Newish?

[freja82]

hi everyone!!

I'm not really new, but i am. I've been lurking around on here for over a year, but havent really posted anything. BEtween my boys and work and unfortunate deterioration of health I havent had as much time to dedicate to fun as I would have liked. So hello again! My name is freja and i love you all, you guys are kind of like my shadow friends no one knows about...who also don't know about me. Well it's time to come out of the shadow realm lol.

A little bit on what's going on. After a long stint away from writing (due to a nasty divorce) and said icky sickness, I have finally gotten the courage and the energy (hopefully) to write again. That being said I used to be a fly by the seat of my pants kind of girl and just go. That never worked out well for me. I would get pretty far and then stop and move on to a new project. I don't want to do that anymore. I believe in thoroughness. This new universe I am working in is BIG and complicated. As in so complicated it breaks the laws of physics kind of complicated and you should probably know what those laws are before you go about breaking them complicated. I have magic of course to explain some things away (thank all the gods for magic yay!) however, this pocket universe still has something like 48 planets. Not all of these planets have to be made or detailed, but I would like at least 17 of them to be mapped out and detailed....which is where you all come in.

I have played around with the tutorials over and over again. I have watched videos and tried to follow the tuts and they are wonderful. I just can't seem to make any of them work. Honestly, I'm starting to think I just suck at this. I have done Ascension's Atlas tutorial at least 100 times and it's never come out right, I have done the artistic regional maps, and others. I hate to ask, but I could really really use your help guys. I'm getting pretty familiar with Gimp, But i still dont have a grasp on understanding it and I wonder if maybe that's my problem.

So without further ado my first question.
Ascension...In your atlas style map tutorial is there a way to skip the first part with all the clouds and stuff for the map? I already have the black and white map of my worlds created that I like (done in Paint) Every time i try going over the layers with the brush tool on the noise layer I end up messing up my coastline that I already have that I like. The map ends up completely different than the one I drew out, and I would like to keep it. Also I swear I saw once something to help with the landglow not working problem, but i can't seem to locate it anywhere. Did I imagine a post about that? forgive me it's been awhile.

I'll stop there for now, i'm sure i could go on for quite awhile. So hello again guys, lovely to meet you and I hope that soon i can actually make some pretty maps without driving my hubby crazy with my frustrated noises from the area of my computer.

[J.Edward]

Hello Freja and welcome to the Guild.
I can't help any with the Ascension stuff but many can.
The best way to get help and figure out the problems is to make a wip thread.
Then people can help you address what the problems might be and then help you get past them.
Dream big I say and imagine better worlds.
Cheers,
John

[Chick]

Hello freja82! Welcome to the Guild!

You might want to start with your existing coastline but use some other map style. The Ascension style is very difficult.

There is a great tutorial in the sticky section of Tutorials, called Quickstart Guide to Fantasy Mapping: http://www.cartographersguild.com/showthread.php?t=4276

From there, go to Hand Drawn Mapping for the Artistically Challenged: http://www.cartographersguild.com/sh...ad.php?t=10655

Once you have completed those two tutorials, you'll be well on your way!!

[Korash]

freya, chick is right about using your own outline for your maps if you already have them. Most of the tutorials that use clouds at the beginning are using them to CREATE the coast line, or at least the starting point for them. If you already have that, there is no need to go through that. You need to pick up the tuts where they start working with the black and white outline. JE is also right about starting a WIP with pictures...we are THAt sort of people...."oooOOOooOo...Pretty Pictures...drool drool..." and once we have soaked the front of our shirts enough, are quite willing to give helpful advice and stuff. But I think you might already know that if you have been hanging around long enough.

He is also right about dreaming big...the ONLY way to get as far as you can go......

Glad you are out of the shadows

[freja82]

thanks guys! yeah i am trying to figure out how to upload pics. technical difficulties. apparently cartographer's guild doesn't like xfc files? i'm still trying to figure out how to change the file type maybe i'll just take a pic of my screen and upload that. I love pretty pics too Korash i look at all of your pics and maps and i'm like soooo preeettttyyyy i want my stuff to be that pretty. 20 hours later my eyes are glazed over, i'm out of coffee, i've tucked my kids into bed and got them back up and sent them back to school and i'm relegated to banging my head into the wall and crying, while still refusing to give up.

[ChickPea]

Hi Freja, welcome to the Guild!

The first thing I would say is don't give up! Whilst you may not get the tutorials to work out exactly the way you want, you said yourself that you're learning about Gimp (even if only a little), but that's progress, isn't it? The tutorials will teach you some techniques that you can go on to use in other maps, but ultimately you're going to want to go your own way anyway, rather than following someone else's vision. Therefore every little thing you learn now is going to help you in the long run, even if you can't quite produce a map that looks like the pic in the tutorial.

About XCF files, that's Gimp's native format with all the layers and whatnot. You want to go to the File menu and export in jpg format. You can upload the jpg to the Guild, provided it's less than 4(ish) MB in size.

Is the Ascension style what you want ultimately, or are there other maps that you'd like to emulate? If you're really just practising with the Ascension tutorial, why not set it aside for now and throw yourself in the deep end and try to create something from scratch. Create a WIP thread in the Regional Mapping folder and start posting. You might want to download some mountain & forest brushes to get you going. There's tons in the mapping elements folder, and also on places like Deviant Art. Gimp can (most of the time) use Photoshop brushes too. The reason I suggest trying some brushes is because you sound quite discouraged and they let you produce something really quite decent without too much effort, and sometimes you just need that little boost. Either way, I'd say try something on your own and see where you go. Don't be shy to ask for help, either!

One other thought about Gimp: you said you'd watched video tutorials. Were these exclusively mapping tutorials? You might actually be better watching general Gimp tutorials whenever you've a spare ten mins. You might have no desire to create the thing they're working on in the video, but you'll see techniques in action and learn some tricks that you can bring to mapping. I'm thinking that if you can get familiar with the basics, that's going to help you tremendously in the long run. Gimp can be complicated, and there are often about ten different ways to do the same thing, but once you get comfortable with using the program, it all starts to fall into place.

Good luck!

[johnvanvliet]

apparently cartographer's guild doesn't like xfc files?

gimp made a VERY BIG change in 2.6 to 2.8

"save " saves in the gimp INTERNAL!!! format for using with only the GIMP
the change is you have to EXPORT to a everyday image format like " *.png "

this is basically the same behavior that Photoshop dose with the adobe PS internal *.psd image format

i'm still trying to figure out how to change the file type

use "export" and you really, REALLY, will want to READ the user guide !!!
for the English language docs
http://docs.gimp.org/2.8/en/


as for uploading images
i use imagebox ( the FAMILY safe settings !!)
http://imgbox.com/
like this 3d rendering from the DAWN mission to the Asteroid Ceres "PIA19899"

the orig image
http://photojournal.jpl.nasa.gov/catalog/PIA19899

the above 3d image is a clickable link ( using BB code )

[URL=http://imgbox.com/jJvjiiJn][IMG]http://8.t.imgbox.com/jJvjiiJn.jpg[/IMG][/URL]