Wyrm's Reach - Seafaring Adventure

[Dsteele]

This is a counterpart to my WIP dungeon map The Dragon's Cage. First time in this style. Hoping it inspires exploration.
Wyrm's Reach.png

[w.gofry]

I love the color pallet and the style!! My super small critique would be that I might blend the base of the mountains with the rest of the land. Otherwise it's a style I want to see a lot more of!

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[Dsteele]

Added a couple tidbits of civilization and more labels, as well as a hex grid. Putting this baby into playtest tomorrow night.

I had one go at blending but didn't like it. You're right though. Have to try a different technique.

Wyrm's Reach.png

[Kellerica]

It's looking very nice!

What software are you using here? The one thing that bothers my eye is how you've used a distortion effect on the labels in order to curve them, which is not really optimal. Not all of the labels even need to curve, and if they do, always opt for a gentle U-curve (this is a hand-me-down advice, originally given to me by J.Edward and it's one of the best tips I've ever gotten ). In Photoshop, one should always use the pen tool to create a path between two anchor points, and then type the text on that path. This gives you far greater control as you can adjust it to your liking, and most importantly, doesn't warp the text itself, just the path it's on. But like I said, I don't know what software you're using so I don't know if it supports this or not.

[Dsteele]

Hi Kellerica! I am using Photoshop. Thanks for the tip on the pen tool to guide writing. I'll have a go at it. Why always a gentle u-curve?

There is so much colour in the drawing I'm finding it hard to get the labels to contrast well without bending them around to make sure they are all on the blue background of the sea.

[Kellerica]

Hi Kellerica! I am using Photoshop. Thanks for the tip on the pen tool to guide writing. I'll have a go at it. Why always a gentle u-curve?

It's just easier on the eyes, really, makes the label look much less restless that way.

There is so much colour in the drawing I'm finding it hard to get the labels to contrast well without bending them around to make sure they are all on the blue background of the sea.

Don't be afraid to employ the Layer Styles panel when working with the labels. Some effects I find most versatile and useful are Outer Glow, Color Overlay and Drop Shadow.

Color Overaly simply because it makes applying new color to a layer so much easier than to always filling each one again and again manually, and it's easy to tweak and adjust when you can see the result in real time. On maps like these, opting for label colors other than black might be a good idea. White could work, or maybe light blue, or perhaps a darker blue. It's all about finding that harmony.

Outer Glow and Drop Shadow on the other hand, are always my best friends when it comes to working with labels (especially the former), and both can do wonders to make your text pop out from the background.

On default, I think the Glow will be set to white with a Screen blending style, but there are a lot of other ways to use it as well. I often find myself using a subtle, dark glow set to Normal blending mode, usually trying to get it to sit naturally with the colors surrounding it (a darker blue than the ocean it sits on, etc.) Another favorite trick of mine, from the opposite type of look, is to use a large, soft Glow with the exact same color as the text on the label, in order to create a feeling that the text blends into the texture of the map (though that might now work so well here).

Drop Shadow is pretty self-explanatory, but should be applied with care. Just in general, the good kind of layer style is usually the kind that works well enough with the things around it, that you won't even take notice of it when it's there - but you absolutely will notice it when it's gone.


Just my musings on the things I find the most useful, feel free to ignore me