First attempt at World Map for my campaign: "A Ballad of Bones and Scales"

[Sushipopsicle]

Hey there! So after going through several tutorials and finally getting the hang of Layers (and layers, and more layers), I finally have a first draft for my world!

A Ballad of Bones and Scales.compressed.pdf

I made the map size pretty big (3000x2000), and had to compress the image in order to attach it, so it's slightly nicer quality in the version I'm looking at.

I've got one comment, two questions, and then I'd love billions of suggestions/criticisms.

Comment: You see the chain of islands that are totally not the remains of some primordial world-devouring monster? They all have a rather uniformed length, and each island would take a group of adventurers roughly four days to cross. There's some scale for ya.

Question 1: I still need to add swamps, but am not sure what colors would work best for making swamps using the Gradiant Map feature. What would you suggest?

Question 2: With a map like this, what would be the best way to designate towns? Should I just draw some rough town/city-like areas? Or just put a little "Town" logo wherever appropriate?

Anything else I can do to improve this map, just let me know!

[Meshon]

You're off to a great start on this... archipelago? I don't know, that's what I like to call lots of islands, though I think your area may be larger than that. Right away the first thing I notice is the smooooothness of your coasts. I would roughen them up with inlets, promontories and some extra jagginess. You may also get in a bit of trouble for your caldera lake in the upper right. I'm guessing that's a volcano? There are some folks around here called the River Police and there might be an issue with multiple outlets from the lake. That said, I could see it working if the lake is really deep and some of those rivers come out of fissures lower down, but usually any body of water will drain to the one channel that is the lowest. There's also a couple of spots down south where it seems like rivers may be running from one coast to the other.

But you had questions. Swamps will be low. Try a few things to see, I'm not very experienced with this style of map, so I can give you a tried and true answer, but a sickly yellow-green, slid toward the dark end would be my first go. Someone who knows better will hopefully come along and sort me out on that one.

As to towns, it really just depends on what look you're going for, but for now I would make maybe a couple of different types of circles for differing sizes and go with that. You won't have to spend a bunch of time making little icons and you'll be able to keep laying out your map. Since you're using layers, keep the towns on a separate layer and then you can always go back and change them later. My advice for now would be just do whatever keeps you moving forward.

This is a great start!

cheers,
Meshon

[Sushipopsicle]

You may also get in a bit of trouble for your caldera lake in the upper right. I'm guessing that's a volcano? There are some folks around here called the River Police and there might be an issue with multiple outlets from the lake.

I knew I would get some flak for that, but you're right. Deep in what was once the magma chamber a portal to the Elemental Plane of Water opened up and it's been pouring millions of gallons of water into this world since. So in a sense it's about as deep as water can get. I've been playing with the idea that some of the rivers are man-made in order to divert the overflow. Any-which-way, I don't see how anyone could have known that because I didn't mention it.

Right away the first thing I notice is the smooooothness of your coasts. I would roughen them up with inlets, promontories and some extra jagginess.

I completely agree. The sad thing is I've already tried to fix it somewhat and this is the result. I need to remember to go jagged when I do my initial hand sketches, it'll save me a lot of trouble down the road.

[johnvanvliet]

just an observation
I have been dealing with kids today so....

from the viewpoint of say a 13 year old boy

what dose that map look like ??????????

[Sushipopsicle]

I've got a bunch of peninsulas... Are those the parts that look like penises? They do have the same root-word.

Or is it the big continent on the left? I honestly thought it looked sorta like a hammerhead shark.

Oh! The chain of islands that are definitely not the remains of some primordial world-devouring monster? I could definitely see that if you're looking at the thumbnail.

Penises everywhere.

Is this a big problem? I'm not sure how to go about fixing it if it is.

[Corilliant]

I don't see a problem with the continent shapes.
I do agree with Meshon about the coasts, as they do look a tad too smooth.

[Meshon]

What software are you using? If you're using Photoshop I might be able to make a suggestion or to about the coastline. There's probably a few ways you could go about it.

Cheers
Meshon

[Sushipopsicle]

What software are you using? If you're using Photoshop I might be able to make a suggestion or to about the coastline. There's probably a few ways you could go about it.

I'm using GIMP, which I've been told is like the free version of Photoshop. So maybe give me your hints any I can figure out some equivalent?

Thanks!

[Sushipopsicle]

Here's my updated version.

A Ballad of Bones and Scales.compressed (1).pdf

My updates so far...
- Added swamps (I went for a more freshwater/everglades look using green and a light blue). Does this work?
- Added some key cities/towns (Tried to have the names reflect the culture of the area, I think it worked better in some places than others)
- Added a few landmark labels (These I just tried to have fun with)
- Added a northern and southern snowline. While not perfect it turned out better than I was expecting.

Still need to...
- Rough up the coastlines a bunch
- Make a scale key (I'm not sure what it's really called. One of those things that let's you know how much distance is covered in 1-5 days)

Was contemplating...
- Maybe adding some additional texture to the oceans?
- Making a family crest for each "capital city" (The stars), to designate who owns/rules the city, and provide a key in the top corner with the matching family name. But I have no clue how to do something like that.

[Meshon]

Okay. The reason I didn't give the hints right away was because I hadn't invented any But I just tried this out and it roughens smooth shapes. There are a bajillion ways to do this I'm sure; this is just one that I thought of right away. See how it goes.

First, I'm guessing all your landmasses are on their own layer? Like if you were to hide everything else there would be the land shapes solid, with transparency everywhere else. If this isn't the case you can probably use a setting in GIMP that lets you select a colour range to get rid of the ocean for now.
Screen Shot 2015-04-16 at 11.17.14 AM.png
Here's my version. Just some solid shapes on a transparent background.

The next step involves selecting those shapes. In GIMP it may be called 'Selection from Alpha'. I'm just going by what the internet tells me, I haven't used GIMP. Yet. If your shapes are on their own layer you can easily use the "Fuzzy Selection" tool to select their outlines.
Next you will make a path from that selection. Instructions to do this in GIMP are here (I think).
Screen Shot 2015-04-16 at 11.19.37 AM.png
I changed the colour to red to make it easier to see, that's all. It can be any colour. So now there's a path!

Next you need to "stroke" the path (that's really what it's called!) but instead of using a regular line you stroke the path with an eraser. And not just any eraser, an eraser that is a) preferably an irregular shape, like a 'grunge' brush and, b) has scatter and angle jitter applied. There is some useful information here on stroking paths. You'll have to access the paint tool options, picture in section 3.12 in order to set up the scatter etc. I don't actually know how to do this in GIMP. Hopefully the docs there will help.
Screen Shot 2015-04-16 at 11.20.22 AM.png
That's roughly what it should look like now.

Now, I'm late, so I've got to run, but I'll check back in half an hour or so. I have one more thing I want to add, but this might work for you. Hope it helps!

cheers,
Meshon