Lost Temple experiment
Ok, I'm experimenting like crazy with this thing and although I am a long way from done I figured it wouldn't hurt to post this up and get some additional pointers.
What I need to verify first and foremost is that this will even work in a VTT. I'm still not certain I have the right settings going on. I did pull it into Maptools but I'm such a dope with maptools that I couldn't make heads or tails of it. Any help would be appreciated.
It's also 2am and I can't see straight.
### Latest WIP ###
“When it’s over and you look in the mirror, did you do the best that you were capable of? If so, the score does not matter. But if you find that you did your best you were capable of, you will find it to your liking.” -John Wooden
* Rivengard * My Finished Maps * My Challenge Maps * My deviantArt
Very cool, man. You might want to blur the edges of your greenery, kinda sharp, but otherwise I'd love to know how ya did this.
If the radiance of a thousand suns was to burst at once into the sky, that would be like the splendor of the Mighty One...I am become Death, the Shatterer of worlds.
-J. Robert Oppenheimer (father of the atom bomb) alluding to The Bhagavad Gita (Chapter 11, Verse 32)
My Maps ~ My Brushes ~ My Tutorials ~ My Challenge Maps
Let's see, I drew this by hand in my Sketchpad without using graph paper (which btw made me have to adjust some things once I got it in Gimp). I also painted the greenery with watercolors being careful not to load up too much water since it was only on paper. I don't know why, I just felt like painting. I also painted the walls and the benches in the alter room. I then used my digital camera since I don't have my scanner working at the moment to import everything into Gimp. This meant I had to clean up the background which had lots of grey crud in it (probably because I didn't take the shot in full sunlight but indoors). I left some of the grunge from the import because this is an old place and is meant to be full of dust. I had some work putting the textures in for the marble floors but I think I'm happy with how they turned out. Lots of fiddling with layer effects there. I also adjusted the colors on them to what I thought would allow me to drop a grid down on them and not look wonky. I had to multiply some colors. I also painted the alter in the actual room (top down view) within Gimp (I'm pretty happy considering I did those snakes with my mouse). I will put some kind of a background texture on the whole thing but I haven't found what I want yet for that. I needed to verify I was creating something that would even work with a VTT before I pressed onward so that's why I posted now. I can post the original sketch if anyone is interested so you can see what I have changed once I got it all into the digital realm.
I am likely creating a lot of extra work for myself but I am still learning Gimp and I've got to be happy with getting techniques down. Next time I for sure am going to use a grid for my sketching. It's a pain to have to adjust walls that are not quite straight even if it does add a certain hand hewn quality to the structure.
I still have to do the floor textures for the rest of the place and I may adjust some of the rooms or even add others.
If you have any other specific questions I will answer to the best of my ability as I sometimes get off into layers and filters and loose my way.
I still would like to verify with someone who can tell me if this will work in a VTT once I'm finished. Whether it will look polished enough to use is another story but I want to validate I'm using good settings, resolutions and whatnot.
“When it’s over and you look in the mirror, did you do the best that you were capable of? If so, the score does not matter. But if you find that you did your best you were capable of, you will find it to your liking.” -John Wooden
Kudos for the watercolor...I've never been able to do anything but make mushy colored paper with watercolors.
If the radiance of a thousand suns was to burst at once into the sky, that would be like the splendor of the Mighty One...I am become Death, the Shatterer of worlds.
-J. Robert Oppenheimer (father of the atom bomb) alluding to The Bhagavad Gita (Chapter 11, Verse 32)
My Maps ~ My Brushes ~ My Tutorials ~ My Challenge Maps
Hmm...been wondering. Should I place doors or are those added later on by the GM? I'm thinking I may have screwed up because it's coming to my mind that I am really only creating the base layer, correct? If so, it may be a real hassle for me to fix what I have done. If anyone cares to help me on this path it would be groovy
I would hate for a door to be opened to reveal a white space of nothingness beneath....LOL, imagine the players...."Holy CRAP, what's that?" "I don't know, do you think we can cross it?" "It looks like some kind of portal to another dimension or something, it's too bright to make out any details." Haha, I would rather not create this problem.
So here is the update. Still need to get on the Alter room and need to figure out what to do about doors.
Last edited by Jaxilon; 05-03-2010 at 02:00 PM.
“When it’s over and you look in the mirror, did you do the best that you were capable of? If so, the score does not matter. But if you find that you did your best you were capable of, you will find it to your liking.” -John Wooden
So I dropped it into maptool to see how this works. I assumed a grid size of 100px as that fits nicely with the top right room - but you can see that the grid doesn't really work well as soon as you move away from there. Ideally on something that looks as rectilinear as this - you want the walls to run along the grid lines.
Screen shot 2010-05-03 at 1.41.57 PM.png
As for doors - you can place them in the base image or have them placed later. It doesn't really matter one way or another. I do think that it's worth having a little colour on the ground outside if only to place the map in some form of context.
Thanks Torstan, you posted while I was going back to add in my image so sorry about that confusion. I will see what I can do about the grids lining up more. If nothing else this will just be a learning lesson for me.
“When it’s over and you look in the mirror, did you do the best that you were capable of? If so, the score does not matter. But if you find that you did your best you were capable of, you will find it to your liking.” -John Wooden
Ok, I think I fixed most of the grid line up issues with this. I think it's starting to take on some shape now. I still have to finish the last two rooms and then go back and do odds n ends including dust so the place looks more old and used.
I had to get wild to reshape the place and one of the results was that some of the colors changed. This thing is getting big in size I'm thinking too which is not good for a VTT.
Last edited by Jaxilon; 05-04-2010 at 11:11 AM. Reason: poor 3am English that made no sense.
“When it’s over and you look in the mirror, did you do the best that you were capable of? If so, the score does not matter. But if you find that you did your best you were capable of, you will find it to your liking.” -John Wooden
Nope, the dimensions are fine. You shouldn't have any problems there.
Just a quick update because I don't like the white floor, hehe. Also, shot some dust over the place, subject to change.
Not sure if I was clear when I said size, but I was referring to the 7 mb file size more so than the map dimensions. I don't really know what I can do about making it smaller though.
“When it’s over and you look in the mirror, did you do the best that you were capable of? If so, the score does not matter. But if you find that you did your best you were capable of, you will find it to your liking.” -John Wooden
Reply With Quote
