Enjin Obscura World Map

[ianobscura]

So here it is, after much heartbreak and tree-planting - my first digital map! It's for an RPG fantasy-steampunk game, which concerns itself with technology, magic and horror.

At the point of start this world is dominated by one superpower (the Imperial Rule of Keddis, on the north-western continent) who are dictatorial, puritanical, and are heavy proponants of the new 'Etheric Age' (its from them that most of the Etheric and mechanical technologies, landtrains, airships, mechanical and clockwork machin's come from). However, they exist in in a sez of other world powers - roughly split into the Civilisied (like the Kindgom of Vremish; a franco-central european mix) and the Barbarous (the Outlanders to the North, the Norsemen raiders and the Coastal Kingdoms). I wont go into too much setting here - just to give people a better picture of what i am depicting: a baroque renaissance - era game with heavy medieval elements on the verge of 'dangerous sciences'...

The map itself is the about the third broad version i started on - going for an oldeworlde feel with hand drawn elements. The biggest issue i had was one of scale; do i reference features or depict them realistically, etc... here's the results and i'll let much better mappers then myself be the judge!

eoworld.jpg

[Saule]

Looks nice, especially for a first digital map!

[Robulous]

Nice, though it's slightly confusing on first sight having the sea coloured green and brown, it looks like the whole map is land.

[Hai-Etlik]

Quite good for a first map.

A couple of suggestions though:

The eroded font you use in some places doesn't really work. It just looks kind of fake and gimmicky. I think you should have just used the other font.

It looks like you were trying to do curved text in pieces. If the software you are using can't do text on a path, you might want to try Inkscape, if only for labelling. You can import your map, do the labelling, and then export just the labels.

The bright white you use for the lakes and to highlight some of the text just looks odd and out of place.

[Eilathen]

I like how you filled in the landmasses. But i really think you should chose a water-y colour for the oceans (something blue or at least blue-ish). As of now it is really hard to see the map clearly.
I hope to see more activity on your blog...and that you start responding to comments over there (or install a forum for interaction - if you are interested in such a dialogue, that is).

[mythus]

I think it is a fine looking map!

As to those complaining about the sea/ocean colors, I am thinking that is to imply effect, either of a sea that is not blue or of an aged map on paper type of thing. Old maps didn't necessarily differentiate between sea and land with color either. . WHile perhaps a constrast of sorts could help seperate the two for the casual viewer, I still applaud the map and the artist's creativity!

[ianobscura]

Thanks for the comments - and thanks for the tip on Inkscape, i wanted to do the whole project with as much opensource elements as possible, so its a great find.

The Land and Water:
Yep, I see what you mean Eilathen, i think the contrast is perhaps too close between the two. I wanted to avoid a realistic terrain (mostly because I dont trust my abilities with a paintbrush yet ) but also to carry across the olde worlde feel.

So - back to the studio with a new arts package to wrestle with some tints and fonts... here's a question - does anyone know of a way to 'distress' fonts (not just a guassian blur) so they look like old ink that has been blotched, mouldered, lost their lustre over time?

And thanks for the tips with the blog as well rest assured i'll be posting some more things up on there soon for any interested.

(perhaps I should kick this thread back to the WIP section....)

ian