Askyan Kingdom (atlas style map)

[Voolf]

Hi guild,

It has been a while since I wanted to make an atlas style map just for fun.
Initially, I was accumulating physical maps of the Earth and was rather focusing on my home country, Poland.
However, the research into GIS, the proper relief, and other technical stuff that is not usually needed for a fantasy map was holding me back.

A month ago or so, I finished Durigon map.
I was playing with it in G.Projector, and then I thought, why not try to just have an atlas style map of a fantasy world?
I thought instead of playing with relief data and all of that, I would just paint the elevation myself.

Still, I had a few doubts and questions about how to approach that, so I reached out to Nate (Vorropohaiah) with a few questions.
I was convinced that he was working with vectors with his maps. but I was wrong. He did everything by hand in PS.
He actually made a pretty nice tutorial for his atlas style.
When I realised he just drew everything, it was like music to my ears, because I knew I did not have to learn and play with Wilbur, GIS, and other stuff like that.

The biggest challenge was mountain chains. Making it look realistic. I am not sure how good or bad I did, but I would say it is a good outcome for the first try.
It is quite different from drawing (so to speak) regular fantasy map mountains. Coming up with an interesting looking overall elevation was also a tough nut to crack.
In the end, I am pleased with the outcome.

The physical map did not take so much time, to be honest, but the iconography, typography, putting labels on paths, and positioning everything just so nothing is covering anything important...
That was the real time consumer here.
I was trying to steer away from Nate's style, and I studied more maps in this style.
Most of them were extremely similar, though, so it was rather hard to make an atlas style map, yet different from the "atlas style"

Anyway, I am finally done with it.
I hope you like it. Let me know what you think.

Btw. I wanted to post the map in full size, but the file is too big to upload, so I had to scale it down a bit.



Ps. I posted this at 1AM, and today I gave it a read. I made quite a lot of mistakes and typos. Sorry!
I hope I corrected everything.