Greetings and Salutations - I am Jan

[Feybrad]

Hello Cartographer's Guild,

My name is Jan. I've been lurking here for a while now, greedily siphoning inspiration from the astounding work being put out here every day and eagerly reading various tutorials and WIP threads to get a glance at some of the workflows of the amazing artists in this guild. I stumbled upon the guild in the commendations of a video on worldbuilding and climates by "Artifexian" on youtube and I was quickly enraptured by the wealth of knowledge and, more importantly, creativity to be found in this community. So thanks to you, "first" of all (I know I ramble on a lot, please forgive me).

Why was I watching that video in the first place, though? Why, because I was building my own world, of course, like so many others on here. I have been working on it sporadically for the last few years, with the first "mapmaking" work being done within the last year. The reason I put that term in apostrophes is because I have so far eschewed putting in things as trivial as borders, labels or legends - basically everything that makes a map actually readable. These are some of the things I look to improve as soon as I have nailed down some of the more basic aspects of my world map. Working on my own, I had previously created a basic coastal outline, a crude tectonic map, a deeply flawed elevation map and worked myself up to a climate map working with azelor's and pixie's tutorials, which was the point at which I noticed some of the deeper flaws with my approach and decided to start over and try to engage with some of the more knowledgeable people found in this community to improve - and show my appreciation for their work all the while.

Thus, I am looking forward to engaging with this community and learning from you!

Jan

Addendum: The attached pictures show basically the point which I have resolved to restart my work from. As you can see: Only the bare bones of what might one day be a world map.

These are the outlines for the land masses I want to have. I kinda seek to preserve the general shapes through future iterations, but I am not married to anything there.

Here we see the plate boundaries (red lines) and the movement of the plates (along the yellow lines toward the orange part of the plate boundaries).

Both combined. Duh.

[Oxifawkes]

Hey Jan!

I am new to this all as well. It's always nice to meet someone else. I wish you well on your map-making here.

[Feybrad]

Thanks Oxifawkes!
I hope you will find a lot of help on here - I can only recommend starting up with a WIP, people here seem to be very welling to lend a helpful comment. And don't forget to check out the tutorial section - there's a wealth of information over there to get newbies like us started.

[XCali]

Hi! Welcome to the guild!

I like your Critical Role reference. Truth be told CR was one of my reasons for getting super passionate about creating maps, making places to have adventures in.

Anyway, I hope you enjoy your time with the Cartographers guild community, and good luck on your map making journey. Which reminds me, what purpose are you creating your world for?
It is interesting to see what motivate someone's maps.
Have a nice day!

[Feybrad]

I cannot hide my inner Fandom for long, it seems

It is true that one the motivations for me making maps is to create a world were for my group of players to someday play in it. Beyond that, for me to have a setting to write different kinds of stories in. However, in the process of creation (not just mapmaking, but the detailing of ecosystems and cultures, cities and organizations) I noticed that I enjoyed this simple act of creating the world even more than just using it. Thus, I took my project beyond the scope of what I needed for stories or even ttrpg-campaigns. I started anew and built, for lack of a better term, for building's sake. I am a worldbuilder by heart and I seek to create a meticulous and incredibly detailed world as a hobby. I do not expect this project to take less than many years until I might say it is completed, but I am excited to take this journey. However, I know that with a little advice, I can go beyond what I would achieve on my own. If anyone is interest, here is my WIP Thread on my current step in the cartography of my world, Acean:
https://www.cartographersguild.com/s...ad.php?t=43515

Have a nice day!