[Paid] Pop-up Card Encounter Map (Fantasy, Line-Art, Semi-Pro, $300-$400)

[Bioluminescence]

TL:DR:
I’ve designed a pop-up card (11”x8.5” closed) with a functioning dice tower mechanism. There are several other pop-up elements on the card, and I would like to have the card and the pop-up bits illustrated such that the opened card functions as an encounter map.

Subject
The request is for the pieces of a pop-up card template/pattern to be illustrated so that when the card is opened, it looks like a fantasy encounter map featuring a hexagonal tower. Because the card is 3d, some of the illustration will be top down, while the 3d pieces will have to be illustrated from the sides - similar to a piece of papercraft terrain. (Like this sort of thing: http://davesgames.net/catalog-white-heart-tavern.htm )

This is the blank, unadorned, version of the card, assembled:
poptower-prot14.jpg

I am not, at this time, asking for the OUTSIDE of the card to be illustrated (i.e. what you look at when the card is closed).

Scope & Size
The card parts/template is on 5 sheets of (double sided printed) US Letter sized card. I have the templates in .PDF and .svg file formats, but can export to other types if you’d prefer.
The scale is 1in:5ft, or to suit 28mm scale figures (typical D&D scale). This is for print, so 300dpi is needed. Vector or raster - either is fine.
Looking for semi-professional quality.
Willing to pay $300-$400 depending on portfolio examples of skill. Paypal. If price is your sticking point, and you have examples of work of similar scope and their cost, please contact me, as I’ve not done this before.

Style
I’m looking for something old-school - black and white line-art (pen/ink) with either stipple shading or hatching. Fairly ‘noisy’. I’m imagining something with bold black ink use (not on the fine or ‘light’ end of the line-art spectrum).

Inspirations include:

• http://dungeonofsigns.blogspot.com/2...-map-fill.html
• https://www.reddit.com/r/skyrim/comm...gbrew_meadery/
• https://www.mapsbyowen.com/shop/arda...jl-bt4nx-84jxt
• https://miro.medium.com/max/700/1*jI...qu34Z5TvA.jpeg (By Russ Nicolson)

Setting
Non-specific Medieval inspired fantasy. Tower should be at least partly stone, the surrounding area should have a temperate climate. Don’t mind what season. Could be farmland, forest, coastal, etc. Happy to entertain suggestions for less ‘generic’ elements - whether crashed airships, eldritch tentacles, long dormant mossy stone robots, or whatever. Nothing gory or non-PG, so no piles of dismembered corpses, please. :)

Time
I have no deadline for this. Because I am an impatient creature who is excited for this card, I’d like to see a first-pass or early draft by approx. 1 month after agreeing to the commission. Taking it to a finished state would hopefully be done within 2 months after that.
With this being a bit of a weird task (not every day you get asked to illustrate a popup map) I’d like to factor in some feedback loops, discussion on map contents, and iteration. If 3 months won’t work for you, please contact me anyway, as I’m entirely flexible on this. If you have a printer (and access to US Letter sized light card) to print and test your own version locally, that might be useful, but I can print prototypes myself to give us an idea of how it looks assembled.

Copyright
I’d like to be able to sell this card, either assembled or as a printable, on somewhere like Etsy in the future. That would mean selling instances of your work, as well as displaying it (or photographs of it) on a store page. So, commercial purposes rights.
(Note, it’s unlikely I’ll use these - I’m very wary of selling things online - but I want to be safe rather than sorry.)
You would retain the right to exhibit the image for your portfolio (and I’d be cool with you printing out some of the card templates for your own personal use, if you wanted.)

Contact Details
I have found it incredibly helpful to read the requests and replies of other people on the Mapmaking Requests part of the forum, so if you’re ok with it, I’d prefer replies to be on this thread. Otherwise my DMs should work here, or you can contact me at
steampunktinkergirl+cartography [......at….] googlemail [....dot.….] com

Also if you have any questions or just want to chat popups, you can use this thread for that too :)

[Ryan S. Thomason]

Hello chief,

I'm an illustrator and map-maker with a few years' experience in highly-detailed imaginative work like you describe there, if my style suits I can be reached at ryan@ryansthomason.com.

[Bioluminescence]

Hey up, Ryan!

Nice to hear from a fellow Scot (my mum's down in Bathgate)!

From your portfolio site, it looks like your preferred method of working is in physical media (those cool abstract book-paintings look amazing and are very non-digital for example).

I don't want to just assume, so I'll ask - do you also work digitally?

I am imagining there'd be a bunch of digital work on this one, what with me having to send a .pdf or .png (or whatever) of the popup template pieces to paint/draw over, and any adjustments that might come about from assembling WIP versions. If you're generally not into working in that way, I'd totally understand. Thank you for showing interest so far, either way!

Amanda/Bioluminescence

[Ryan S. Thomason]

Hi Amanda,

I do prefer working by hand, yes, but I'm just getting up to speed on a graphics tablet so I can supply digital work too - hope that helps?

[Tiana]

Because I am an impatient creature who is excited for this card, I’d like to see a first-pass or early draft by approx. 1 month after agreeing to the commission. Taking it to a finished state would hopefully be done within 2 months after that.
With this being a bit of a weird task (not every day you get asked to illustrate a popup map) I’d like to factor in some feedback loops, discussion on map contents, and iteration. If 3 months won’t work for you, please contact me anyway, as I’m entirely flexible on this.

LOL... that's not impatient. Good direction contributes to good art! You want to see a sketch in a month. That's just an expectation. Perfectly reasonable, and it rules out some artists whose queues are backlogged for months, but that's fine. Don't feel bad about having an expectation of turnaround and stating it.

I've never made a pop up map but I'd have a go at it. Especially if you want to explore a weird art version of it... I'm all for eldritch tentacles! My fantasy map portfolio if you wish to view it.

I'm surprised you're not doing it yourself, though. I mean, you have a silver compass. You clearly know how to make a map!

[Bioluminescence]

I'm surprised you're not doing it yourself, though. I mean, you have a silver compass. You clearly know how to make a map!

Ah, if I could go back in time and spend ~10 years practicing, then maybe I would be doing it myself - instead, I'm happy to pay someone else for their experience, skills, and style. (Also, I'm not sure I can pull off the kind of style I fancy - always the way - we want what we can't have )

Thank you for your interest so far, Tiana - I'm just taking a few days to properly consider the folks who have come forward. It's much harder to pick than I expected. What a wonderful problem for me to have.

[Bioluminescence]

Heya lovely moderators! This request has now been [Taken]

I've found some wonderful cartographer/illustrators here, and the work has begun. I'm very excited to see how it all progresses - hopefully in a couple of months time, we can share it back with the Guild