crazy monsters form out of nothing that target mainly humans would mean that having other fantasy races would be an interesting or superfluous addition.

[Ambat]

Honestly most of my worldbuilding is limited to what choices I can make to support the narrative as it's being told. I'm not the type of storyteller who puts a crazy amount of thought into things outside of the scope of the narrative--I have friends who have like year by year backstories for their characters with irrelevant memories for each one which is like totally cool, but that is definitely not my style haha! I really try to make sure that everything that I'm including in my story visually and writing wise supports the main narrative or the side elements that lead up to the main narrative.

I'm still experimenting with how I approach backgrounds in my comic. I didn't really put any thought into them at all in my first chapter, but in my second chapter I've been really buckling down on them. I'm trying to make choices that support the aesthetic I'm going for (retrofuturism) but also choices that give a better idea of what kind of world these characters live in. As I get the chance to draw more scenes in the city, I want to really urbanize it and make things really dirty, which will be a fun challenge, although unfortunately I'm not going to get the chance to draw a city scene for quite some time...

[NickRowler]

I've been building my world for over 10 years...I've been add and tweaking stuff.

What I do is I constantly am thinking about it. I day dream/brainstorm all the time. I will sometimes come up with stories to use in the world to see how they would work (and make changes to the world if necessary). Also talking to other people can also be helpful. I originally had my magical creatures referred to by their element followed by "monster" (like Fire-Monster, Water-Monster, etc). But someone told me that "monster" was too harsh of a word to use. I then changed it to "fay" (Fire-Fay) but later decided that it would be easier just to say "people" (Fire-People).

My current comic hardly scratches the surface of the world I created. I don't really plan to go that deep however I do think having a world in place makes writing easier.

[indagold]

Starting out I just think of scenerios, environments, buildings, people or objects and what world they'd come from and work from there thinking of what belongs, building on it until it gets big enough and well developed. Though I tend to want to stay small because creating a massive world with lore and stories is great and all but is too ambitious and too time consuming if you were to create something with it.

Recently i'm starting a comic that has a universe and lore i've been building on for more than 15 or more years. I was planning to abandon the universe given it's just too much and than I realized I can just write short stories using it as a setting and all the lore, stories, rules, laws and other intense tidbits doesn't need to be dumped on anyone. I could just take bits and pieces of something massive and scale it down for a reader to understand and not get grossed out by endless exposition. Just show what you need to and that's it. The more alien and massive it is the less people can relate.

[Vanesalisa]

well I was going to make a fan comic but my friend told me that why don't you try original comic and I was like you know that's not a bad idea then bam Hollow Creek was born. I wanted to focus the story with by getting to know the characters on their past so the readers would understand the character more before they start hating or liking them. I plan on making up a lore or an urban legends in this story, showing some more psychology and supernatural.

[wander_creature]

The universe of Outer Spaces is developing slowly - I'm trying to let it grow and expand in a natural way that's based on what the characters see, and have less in the way of an overarching scheme. I try to bring out something new about their world in each strip, even if it's something small. I love the kind of day-by-day worldbuilding in projects like Adventure Time, for instance, so I'm trying to capture a bit of that same sense of wonder and discovery.

That said, the Outer Spaces are kind of like a lava lamp, full of changing colors and matter rearranging itself. In the midst of it, an asteroid has been turned into a city-outpost for an as-of-yet unaddressed star empire whose primary color is green. Inks are darker creatures with a sense of openness and a curiosity for adventure, although they're met with disdain and skepticism by many of the galaxy's more colorful occupants. So far space llamas, gigantic star-wandering bioluminescent eels, squids and lobsters, and mechanical professors lost on galactic treks have crossed paths with the story. All this on a comic about mental health and coping with life. Go figure.

That said, I've got some awesome things yet to come, so check it out Over Here!

[Zetsubonii]

That's actually interesting, just straight to the point and secure what's needed xD If you were to add other countries, how would it go?

[Zetsubonii]

I agree that it is slow ^^" I have no further thing to comment on that part, however, as for the different elements of your stories, sounds interesting xD I do plan on having similar event go on in my universe like radioactive beverages sold in convenience stores nonchalantly, dinosaurs governing cities and so on and so forth xD I look forward to see how you'll grow your universe

[Zetsubonii]

I guess both but mostly like how you build upon your story to make it seem larger than what it currently is Like how Ironman was just a basis for the MCU kinda thing

Also, I like the idea of making maps and extra info to add to a universe as well adding the actual world building in your main story itself What normally influences your world in terms of media and such? :U

[Zetsubonii]

Seems like you have quite a lot ^^" How long does it take you to make a world from a single idea?