Argontath 5.0 - 40 years later

[Valtharius]

The World of Argontath

Procreate - iPad

7300x5300 - 600 DPI

Started this world with my best friend Jim, back in 1981. We drew maps on note, hex and grid paper. What a great time we had as friends. A year later he committed suicide. So, every 10 years I go through and recreate the map.

The first revision in ‘91 was a large 36x24 sheet of paper. Printed up some 2000 city/river/castle/ruin names and cut them out and Elmer glued them down. ‘01 was some awful computer paint program and some paper, absolute garbagefest. ‘11 was Photoshop and I was really happy with the results. Now it’s 2021, I’m using all Procreate on the iPad.

I have the completed sphere in hand (literally), but this particular area of the world I’m concentrating on is about 20% of the entire planet. Experimenting with this as I am only allowed 12 layers, so multiple instances of the known world map are created to place down the features. They’ll be blended together later on down the road. Procreate lends itself well in some instances for map creation. However, the text end of the map… sheesh, this is going to really be a major drag.

The black outline map (one of the small island nations) is a tiny section of the main map. It’s a tiny, little island chain up in the central north. I think it’s true dimensions are around 135x70. I pulled it up to the 7300x5300 and cleaning up (roughing up) the coastline. I’ll do this for each country. Procreate does a great job of pulling layers from one piece to the next without a lot of loss. Hoping that I can drop each country layer into the main map later on with all of it’s information (cities, etc) intact.

Experimentation is the fun part of any project. Making the map almost makes me want to get back into gaming again… almost. Needed a break from roughing up the coastlines and painted in the two moons with their beasties that I’ll use as the start of element border/corner areas. I have a lot of artwork (painted, otherwise) from the last 30+ years that I’ll add to the border art. I’m sure I’ll muck it up with it being over busy and hard on the eyes. lol

If you’ve used Procreate for mapping on the iPad, let me know! I’d be interested in hearing your experiences with it.

Thanks for looking. I’ll update periodically.

[Kâ Lys]

You forgot the picture I believe.

[Valtharius]

Hoping this works. ]

[Valtharius]

That one sort of worked. Lol This is very much in the rough draft stage.

[Neyasha]

I'm so sorry you lost your friend so early. Recreating the map every 10 years is a beautiful idea.

The picture of the two moons with their beasties looks amazing!
The coloured map looks a bit confusing at this point, to be honest, but I'm curious how you will develop the map in the next drafts.

I started doing a city map with Procreate and a quite small iPad (an old iPad Pro 10.5). On one hand it's a lot of fun working with Procreate and it feels very natural, but on the other hand it sometimes feels quite limiting to me. I guess I will later do the labeling with Affinity Designer. I’m also interested in reading about your further experiences with Procreate.

[Valtharius]

So much to do. That means I’m not locked into one task. I divide up the week for tasks. Sunday’s are artistic and autistic days for me. Football is on and between plays and commercials, doodling up elements for map icons. Here is one version of the volcano. You can see the element placed on the NE end of the island.

I’ll look up Affinity Designer. Procreate is awful when it comes to labeling, text, adjusting text, curving text. Hoping they work on the text aspect next.

I’ve put off the map for a few months in hopes the next version of Procreate would be released. It offers 3D capabilities. That would be of great help when creating a series of icons for maps. Procreate is a powerful program for a mobile art app. I’d be interested in seeing your material and hearing about your experience too. The map with all the blotches is a ‘color slap map.” Gives me a rough outline and ideas for the topography.

[Valtharius]

Working on Map Elements. Volcanos and a Mountain.

[Valtharius]

I will create several more variations of each. Hills and Swamp.