#You should draw your rimworld colonists!!

[pushing500]

your mechanitor's message series has me wanting to draw art of my own colonists

I highly recommend drawing RimWorld pawns as a great way to practice art! I sometimes feel like I should try harder to figure out digital art because of all the stuff I end up drawing while I'm playing. I'd save a lot of money on sketchbooks and paper if I was drawing on my laptop.

I have a whole bookshelf dedicated to sketchbooks, and my desk is running out of room for pencil pots!! Still, I enjoy looking back at older art and feeling like I've improved—and like I'm improving a bit more each day!

It's definitely worth trying, in my opinion, and if you ever feel like posting your efforts... Well, I can never get enough RimWorld content! <3 <3 <3

[stevensaus]

Review: RimWorld

blog: RimWorld isn't your normal kind of game. The official description gives you a hint of this: RimWorld follows three survivors from a crashed space liner as they build a colony on a frontier world at the rim of known space. Inspired by the space western vibe of Firefly, the deep simulation of Dwarf Fortress, and the epic scale of Dune and Warhammer 40,000.But before you think this is just another game like so many others, there's a big twist: In RimWorld, your colonists are not professional settlers – they’re survivors from a crashed passenger liner. They'll be accountants, homemakers, journalists, cooks, nobles, urchins, and soldiers. There's a lot to like about this game - though it's technically still in alpha (and has been since its first release at the end of 2013), it's more polished and developed than many other independent final releases. It's also very actively developed, with new releases bringing performance and feature improvements. Like many indie games, graphics aren't its biggest draw, but they're stylized and quite acceptable. It's crossplatform - Windows, Mac, and Linux - and whether you use Steam or a direct download, there's an active modding community which lets you tweak and enhance gameplay significantly. RimWorld has aspects of worldbuilding, RTS, and 4x games, and should appeal most to those who enjoy those kinds of games. Rimworld is $30 (which includes all updates and the final game), and is well worth it. http://bit.ly/2ufleP0

[pushing500]

Hi! I love your rimworld art, it makes me want to draw my little guys in situations! I was wondering what xenotype Candlelight is? My colony’s Wookshy is a pawn named Aidan who has the abrasive trait is very divorced and recently declared an eight year old to be his rival.

Hello, thank you for the message! I'm so glad you like my art, and I absolutely think that more people should draw their little guys in situations more often. I'd love to see it!

Candlelight is the T'au xenotype from the 'Tau Armory' mod. The T'au are my favourite Warhammer 40k faction, and also one of the two armies I collect minis for.

Fun fact: it was a Rimworld colony gone awry that first got me into Warhammer 40k!

I think every Rimworld colony needs a Wookshys to keep things balanced. I have to say, though, your Aidan colonist sounds highly amusing. What did the eight-year-old do to be declared a rival, I wonder? Or perhaps eight-year-olds are just like that...

Have a smol Wookshys doing his daily task of fishing and staying out of the other colonists' ways while they work. <3

[pushing500]

I just need you to know how invested I am in your rimworld game! You really bring these guys to life with your art~ I love Taz so much! ;w; ❤️

Ah, thank you so much! I'm so glad that other people enjoy this colony as much as I do. Rimworld has such a beautiful way of giving every pawn their own personality, and I think I have just as much fun putting that into drawings as I do playing the game!

I've spent the last little while drawing this for you!

The "fun fact" behind this page is that, despite being extremely competent shooting and melee fighters respectively, Kaz and Baz still use the tribal weapons they used when they first came to raid my settlement. Kaz is armed with a sling, and Baz has a spear.

The main reason for this is... I have not researched gunsmithing yet. I was too distracted researching more important things, like saunas. Plus, I think it's kind of funny that my best shooting colonist (Kaz) is armed with something as simple as a sling when I put so much effort into making a fancy T'au gun for Candlelight. For the aesthetic, you understand, it's important.

I feel like I should apologise for having colonists with such similar names, haha. It's very lazy and Australian of me. Maybe "Baz" will become "Bazza" in the near future, that's very Australian.

Anyway, your message made my day, and I will be grinning about this for the next week. Thank you for giving me an excuse to talk about my Rimworld game some more! Have a wonderful day!

[pushing500]

I absolutely love your Rimworld saga, I've always wanted to do something like it for one of my colonies but I'm a better writer than I am an artist. Any tips for someone not used to drawing people?

Thank you for the great stories and adorable artwork 💕

Ah, thank you so much!! I'm glad you like the Rimworld stuff, I really love making it, and I'm happy it seems to have found an audience that enjoys it.

As for art tips, here are three things I always try to remember when I'm drawing:

1. It's okay to use references!

I see a lot of people worried about art theft, tracing, and stealing, which are important issues to keep in mind. No artist wants their work stolen, and nobody wants to be accused of tracing or things like that. Certainly valid concerns for all parties.

However, I've noticed that a lot of people avoid using references because of those concerns. It's alright to use references for your artwork! You can and should look for references to practice with. It's not easy to make up every single pose from nothing, but I've seen a lot of artists give up because they can't figure poses out without looking up references, and they feel like that means they're not real artists.

I'm partial to stock photos personally. There are stock photos for every conceivable situation. Behold, one I used just yesterday:

References are good and definitely okay to use. Use them a lot! They're a wonderful way to practice, and it's much easier to make up your own poses and draw people once you're used to drawing the human form from your references.

2. Don't be afraid to be silly!

Not every piece of art needs to be a serious and carefully thought-out commentary on the nature of humanity or society or things like that. Not every piece of art needs to be beautiful, or perfect, or even comprehendible. When I first started drawing art for a Rimworld colony, I was sitting beside my little brother and watching him play. I was doodling pictures of his colonists, and do you know what I ended up with? Nothing deep and meaningful, that's for sure.

I ended up with memes. Memes that are still blu-tacked up where everybody who comes into my house can see them.

I love them. I had so much fun drawing them. That's the important bit! They're ridiculous, silly, stupid memes, and I love them so much because I loved drawing them. Have fun with your art. Don't make it a chore. Be silly. Let yourself enjoy the act of creating, even if you end up with something dumb. That's the best kind of art.

3. Do so much art! So much of it!

The old saying says practice makes perfect, and it's not entirely wrong. I don't think I have ever met someone who has ever created something and decided it was perfect, no matter how much they practised.

However, the more you practice, the better you will be. I would post pictures of my older art to demonstrate the improvement, but I still haven't quite managed to choke back the gag reflex that comes with seeing the old drawings I have tucked away.

Maybe one day, when I'm braver, I'll show you the wonky caricatures of people I used to draw, and you can see for yourself that the more you make, the better you'll get. For now, though, I shall leave you with a tiny sampling of my sketchbook collection and one (1) spooky boi:

I don't know if any of that was helpful. I'm not much of a teacher, I'm afraid, but I do wish you the best with your artistic endeavours! For what it's worth, I'd read a written story about a Rimworld game just as eagerly as I would absorb pictures of it.

Thank you for your lovely compliments, and I wish you the loveliest of days! 💕

[justadumbasskid]

Aw c'mon. You're out here makin' me blush! Thank you, I really appreciate the knowledge that people actually enjoy the crap I post. I've always loved the personalization you've poured into your colony, and how you've so heavily personified your colonists. Your drawings really bring each interaction and event to life.

Nice ship, by the way. Hard to believe this colony will actually come to an end. Lord knows I'll miss you posting about it, and all your silly little characters.

Should you continue with a new colony, I highly recommend a mechanitor-focused playthrough. I'm a bit biased toward the techist-style ideologies, but I really do enjoy the high-tech side of RimWorld the most, even if it does send your colony wealth through the roof.

I did end up installing the Toddlers mod, and now we see the result! Baby Ro has become Toddler Ro!

The first thing he did with his newfound mobility was "bugwatch". I thought it was amusing that his bugwatching happened to be right where Frisbee the giant scorpion was walking, and I mean... Yeah, sure. A lot of people would consider her a bug. Entomophobic Zonovo does, at the very least.

Debby has decided to cause more drama with her polyamory trait, and Laurie has to pay for it. I wonder what will happen if Eva really does turn out to be a mime? That would definitely add drama to this story. Poor Brennan and Laurie, though.

We had an eventful raid with Eurros Pusmeberrus, a distant relative of Andrei and Andy's, coming to visit. We managed to capture her, but I don't know if we'll recruit her. She kind of sucks.

We also captured her friend, who was "unwaveringly loyal", but that was of little consequence as we had just finished building a subcore ripscanner. Doere was not a prisoner for very long.

Before Doere was ripscanned, Albina patched her up to avoid her bleeding out, and Henry tagged along to watch. I think the 'work watching' learning desire is my favourite one. Usually, it's cute to imagine a little kid trailing someone and bombarding them with questions about the jobs they're doing, but I'm not sure if it's quite as cute when it's watching someone operate on a prisoner.

Pacifist Vu started a social fight with Irwin, which resulted in her whole arm getting destroyed. Luckily Albina has the 'regrow limb' psycast, and hopefully, Vu will learn not to pick fights with people she has no hope of beating, no matter how empowered she feels wearing stolen liberated armour.

Then we got raided again by more people related to a colonist (and to prisoner Pusmeberrus, who in turn is related to Andrei and Andy). Fortunately, Hazrov is a crack shot and downed enough of them that the others turned tail and fled before they reached us. It made Wendy a bit sad, but I'm sure she'll get over it.

Finally, here's Andy being better at drawing dinosaurs than I could ever hope to be.

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[stevensaus]

Review: RimWorld

blog: RimWorld isn't your normal kind of game. The official description gives you a hint of this: RimWorld follows three survivors from a crashed space liner as they build a colony on a frontier world at the rim of known space. Inspired by the space western vibe of Firefly, the deep simulation of Dwarf Fortress, and the epic scale of Dune and Warhammer 40,000.But before you think this is just another game like so many others, there's a big twist: In RimWorld, your colonists are not professional settlers – they’re survivors from a crashed passenger liner. They'll be accountants, homemakers, journalists, cooks, nobles, urchins, and soldiers. There's a lot to like about this game - though it's technically still in alpha (and has been since its first release at the end of 2013), it's more polished and developed than many other independent final releases. It's also very actively developed, with new releases bringing performance and feature improvements. Like many indie games, graphics aren't its biggest draw, but they're stylized and quite acceptable. It's crossplatform - Windows, Mac, and Linux - and whether you use Steam or a direct download, there's an active modding community which lets you tweak and enhance gameplay significantly. RimWorld has aspects of worldbuilding, RTS, and 4x games, and should appeal most to those who enjoy those kinds of games. Rimworld is $30 (which includes all updates and the final game), and is well worth it. http://bit.ly/2tgliwO