Welcome to the weekly round-up, a summary of all that’s been happening at the Guild over the past seven days.
Challenge News
February 2018 Regular Challenge : Elevator Pitch Prophecies
February’s challenge was titled ‘Elevator Pitch Prophecies’. Diamond wrote…
I thought we'd try something a little different this time around. An elevator pitch, for those unaware of it's meaning, is a short sales pitch. It gets its name because it's generally short enough to convey the gist of the idea in a powerful way in the time it takes to ride in an elevator.
And prophecies? We all know what those are, but some are long and convoluted.
The idea this month is to take a short, bite-sized prophecy, generated from this handy donjon table: http://donjon.bin.sh/fantasy/random/#type=Prophecy
...And create a map out of it. The way you interpret the prophecy to make a map is entirely up to you, as is the subject matter, style of map, etc etc. You could illustrate a hero's journey to fulfill the prophecy, or a map of key locations from the prophecy, or the mad prophet's own illustrated notes - the original version of the prophecy. Whatever you want. It just has to be clear, with a little thought from the observer, how the prophecy you pick relates to the map.
And prophecies? We all know what those are, but some are long and convoluted.
The idea this month is to take a short, bite-sized prophecy, generated from this handy donjon table: http://donjon.bin.sh/fantasy/random/#type=Prophecy
...And create a map out of it. The way you interpret the prophecy to make a map is entirely up to you, as is the subject matter, style of map, etc etc. You could illustrate a hero's journey to fulfill the prophecy, or a map of key locations from the prophecy, or the mad prophet's own illustrated notes - the original version of the prophecy. Whatever you want. It just has to be clear, with a little thought from the observer, how the prophecy you pick relates to the map.
This was another hugely popular challenge with a bunch of great entries. Our congrats this month go to Abu Lafia, for his map ‘The Fall of the Kingdom of Cauldrons’. Abu wins his second gold compass and pats on the back from everyone at the Guild. Honourable mentions to our runners-up. We had a tie for second place between Shall Teclex with 'The Crimson Tide', and Shenanigans, for 'Shadow, Sheen, and Sharpness'. Third place went to Nopkin with 'The Green Castle'.
Thanks to all who entered. It's very rewarding to see fantastic maps being created every month in our challenges.
March 2018 Challenge : Map a Feud
March's challenge has already started, and Diamond's in a mood! He says...
Hello fellow Guildies! I'm coming down with the flu and I feel a little grumpy, so this month your challenge is to map a feud. The feud could be over anything, but here's a few ideas:
- The feud has more than two sides and more than two reasons for its existence
- It's multi-generational
- It involves proxies and/or allies
- The feud is over livestock, land, or property theft
- Forbidden love!
- Inheritance of title or land
You don't have to use any of those ideas, or you could use them all, it's entirely up to you.
The challenge will run until Saturday, 31 March, around 9PM Pacific time.
If you've any questions, ask them in the main challenge thread here.
Feb/March 2018 Lite Challenge : Map My World!
This month’s Lite Challenge has about 10 days to go, at the time of publishing. It’s proving to be a super popular challenge, with 16 entries, currently.
Go check out the current entries here, and it’s not too late to start your own thread!
Atlas Awards
Voting has started for the Atlas Awards 2018 Edition!
Setting up the Guild’s normal voting system is a pretty mammoth task when there are eight different polls, each with entries in double digits, so we’re trying something new this year. Instead, we’ve set up a Google Form to gather the votes, and you can see it here.
On the first page, enter your Guild username and email address. If we don’t recognise your name, your vote may not be counted. The email address is just so that we can verify it’s you, in case anything seems off. After you’ve entered these details, click next and you can start to vote.
Each category has its own page on the form. Just click the checkbox next to the map you want to vote for, then click next at the bottom of the page. If you don’t want to vote in a category, you can skip it completely. If you change your mind about a category, click Back and choose something else.
On the final page, click ‘Submit’ to send in your votes. It’s important you click ‘Submit’ on the final page. If you don’t, we won't receive any of your votes.
You can have your votes emailed to you, if you choose, via the slider button on the last page.
Voting ends on the evening of Sunday 11th March, and we'll announce the winners a day or two after that.
If you've any questions, or want to discuss your votes, head for the Voting thread.
Five Threads to check out
The latest work-in-progress threads, interesting discussions, new tutorials etc etc. It's all here.
- What kind of pens do you recommend for inking? And what about inks?
- Ilanthar's working on a new map for his Eldoran setting
- Kalium's got two WIPs under development: 'Kasuorvis - atlas style continental map', and 'The Ketaxil Peninsula'
- Caenwyr posted several updates on 'Ostwyc, the Lion City'
- Azélor's working on a space map titled 'The Sun's hood'
- Bonus thread: damonjynx shared a tutorial 'How I make my Dungeon Maps'
Five Finished Maps
- Two new maps from Abu Lafia: ‘Oria World Map’, and ‘Bereth-Ahal Enclave’
- Map of Darien by FrancescaBaerald
- A Kontinens by Warlin
- City of Kelbrand by Sapiento
- The Old Watch Inn by Jo
- Bonus map: The World of Ixalan: A Magic the Gathering Map, by Jared Blando/The Red Epic
Around the web
Some links for your reading/viewing pleasure...
- 'Yale putting high-tech tests to its controversial Vinland Map' - 'The Vinland Map, widely considered a modern forgery, purports to be a 15th-century world map with a pre-Columbian depiction of “Vinland,” a section of North America’s coastline southwest of Greenland'
- Worlds Real and Imagined, a digital exhibition from Corpus Christi College at Cambridge University
- From LOC maps, "This fascinating 18th-century illustration by Johann Baptist Homann depicts 15 Central Asian cities!"
- And another glorious Asian map: Guide map of Nikko, Japan, 1900
- The web site of 'Daniel Crouch Rare Books' has some catalogues showing some gorgeous (and pricey!) maps that they have/had for sale. You can download a PDF version of the catalogues for free, and have a browse.
- 'Look But Don't Touch: Tactile Illusions on Maps', from Harvard Map Collections
- From Ordnance Survey, '8 tips for map critique'. Agree?
- In real world mapping, Fortune.com says 'Nobody Wants to Let Google Win the War for Maps All Over Again'
- 'Rylsk, Russia from the 1860s', with a link to more Russian maps
- From Boing Boing, 'What's new in the world of tabletop gaming?'
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