(WIP) First Willing to Post Map

[ltan]

I did a little bit more on the map today at lunch. I used some of Gidde's guide on Hand-Drawn Maps, which also led to Ironmetal250 and RobA's guides as well. Although I didn't do the mountains by hand as I do not have a tablet, not scanner at work.

-Max- and jbgibson, do these mountains look better and like I am on the right track? I also extended the image size for a future border.



I am thinking that when I redid the mountain range that I pushed it too far towards the coast without supporting geology as to why. I will work on pulling that back inland more unless I am told that it is good where it is.

[Gidde]

I really like the placement of the mountains, very believable based on your coastline.

Try scaling down the brushes a bit (I'd probably try 50% of what you have). It's hard to get a sense of scale with so little of the map laid down, but they're a little overpowering. If you really need them big, maybe lower the opacity?

Also, you may want to poke around the mapping resources section for a bigger choice of symbols. Ramah did a nice set of mountain symbols a while back that might mesh better with the ... um, soft? feel of the rest of your map (and quite frankly they're better than mine lol - although I'm flattered you chose them). They're in the style of his Vaniya Cartographers' Choice map.

[ltan]

Thanks for the suggestion Gidde!


For anyone not wanting to hunt for Ramah's Mountain Brush set, Vhallor27 put them in this post




*update*

Fixed the mountains I think. They are no where near as beautiful as Ramah's... But that is to be expected. Also started adding trees. I still need to go and work in my rivers, so the Mountains,Hills, and Trees layers will be turned off so that I can do that...

[ltan]

The last update for now. Tired, and I might decide to change things after I wake up.

[Gidde]

Looking good! The scale of the symbols looks a lot better.

[ltan]

I started to add rivers today.


When I get some time tonight I intend to redo the tree layer so that they work better with the river layer. I also intend to refine the rivers more.

I used an updated height map for the hills and mountains as my guide for where to place them. I looked at where it seemed to make sense for them to run from the high to low points in the height map.

[ltan]

Re-adjusted the trees some. Going to stop for the night...

[ltan]

Well, some sad news to report. After a bad storm came through our area I not only lost my original GiMP file that I was working on, but my whole HDD. It has been a bit of a trial to get a new system up and running, but I have done so and now need to work on getting images together to recreate where I was a month ago.

[Chick]

When you do, I have a suggestion for you. Don't make the trees quite as big as the mountains this time

[Ascension]

I feel your pain brother, it sucks when ya lose your stuff. A map's main purpose is to disseminate information, aesthetics just make it look pretty. Your map had the necessary info, or was trending in that direction, so that's good. The aesthete in me tells me that you need the same kind of trees to match the mountains. Your trees look like pen & ink while the mountains are pencil. That's the only critique I would have otherwise get back in the saddle and get it done.