The Low Countries & Periphery, c. 1584

[Will Phillips]

I've fallen into quite the historical rabbit hole over the past several years. So much so, my worldbuilding and RPG efforts have fallen by the wayside. During all of this, I've also been working on my hand-drawn mapping skills. It's been some time since I've worked on an ambitious digital piece.

Time to return to my Photoshop roots, then.

This will be a 24" x 18" map at 225dpi depicting the Low Countries (roughly today's Belgium, Netherlands, and Luxembourg) and surrounding region circa 1584-ish.

My goal is to create a helpful reference work that will depict the region's political boundaries and primary cities as well as languages. In an inset, I'll be mapping the religious affiliations of the area along with IDing bishoprics and universities (these items being another indicator of larger socio-cultural trends).

All this is going to make for a very complex, dense map. So I'll have to be meticulous in my layout.

Should be fun!

Here's a quick WIP. I began this weekend by taking the shotgun approach and working on lots of little things in order to get the feel for the map. Moving forward, I've broken the map into separate working .PSDs and will be handing the geography and political borders first, then labels, and so on.

RNMap-LC-WIP-2018-12Dec-02-ProofOfConcept.jpg

[Gidde]

Looks like a fun, huge project! Looking forward to seeing how it progresses.

[Will Phillips]

Thanks, Gidde! Definitely feels huge, already, haha.

Here's a few hours work tonight primarily focused on outlining the Low Countries provinces (Orange and Red) and getting into some territories that were part of the Holy Roman Empire (purple). And some river and coastline work, with a smidge of topography.

Doesn't look like much, but that's the funny thing about historical mapping: I have to get the approximated locations of former and historic boundaries (that have changed over time or disappeared altogether) correct. Not like fantasy mapping, I'm finding out. Very tedious stuff.

But, at least there's progress being made.

RNMap-LC-WIP-2018-12Dec-04-BorderWork.jpg

[Will Phillips]

Did some more work on borders - just have the remainder of the German territories to work out.

To mix my work up, I dropped in the legend and inset and all that to mess with layout.

Not sure I like the lighter ocean blue, but the dark ocean / light rivers and coast makes the rivers too jarring. Going to have to mess with that. Maybe a single color for both...

RNMap-LC-WIP-2018-12Dec-05-BordersAndLegend.jpg

[Llannagh]

This should be interesting, I live in Lower Saxony in Germany. Already recognized some stuff!

[Will Phillips]

Not much to say, other than there's gonna be lots of labels to worry about and that the file sizes are getting stupid big.

RNMap-LC-WIP-2018-12Dec-09.jpg

[Will Phillips]

Mucking around with some topography. The forests will need to be less prominent, the wetlands more so, and the secondary borders stronger (to cut through the forests).

Also some playing around with the legend and inset map.

RNMap-LC-WIP-2018-12Dec-10am.jpg

[Llannagh]

Although I'm a fan of topographic maps, I think putting it into this map hinders the readability. If you're aiming to mainly convey information about the political situation at that time, you might want to consider leaving out the forests at least. The terrain is not too distracting.

If you will need to put in a lot more labels too, my advice would be to leave out the topography, unless it adds significantly to the political situation (like strategic influences).

[Falconius]

I think you can get away with the forest if you manage to find a good balance. I don't even see the wetlands to be honest. Are they the diagonal hatching? Cause I assumed that indicated contention.

[Will Phillips]

Although I'm a fan of topographic maps, I think putting it into this map hinders the readability. If you're aiming to mainly convey information about the political situation at that time, you might want to consider leaving out the forests at least. The terrain is not too distracting.

If you will need to put in a lot more labels too, my advice would be to leave out the topography, unless it adds significantly to the political situation (like strategic influences).

Yeah, that's certainly the struggle right now. I'm wanting to convey as much information as I can about the region as a reference, and some inclusion on forest cover, wetlands, and elevation seems pertinent. If I can't get it all to work well together with the political labelling, it'll have to go.