[WIP] - New Personal Project - Northlands

[Alturax]

Hello all! After a long break, I've decided to move on from the paper. Been working on this fictional world for a while, and I'm going to attempt to turn the drawn maps and references into some good digital maps.

Here's what I've got so far for a Northern country.

1.jpg

Also, if anyone knows German and detects nonsense in city/country names, I'd appreciate some corrections

All CC welcome.

And for some techtalk - I followed mostly the same procedures for my previous map, linked: https://www.cartographersguild.com/s...ad.php?t=35731
But instead of applying a parchment woven texture, I applied a leathery vellum texture, for a different feel. Added some light shading as well as an Outer Glow layer style, blending mode set to Overlay, for the coastal glow. Rivers were handmade for the most part with the mouse, using a simple round brush with some Shape Dynamics.

[Alturax]

Updating:

Following the same general style I used in my last map, I came up with this:

4.jpg

And then I tried my hand at political intrigue:

8.jpg

[davoush]

Hi Alturax, I really like the colours and texture used. Just a suggestion, but the colours on the political map don't stand out that much to me - it took me a while to realise they were there! Perhaps make the borders a bit more obvious?

[HadrianVI]

This looks really nice. I'l looking forward to see more

[Alturax]

@Davoush - Thanks for that! I added a small border and defined the colours a bit differently:

9.jpg

Colour blending modes for the colours are Overlay, as well as the small "stroke" around the edges. I'l add heraldry soon.

[biwaka]

Hey good work, I really like the changes in the Colours! The german countrynames are a bit wrong. Yes you can combine words like rau for harsh/rough and Ufer for shore. But Rauesufer is wrong it would be Rauufer which the -es has no place in the name unless you would write Raues Ufer. I hope I explained it right. Drachestaat and Schwarzesfeld are also a bit wrong. You could name it Drachenstaat which means the State of a Dragon or of Dragons. Schwarzesfeld could be Schwarzes Feld which means dark field or Schwarzfeld which also means dark field .

[Alturax]

Trying some heraldry styles (it's crude but it's a test):

12.jpg

[DanielHasenbos]

I really like the look of this. The labels seem a bit small, but I'm looking at it on my phone, so it might be alright. How did you come up with the heraldry? Is it random or does it mean something?

[Alturax]

@Biwaka - Thank you so much! I'l make the corrections ASAP.
@DanielHasenbos - Those labels are mostly a prototype, but yeah, they are a bit small. Didn't want to crowd it too much, but I might just end up putting the duchy names in the Legend, and just leave the heraldry. Onto that, I have some plans for it. Nurem, for example, will feature 3 loons (nur) on display, and others will feature bears and crosses. Most of it is just generic attempts at possible colour schemes, but I want to give it some more depth later on.

[Alturax]

And here's the heraldry!

15.jpg