Illum Commission

[arsheesh]

Here is the final version of a commission I recently completed for Brian Lions for a RPG setting he intends to publish at a future date. The setting might be described as hard fantasy with a good dose of Gothic horror. Players begin their careers as members of a notorious monster hunters guild known as The Red Cloaks. The landscape has been transformed over the years by various arcane means. People live in fear of cruel dragon overlords, vampires, lycans and the walking dead, to name but a few monsters.

Given the themes Brian and I collaborated together to come up with a border and composition that reflected the setting depicted by the map. It was a very fun project and I enjoyed working with Brian to help make his visions concrete. Hope you enjoy.

Thanks to everyone who provided feedback during the creation of this map. The WIP thread can be found here.

[XCali]

This map is wonderful! It is truly inspiration. It shows sooo well what can be achieved with cartography. Your linework is beautiful and sleek. I would love to learn how to do linework like that.
(And I love your lycans!! )

[arsheesh]

Thank you very much XCali, it was a fun but labor intense project and I'm quite happy to have completed it. I appreciate your feedback.

Cheers,
-Arsheesh

[Bogie]

That is insanely cool!! Some people are going to say they love the border, or the mountains or the forests or the monsters.. It is all fantastic!

[MistyBeee]

This one is so cool, Arsheesh ! I enjoyed a lot the VIP thread, and the color version gives it justice. A lot of good elements there, but I think my favorite details are the bats, and how the forests becomes snowy to the North. And the vertical frame. You know I love this vertical frame ^^

[QED42]

I remember seeing the WIP thread for this one, it turned out very nice!

[LizardInk]

What a great map! You handled a lot of complicated, tricky elements really well. The creatures are especially cool! Lots of adventures to be had here.

[arsheesh]

That is insanely cool!! Some people are going to say they love the border, or the mountains or the forests or the monsters.. It is all fantastic!

Thank you very much Bogie.

This one is so cool, Arsheesh ! I enjoyed a lot the VIP thread, and the color version gives it justice. A lot of good elements there, but I think my favorite details are the bats, and how the forests becomes snowy to the North. And the vertical frame. You know I love this vertical frame ^^

Thank you MistyBee. The bats were a fun bit to draw. And the vertical frame presents it's own sort of challenge: since not all of the (full sized) image may be viewed at once is important to figure out a composition that has visually compelling points of interest in multiple locations yet which all work together as a whole. I had to think through how to go about doing that for a while in the design process.

I remember seeing the WIP thread for this one, it turned out very nice!

Thanks very much.

What a great map! You handled a lot of complicated, tricky elements really well. The creatures are especially cool! Lots of adventures to be had here.

Thanks, yes the creature were one of my favorite parts of the map as well.

Thanks everyone for all of the kind feedback.

Cheers,
-Arsheesh

[Wingshaw]

I watched this map evolve over on IG, and I must say: you've created a beauty! Not surprising that you make such a nice map, of course, but I would like to see some more of your work...

Wingshaw

[Pomb]

It's a keeper! Can't wait to see more of your work @arsheesh it's pretty inspiring. I really enjoyed going back into the WIP and checking how it got refined from the rough.