La Marche de Kanoba (WIP)

[ThomasR]

Hello everybody !

Here is a rework of a project I started a while ago. I posted an early version a couple months ago but since, I decided to start over. On my first draft, I used some brushes made from parts drawn by others (mainly Max's works) and I decided to do it myself (with a huge dose of inspiration from the works featured here). I found a wacom intuos and here am I.

This works presents a region for the french RPG Oltrée. It's a sandbox game where the players are part of an organisation called "La Patrouille", a remnant of an ancient empire that fell appart a long time ago. "La Patrouille" is supposed to keep the population safe and tries to re-establish the glory of the Empire. The setting is a dark age very close to the Charlemagne era but with fairies and monsters.

I worked from the tutorials posted by torstan on his wonderful site fantasticmaps.com and used the works of people like Max, Sirinkman, Chick, Lesopeso, Stratomunchkin and Sapiento (I'm forgetting many others) as models for some things I'm trying (struggling) to do.

Here are the first steps. All help will be welcome.

The coast line and some lakes

The outline of my mountains

The ridges

The mountains finished

The river system

I'm currently working on some cliffs and the forests.

This last picture shows my first design. You can see it's very similar, except this time I'm drawing everything, not using brushes. I'm working on something less cartoony for my trees.



Hope you like it and thanks in advance for your feedback.

Thomas

[Greg]

Looking nice so far thomrey. It's nice you've decided to hand-draw it! I look forwards to seeing how you manage to add in all your elements.

About the rivers, are the thinner lines that cut across/around in places the start of Oxbow lakes, or are they beaches? I know it's early days yet, but it's not too clear and some of them look unnatural if they are little side rivers.

Again, I know it's early days and you've done it on your old map, but that coastline needs something to make it more noticeable especially with your bold rivers.

Good start though and I anticipate your next update!

[ThomasR]

Thanks for the feedback !

Concerning the rivers, the thinner lines are supposed to be side rivers, little deviations that create inland islands. I got the idea from the river Loire in France and this map buy Municorn : http://www.cartographersguild.com/sh...ad.php?t=27623

Could you please explain what you mean when you say they look unnatural ? I'd like to improve on that point.

About the coastline, they're not done yet. I plan on adding small details to give it some depth (beaches, cliffs ...). I tried adding ripples but wasn't satisfied by the look of it. Maybe drawing some ripples with the tablet ... I don't really know what would make it more noticeable appart from a colored sea. Again, if you have any ideas on how to achieve this goal, feel free to point me to it. And last, a little question, what do you mean by "bold rivers" ? I planned on making them blue later, dunno if it will help or not.

I'm currently working on the forests and some cliffs in the gap in the mountain above the northern little lake and between the south-east mountains and the coast.

Thanks again for your help GLS ! I'll try to work on it tonight.

PS : BTW, I loved your "Mausoleum of Adonis" map !

[Greg]

No problem thomrey!

With the coastline, I think it's just a case of waiting to see how your details make it more noticeable. Like with your old map you could do a line that copies the shape of the coast, or do short horizontal lines coming off it. By "bold" rivers, I just meant that these lines are vastly thicker than any other lines on your map, not a problem just an observation.

Going back to your rivers, I'm afraid I'm unfamiliar with the Loire. I think the main issue I have is that generally rivers don't split too much. When the thinner part is cutting off a corner I think it looks fine, because that's like an Oxbow lake forming, but when the little river stems off the side around a corner, it just seems a bit weird. Perhaps I'm just being silly as I'm sure rivers probably CAN do that, it's just not common and I don't know any examples. Rivers obviously split if they hit an obstacle of some sort, but I think with the extremes of your line thicknesses it just looks a little off to me. Like I said though, the Oxbow ones are fine, and the others may be too and it's just me being picky or what not.

Hope that helps and I look forwards to seeing those details added in. Are you planning to colour it do you think?

PS: Thanks, I was pretty pleased with that map too.

[ThomasR]

It helps a great deal, thanks ! I see what you mean concerning the side rivers, they shouldn't happen when the river turns. I'll only do it when the river flows straight.

Here is a capture of the region I was talking about :



I'll rework the rivers.

Thanks again !

[Greg]

They can happen when they cut corners like this demonstrates http://waterandlandforms.weebly.com/...77535_orig.jpg , just not so much when they go around corners.


Oh and thanks for sharing the screenshot!

[ThomasR]

Here come the fixed rivers, some cliffs and a little bit (maybe too little) of details for the coast line.

[Caenwyr]

It's starting to look really good here!

A few remarks:

• your coastline details are sometimes rather far away from the actual coastline. That makes them look rather like inland structures than something linked to the coast. It's actually okay if they hug the coastline, even touching the coastline stroke shouldn't be a problem if you do it right! As a matter of fact, the details on the smaller islands already seem pretty neat.
• your mountains are great! Their strokes are a bit thin, especially compared to the coastline stroke, but that's not a big issue. However, I've learned from past experience that putting mountains really close to the coast is often not a very good idea. the dimensional nature of the mountains doesn't work well with the top-down-ish coastline, so the eye seems to point us toward all sorts of strange things that can't be possible. I'm especially giddy about those (otherwise magnificently drawn) mountains on that island. They seem to fit so tightly that they would probably look better if they were a bit smaller. Other than that, however, your mountains are epic.
• Also, I noticed a strange artifact on that same island, a black stroke behind those mountains that wasn't there in your previous update. Just a small error I'm sure.
• Your rivers have a great taper to them, which I admire very much! What I don't like too much is their loopiness. Meanders are a perfectly acceptable feature on a river on a small scale (rivers tend to meander quite a bit given a small enough gradient and enough space left and right), but on a higher scale rivers always try to follow the steepest slope toward the sea. Which is generally a straight line, unless there's some topographical/geological feature blocking the way. Real-earth rivers therefore tend to be rather straight with here and there a bend. Take the Mississippi: known for its hundreds of meanders, but still running in an almost perfect north-south direction if you zoom out a bit. So if you want your rivers to look more realistic, you might consider straightening out some of those bends, and adding smaller loops and nicks and dents in that line.

This probably seems like a lot of critique, but I wouldn't bother doing that if I didn't believe you could turn this one into something awesome. Because the seed is already there, you obviously have the skill AND you seem pretty determined to get everything right! All in all the map is already a great piece of work, and the only real issue I can see here is the rivers. All the others are just minor remarks you can fix in a minute or simply ignore if you like.

[Ilanthar]

Yup, looking very good. And I quite agree with Caenwyr excellent suggestions.

[ThomasR]

@Caenwyr : Many thanks ! And do not worry about critiques, that's why I post my stuff, it needs to improve.

- about the coast details. I have to admit I half-assed this point lazily thinking I just needed to give an impression of consistency but I realize I need to think it just like everything else. I'll go check some maps on the subject and come up with something I hope better for the eyes and more convincing. Just one question though, when you say "the details on the smaller islands seem pretty neat", do you mean the main outline or the tiny details I added ?
- I know that mountains and coasts do not get along that's why I tried to put a cliff between the south east ones and the sea. I'll try to take them a little bit further inland and maybe extend the cliff (these mountains have a purpose that's why I don't wanna push 'em too much inland). Concerning the island, I agree, they are a little bit stacked. I'll reduce them to see how it looks but they've got to stay (there's something inside that peak).
- The strange artifact is gone, I inadvertently put my pencil in the wrong place while doing some work but it was an easy fix (thanks layers !).
-I see what you mean about the rivers. I definitely have to fix this. Maybe I'll put some hills before to get a sense of the terrain. I might not do it immediately but that's an important point on my to do list. I also have to adapt the look of the rivers to the size of the map. It's about 130 km north/south and 90 east/west. I'll try to keep it believable by checking some satellite pictures.

Thanks again Caenwyr for spending time on this project. I'll gladly take all the critiques you have, I want to improve this map and get it right. The lifework is a bit hard for me but if I spend time on it I think I can get something that satisfies me. When the coloring will occur, I may not be that pleased with myself, color's a bitch ! And again, many thanks for the compliments (which are more present than the critiques).

@Ilanthar : thanks !

Back to work then ! Hope I'll have some time today to improve the map.