"Mediokritus"-- First Continent Completed

[Peter Toth]

Hello everyone,

I can't imagine what I may be doing wrong, but often when I make specific requests for a critique on a project, they go unanswered. Is this phenomenon common on the Guild? Are my maps uninteresting or poorly crafted? I'm not the superstitious type, but I heeded a friend's suggestion and decided to post on St. Patrick's Day, in hope for more promising feedback from the masters of the Guild. In particular, I am interested in knowing what I can focus on to make my maps more realistic and visually appealing.

Today's contribution is a follow-up to a rather ambitious plate tectonics conworld project, which I introduced a week or two ago in this section. This particular map represents just one of many continents on this so-far-unnamed planet. Here are my first results:



Then, for the final copy, I've enhanced the rivers and added lakes; however, as this is an altitude map, the deserts on the northwest coast haven't yet been rendered.



For those masters of the Guild, could you please critique this project?

I thank you immensely.

Peter

[Jean-Abdel]

Your continent being close to the equator, you can't have that many lakes and rias and islands, especially in not montainous area, look at the coasts of Myanmar, Thailand and Vietnam for examples of mountainous and not mountainous coastlines. Your mountains and rivers are great tho.

[rdanhenry]

While I'd hardly call myself a "master" and I have no experience creating this style of map, there are a couple of comments I would make.

First, I would recommend turning down the opacity on those grid lines. They don't need to be solid white to be visible and the less they obscure the map detail, the better it will be.

Second, I am not convinced that this whole continent is speckled with little lakes, as shown. Certainly, there could be areas with a ton of lakes, but it is very unlikely that these conditions would exist essentially everywhere, even on the islands to the lower left of the map.

[Naima]

I think looks very good and even if some features could look weird we have even weirdier features in nature https://www.cartographersguild.com/s...ad.php?t=43631

[Azélor]

My suggestion would be to tone down the colours a bit.

Something like this:
https://www.google.com/imgres?imgurl...QwBA..i&w=2200

or this :
https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikiped...raphic_map.png

[Ryan Pourchot]

How large would you say the continent is compared to a real life comparison? looks great, but I do agree with the lakes being too many. Lakes are usually formed by glacial, natural dams, man, land below sea level with constant rain, wet season flooding of a basin, or in a rift valley.
Your mountains are great, but to add back to the water, you will have a rainshadow effect. It will accumulate the moist air when it rises up the mountain range, then fall as dry air, creating a desert/semi desert. That will depend on your weather patterns. Also currents will also change your climate, cold currents will create a desert as well. Your rivers are good, but could be skinnier closer to the headwaters, verses wider as it flows to the mouth.
I agree with the lower opacity of the grid, or even no grid will look better. And I agree with Azelor by toning down the colors, your map would look more pleasing.
Naima is right, everyone does maps weird or different, these are only suggestions.

Sent from my SM-G930V using Tapatalk

[Peter Toth]

Hello Guild,

Thanks to everyone's valuable feedback, I've made some changes to the original submission. I've toned down the number of lakes, heeding Jean-Abdel and Ryan Pourchot's advice, and yes, I've examined the coasts of Vietnam and Thailand and taken note of the shape of their topography. (More on that in a minute). I’ve also made the gridlines more transparent; and more importantly, the colours have been toned down to something FAR more pleasing to the eye (thank you Azelor!).

As far as realism goes, I believe I may have to backtrack and redesign my coasts and mountains, eliminating some of the rias, lakes, and islands as per Jean-Abdel's suggestion. For this current submission, however, I've decided to focus on map presentation as opposed to hardcore realism, so I know that my map may still be riddled with minor geographical errors.

As for the tectonics of the master project, I've decided to leave them unchanged for now. In my next project, I will read Charerg's tutorial on Gplates and attempt to create a more hardcore conworld. I am steadfastly determined to improve my craft over the next several projects, in hopes of one day become a master at this very addicting and fulfilling art form.

And to answer Ryan Pourchot's question, the size of the continent is suggested by the scale below. (I've made this conworld slightly larger than the earth.)

Thanks again everybody, for your advice!

Here's the project by the way...



Cheers,

Peter

[Naima]

I like it a lot, I think its very good and plausible, No need to dig into ancient tectonics and orogeny to explain why the mountins are there, as I am pretty sure you can find a reason for them .
After all if you see Europe and how is messy you can justify pretty much a lot of other fantasy maps ... well not all ... ...
Anyway the map is very nice my only criticism is the River wideness, due to the scale most of those rivers have varying wideness fo 25 to 50 kms each ... are more like Long Fjords than rivers... But again , if this is your intention , also that can be justified I think.

[Rittmeister_Krefeld]

Hi I second Naima's comment in that I look at the last map and thought it was the size of Tasmania, then saw the gridlines and tried to figure out why. I think it's because of the double lines on the river, makeing it seem a much closer scale than the one you intended. Other wise i love the shape and colours!!! Great job!