My First World Map

[Chris Lewis]

This is my first world map for a novel that I am writing. Thoughts, feedback, criticisms welcome. Thank you for looking and commenting! Chris

[wyavern13]

so what is the lattatude in relation to your world that it is taking place? is there magic, alchemy or technology?

[Tiluchi]

This is great, especially for a paper map! I especially like the scroll you drew, and the mountain shading is really good for pen and paper. I'm not as convinced by the forests, especially the borders, as they look rather rough next to those great mountains you have. Will you be colorizing or digitizing this?

[kacey]

Looks good Chris! I really like the compass, and the mountains. I'm with Tiluchi on the trees tho, but I think the issue there is the dark thick edge on them, without that part I think they would be alright.

[Chris Lewis]

so what is the lattatude in relation to your world that it is taking place? is there magic, alchemy or technology?

These are new concepts to me, especially not being a gamer per se. I'd be interested to hear your thoughts though. Thank you for taking your time to comment, wyavern!

[Chris Lewis]

This is great, especially for a paper map! I especially like the scroll you drew, and the mountain shading is really good for pen and paper. I'm not as convinced by the forests, especially the borders, as they look rather rough next to those great mountains you have. Will you be colorizing or digitizing this?

Thank you for your compliments and thoughts Tiluchi! Yes, I am still working on tree design...the thoughts in my head weren't coming easily to my hand I'd like to get into colorizing this but will probably keep it black and white for now. I did want to scan my map and be able to to the lettering with computer but haven't gotten that far yet. Suggestions on colorizing/digitizing? Thank you again for taking your time to leave your thoughts.
Chris

[Chris Lewis]

Looks good Chris! I really like the compass, and the mountains. I'm with Tiluchi on the trees tho, but I think the issue there is the dark thick edge on them, without that part I think they would be alright.

Thanks kacey. I like your idea of removing the thick edge on the trees. I will certainly try this as I experiment in the future. Thank you for leaving your feedback, I appreciate it.
Chris

[Tiluchi]

Well I'm hardly an expert on digitization since I've been doing maps wholly digitally lately. But I'd guess how you do it depends on whether you want your paper drawing to be your final drawing, and just use your computer for lettering, or if you want to also do drawing corrections or revamp your style digitally as well. If it's the former, I'd recommend just scanning your map onto your computer (a high-quality scanner may be a good idea if you're a stickler for detail) and then adding lettering as a new layer in Gimp or Photoshop, whichever one is your preferred medium. If you want to do some more serious artistic edits on the computer, it might make more sense to scan it and then trace over your linework with a drawing tablet (if you have one-if not I highly recommend it- they make drawing on the computer about 100 times easier and faster). You wouldn't even have to use a high-quality scanner in that case, just the photo you've uploaded here would be fine. That way it'll be much easier to erase or redraw parts of your map without it looking too weird.

However, as I said I'm very far from being an expert, so someone with more experience may jump in here and correct me. :-)

[zhar2]

Love the attention to detail!

[Chris Lewis]

Yes, I think for right now I'd stick to the scanner option and add a layer for the lettering since my hands are too jittery for the real small stuff. I'll start researching drawing tablets adn maybe put that on a gift list for next year, lol. Thank you for all your wonderful thoughts and for taking your time to provide them. I really appreciate it, my friend.