New here with my first map!

[Dethias]

Hi Everyone!

I'm new here and I recently created my first map...well, sort of! It's a visitors map of my local area made in Photoshop with a Surface Pro 3. I wanted to make it fun to look at with a little Middle Earth spin to it. I'm also a landscape oil painter and a land surveying technician. Let me know what you think!

[Greason Wolfe]

I think that if that is your first map, you are in fine shape. Colors are good and not too overwhelming as are the textures. On the whole, it doesn't look overly cluttered, though you might consider labeling a few more key points of interest (if there are any). All in all, though, I'd say that you're off to a good start.

And more importantly, welcome to the Guild.

[kacey]

This is a great first map! Welcome to the guild.

[rdanhenry]

Looks like somebody was tired of coming up with lake names. Well, the next time anyone here thinks their naming is bad, it may help to know somebody named lakes "First Lake", "Second Lake", "Third Lake", and "Fourth Lake". (Plus a "Silver Lake", probably the most generic lake name there is.) It's a good map, though, and I really like drawings of the animals and the skier.

[nopkin]

Pretty impressive for a first map! Keep up the good work!

As Wolfe said, the overall look is very pleasing and I think that’s the most important part and the hardest to achieve. One thing that bothers me is the bevel effect on the lakes. Depending on how you look at them, they seem to pop out or be placed on top of the map (if that makes sense), which is really weird. Other than that, great job. Have some rep.

[Wired]

Looks really good; certainly better than a lot of what I did after a year.

[Dethias]

Looks like somebody was tired of coming up with lake names. Well, the next time anyone here thinks their naming is bad, it may help to know somebody named lakes "First Lake", "Second Lake", "Third Lake", and "Fourth Lake". (Plus a "Silver Lake", probably the most generic lake name there is.) It's a good map, though, and I really like drawings of the animals and the skier.

Thank you for the kind words. Yeah, they are boring names but your comment made me remember something I should have put on the map. Those lakes, from 1st to 7th are called the Fulton Chain of Lakes. I'll need to put that one in there. The skier is actually a sketch of my daughter.

[Dethias]

Pretty impressive for a first map! Keep up the good work!

As Wolfe said, the overall look is very pleasing and I think that’s the most important part and the hardest to achieve. One thing that bothers me is the bevel effect on the lakes. Depending on how you look at them, they seem to pop out or be placed on top of the map (if that makes sense), which is really weird. Other than that, great job. Have some rep.

You are too kind about the colors. Thanks for the rep too! Also, I appreciate the feedback about the water bevel. I agonized over that. I wanted to do contours and I didn't care for it. Then I tried broken waves and it turned out kinda bad. I discovered the bevel and I thought it looked kinda cool and different. Maybe it's too strong though and I'll play around with it a bit.

[jbgibson]

Ooooh, nice work! Looks like your twin backgrounds feed straight into A.C. (Awesome cartography). The bevel effect only causes trouble for me because I have an ingrained expectation that light comes from the upper left - as though I were a right-handed writer/ drawer and needed a desk lamp to clearly light my work without hand shadows. You have light coming from the bottom or lower left, which is as good a choice as any.... until you get to us pre-programmed eyeball types :-).

No matter what it is a very nice map; quality plus being bold enough to feed us substantive content right from the start is worth some reputation - I’m glad others have already agreed!

[Kellerica]

Very nice first map. A most warm welcome from me as well, I'm sure you'll fit right in.

Looks like somebody was tired of coming up with lake names. Well, the next time anyone here thinks their naming is bad, it may help to know somebody named lakes "First Lake", "Second Lake", "Third Lake", and "Fourth Lake". (Plus a "Silver Lake", probably the most generic lake name there is.) It's a good map, though, and I really like drawings of the animals and the skier.

I live right by a lake which name literally translates to "waterlake". WATERLAKE. I know Finland has a billion lakes and all, but even so I think someone just gave up with naming at that point. Thank you, very helpful to know that, you know, there's possibly water in the lake or something.