Welcome!
The Cartographers’ Guild is a forum created by and for map makers and aficionados, a place where every aspect of cartography can be admired, examined, learned, and discussed. Our membership consists of professional designers and artists, hobbyists, and amateurs—all are welcome to join and participate in the quest for cartographic skill and knowledge.
Although we specialize in maps of fictional realms, as commonly used in both novels and games (both tabletop and role-playing), many Guild members are also proficient in historical and contemporary maps. Likewise, we specialize in computer-assisted cartography (such as with GIMP, Adobe apps, Campaign Cartographer, Dundjinni, etc.), although many members here also have interest in maps drafted by hand.
If this is your first visit, be sure to check out the FAQ. You will have to register before you can post or view full size images in the forums.
Ah. I suspected it was by hand. It looks great btw so as always patience pays off. Thanks for leading me to the David Rumsey collection.
I don't think you'll like the answer. I manually painted each contour on a vector software (illustrator, inkscape is free and should also work). AFAIK there's no other way to do it. The trick is to lay out mountains and rivers first, and to set up the contours according to that. To see the shapes of the mountains I kept Google Earth open on the side to check consantly. I set down paths that matched the ridges and then paths that matched the rivers between each ridge. Then I placed the contours, contracting them when meeting a river and expanding them when hitting a ridge. Studying contour maps is also useful if you want to do it this way, the David Rumsey map collection has a few.
Hi, it's no problem, thanks for getting back to me. I was wondering how you got from "Advance_2.png" to "Advance_3.png" and "Advance_5.png". Did you make Advance_3 by hand or did you generate it procedurally from Advance_2? If it was procedural I'd like to know the technique.
Hi, sorry it took so long to answer, I often take long breaks between maps.
I have a question for you about the Muna Workshop thread. Are you still active?
