List of Mapping Software

[Mark Oliva]

Try out Fractal Mapper 8 from NBOS. I've used FM8, Dundjinni, CC DOS, CC2, CC2 Pro and CC3. FM8 will do all that you want, and it's easy to learn, where CC3 has a very high learning curve.

Dundjinni has been mostly out of business for a few years now, and it appears that it went totally out of business a few weeks ago. The Dundjinni website has gone totally dead. Dundjinni is/was a good program for dungeons and battle maps but not particularly well suited for town or overland mapping. The program last was updated 7 years ago, in 2008.

You can evaluate FM8 completely without spending a cent. Just do the following:

1. Download the free trial version at http://www.nbos.com

2. Download the free manual-tutorial PDF at http://www.nbos.com/nox/index.php?action=1001&id=125

3. Download the free raster mapping tutorial at http://www.vintyri.com/vintyri/tu1.htm

The trial version of FM8 is identical to the full version with two exceptions: You can't save files, and you get a smaller symbol library. If, after you've tried FM8, you decide it's not for you, you haven't lost a cent.

[Striogi]

Mark,
Thanks for the info. Someone might want to update the opening posts of this topic so that new folks are not inadvertently misled...

[markem]

By the way - Dundjinni is back up and running! :-)

[markem]

Someone mentioned Inkscape. It is FREE and it will allow you to import images. All you have to do is to go to Google, click on the IMAGES link and type in something like overland mapping. You will get tons of images that you can use. Also try the +FREE clipart rivers (or mountains, valleys, forests, etc....). You will get tons of images. Anyway, Inkscape allows you to use everything as an object. There is also DIA (or is it DAI?). This is a CAD program that also will allow you to import images. Inkscape is more like an art program but with the two you can create anything. What I do on my FRP BBS is I do everything in Visio and then for my users I do the same design in Inkscape and post that (not always but most of the time). This allows the players in my game to move their figures around on the map to show me where they want to stand in relation to the monsters.

I've also used Screen Monkey from NBOS. It is ok but it lacks a lot of features like what Roll20 has. Last, but not least - there is Obsidian Portal. All of these are browser based programs mainly for playing an RPG on. But you can also use them to build maps which is why I even mention them. But for most people starting out I'd recommend Inkscape just to get started. Once you've exceeded what Inkscape can do you can then look into CC3, Fractal Mapper, etc....

[markem]

Sorry - go to Google, click on the Images link. Type in "river art" or "mountain art" or "forest art". At the top there should be a horizontal line of things to select. Select the "ClipArt" option and that will take you to the tons of images that are free. I'm posting this because I tried what I had posted and it was not right. So I went through the steps until I had it down pat. Have fun! :-)

Oh! Also - I don't think anyone has mentioned just using MacPaint or Paint (Windows). Both can also be used to draw maps and other images.

[JustinWaters]

I'm interested in this Cartography software list.

There are so many listed and it is difficult to swim through all the Pros and Cons of each one.

Basically I'm looking for a piece of software that allows me to plug-in some coordinantes x,y,z and then it adds a point.

It's for a game called Entropia Universe where you mine underground. I'm mapping resource depth underground and hoping for a visual representation where people could see where underground resources were found.

[Deadshade]

Your problem is too simple - no specific cartography software I know would do only that - generally they do more complex things.
What you need is just a small mathematical program like http://k3dsurf.sourceforge.net/

With that you can plot any 3D surfaces you want. F.ex you can consider that every ressource deposit is a small sphere of varying center and radius and this kind of software will plot all the spheres wherever you want them to be.

[johnvanvliet]

mind you that k3dsurf is a fork of "opencscad"
http://www.openscad.org/

and the windows prebuilt "k3dsurf-062.exe" was BUILT in 2007

k3dsurf is 7+ years out of date and might not run on win7 or 8
and will not run on a ARM powered win8 laptop /tablet ( surface)


underground as a whole planet ?
if so then you only need to plot things in the outer 2 % of the sphere

for that i would just use a flat map of the planets surface
and map the depth of things below the surface

something like this maybe
http://ncgmp.usgs.gov/geomaps/introgeo_mapping.html
or fig6 here
http://pubs.usgs.gov/of/2005/1428/dedonatis2/


or if you are looking for something like this
http://subsurfaceviewer.com/ssv/index.php?id=3
-- image --
http://subsurfaceviewer.com/ssv/asse...nimation_2.gif
-- there are MANY free and GPL'ed software products that can do this like VTK
http://www.vtk.org/

[Roseweave]

Still finding it hard to find something that suits my needs perfectly. I may be better off going the photoshop route, but one of the simpler ones rather than the "Realistic" ones which would give me a headache.

[Roseweave]

I tried Dunjinni but it's too slow and clunky and awkward. Dungeonforge has a really nice interface, but an extremely limited tileset