Map Sucks, Help Wanted

[ChaosTheory]

Attachment 74776Attachment 74779I've been working on this map for a fantasy novel I'm writing, and I drew up a sketch. I thought it wasn't half bad too, until I saw other maps on this site. After this, I realized that it was half bad, but luckily I'm only a hobbyist, so I can be less than perfect. So, without further ado, the map.

Arulan v.2.png

In this map, there are five provinces: Arden, the western province of Men, whose capital is Regalia; Luxen, the southern province of magic, and with Acropolis as its capital; Trevyck, the eastern sprite province, and with its capital of Verrda; Kragg, the mountainous northwestern province, home of the Kraggites and with Abyssek as its capital; and Necroa, the northeastern "bad-guy" province, with Mortem Locus as its capital. There are a few things I need help on:

A new way to draw the mountains (by hand)

An approach to giving detail to the coastline

New places to build cities, and possibly names to go along with them

Any suggestions relating to the provinces would also be welcome.

Thanks!

P.S. Sorry about the bad pencil strokes, it was a fast sketch. Also, is there any free software for map building, and if so, where can I download it?

[Chick]

Hi ChaosTheory, Welcome to the Guild!

There are several options for you, but I suggest you consider having one of the not-half-bad artists here do your map for you. There is a section of this forum called Mapmaking Requests, and if you are willing to pay a bit for a really nice map, try posting there. If you would like more info about how that would work, just email me at yodercm@earthlink.net and I'll fill you in on how maps get commissioned and give you an idea of the costs involved.

Cheers,
Cornelia

[ChaosTheory]

Ok, I've done some touch-ups, and I'll take your advice and post on Mapmaking Requests. Here's the new version:

Arulan GS v.2.png

Thanks for the advice!

P.S. It's a very simplified version.

[Meshon]

What you do is post this in one of the work-in-progress forums, probably Regional/World Building, and consider it the beginning of an amazing map. You're right that there are some amazing maps here, and some really great artists (in fact you have a reply from one already ), but there is also a lot of learning and practice going on. This community is really generous about providing feedback as you build your map, and I'd highly recommend trying that route out. As an example, I just posted this clunker, which is really not at all in the same league as your good start. But someday it will be good enough

That said, if you have a reasonable budget, chick's advice is spot on, and you will get some great results if you commission a map here. Especially depending on your time frame, you might not want to do a whole bunch of learning to create this map for your novel. You'll have lots of time when that's done to hone your skills.

cheers,
Meshon