September 2015 Challenge: The Durnstel Estimates

[foremost]

Howdy all.

Many of you are well aware that I like to join challenges that are way out of my league. Normally I can hold back, but this month's prompt was too intriguing.

This will actually be the FIRST EVER digital map I've tried. All others have been done by hand and then scanned in... and while they were never fantastic on paper, the scanning bit didn't always do them justice. I figure challenges here on the guild are about learning and growing as a cartographer (and getting them badges!) so why not give digital a go?

Anyway... to the map:

### Latest WIP ###
The Durnstel Estimates (1).png

97% (roughly) is transparent right now... hopefully that will make it easier to color later on. I've also left myself some space at the bottom for context paragraphs and a legend.

Anyways... I would really appreciate suggestions. Trying to work out how I should do the mountains... it all has to be line art.

Thanks very much.

[foremost]

Hello once again!

Did some work on this project throughout last night and this morning - here's what I've come up with.

### Latest WIP ###
The Durnstel Estimates (2).png

I did not make the city icons, but they do have a CC license, so I think i'm good to go... right? I also added some mountains and grasslands, plus gave the legend box and title box a background color. I might change it in the future... currently just a placeholder.

Thanks for looking. Critiques welcome.

[foremost]

Worked on it again this evening - here's another update:

### Latest WIP ###
The Durnstel Estimates (4).png

What's new is the city information, the eastern swamps, and more scattered grasslands. There's also the color, but I hope you noticed that. This is progressing way faster than I believed it would, so I think I'm going to expand the overall area depicted and include a second silo. Let me know what you think; so far, the silence has been deafening!

[Abu Lafia]

Hi Foremost, i like your entry a lot so far! It's a great idea and the rather plain shematic style fits the purpose of the map very nicely in my view. The city/nation descriptions are great, i love the subtle allusions(?) .
I have only two small suggestions:
- you might find a way to depict the silo itself with a similar icon (being the central point of interst on the map)
- i think a more distinctive color choice would be good
Im looking forward to see this develop. Keep up the great work!

Edit: the dotted circles around the three Shariar citiy-icons are not perfectly "concentric" (dunno the right english term, iguess you know what i mean ) not sure if it is wanted this way

Cheers,
AL

[foremost]

I have only two small suggestions:
- you might find a way to depict the silo itself with a similar icon (being the central point of interst on the map)
- i think a more distinctive color choice would be good
Edit: the dotted circles around the three Shariar citiy-icons are not perfectly "concentric" (dunno the right english term, iguess you know what i mean ) not sure if it is wanted this way

Cheers,
AL

Hey Abu Lafia, thanks for your suggestions!

I agree with your comment about finding a suitable icon for the silo itself. I'm a stickler for continuity, so it's important that the icons all match. I put in a test icon (see the attachment below) and am curious as to how you and others think it looks. It's pretty small, so it might suffer from some pixel loss; the lines are supposed to be solid.

Not entirely sure how to approach the color issue, though I agree it's rather bland at the moment. I will be introducing a new neutral-standing nation (orange) so that may help. I'll give this some more thought.

Yes, the area-of-affect circles are supposed to be off-center.

### Latest WIP ###
The Durnstel Estimates (5).png

Other changes this go round include expanding the size of the project, expanding the legend, fixing some typos, and putting in the range for a second silo.

Critiques welcome.

[Abu Lafia]

The silo icon looks good (if imagined with solid lines^^). Since the area where it is located doesn't allow a bigger icon, i think it's a good choice to have the symbol on it instead of the "front-view" buildings on the other icons. For the colors it's ofc more a question of personal taste, but i think the addition of the orange will help. I'm curious how the expanded map will look like.
Btw., will you stick with the font for the title? I just thought that maybe a somewhat "old-school" calculator-like or pixelly font might look fun on this map?

[foremost]

I'm curious how the expanded map will look like.
Btw., will you stick with the font for the title? I just thought that maybe a somewhat "old-school" calculator-like or pixelly font might look fun on this map?

Hey again.

I scanned for some good fonts this afternoon and this is what I came up with:

### Latest WIP ###
The Durnstel Estimates (6).png

It's not a whole lot different, but it's more stylized than Arial and it's easy to read even when it's small. Speaking of small text, I increased the font size of the legend stuff from 6 to 7. I would like to increase it further but that sort of limits how much I can write.

I ended up changing the icon for the silo because I couldn't find any way to make the old one work without making it humungous. I think I actually like the new one better, though. I also added a grid system, which I will use later when I put in points of interest symbols (diamonds, I think). Also finished placing the second and third silos.

So, this update is mainly just a bunch of small stuff. Next one will have something interesting, I promise.

You were right about the subtle allusions in the legend... kudos for noticing that right off the bat. The icons are obviously those of real cities (Paris is the most obvious, leftmost purple), and I think the allusions began because I was looking at each icon as I wrote some stuff. Anyway, purple now represents the U.S. in World War II, and Green represents Japan. Fun.

[foremost]

Hey all.

I lost a little bit of steam over the weekend, for a reason that remains unknown. Perhaps I'm simply most driven to work on things only when I don't have the time to do it!

Anyway, I returned to it this morning and here's what I've come up with:

### Latest WIP ###
The Durnstel Estimates (7).png

I expanded the coastline, dropped in some towns, and colored and detailed the ocean. Next update I should have some land detail work in the upper right corner. I'm planning to call the island "Three Mile Island" for obvious reasons. The plan is to continue in small steps, as I think that's how I do my best work.

Please let me know what you think!

[foremost]

I'm back with another update!

### Latest WIP ###
The Durnstel Estimates (8).png

There are actually quite a few changes in this one; I added color to the remaining land, filled in some mountains, grasslands, rivers, etc...

Comments appreciated.

[Abu Lafia]

This is a really good update foremost. The third nation indeed brings more dynamic into this (not only colorwise) and the font choice is excellent in my view. The only somewhat confusing thing is, that one expects grid lines marking fields (A1, A2, ...) but the horizontal and vertical lines, crossing the three silos, creating fields that don't match the letters and numbers on the left and bottom border (dunno the proper cartographic vocabulary ).Besides that little nitpick, it's looking great!
Keep up the good work!