Another New Guy

[gorgeboy]

Hello everyone!

I have been making a fantasy novel for a while now and one day I stumbled upon the profantasy website and was stunned by the amazing maps people made and decided it would be a good idea to get this program for myself... until I saw the price. Ive done a little bit of looking at some maps and tutorials but can't decide exactly what software to get. I'm leaning towards either GIMP or some kind of photoshop. The only real things i'm concerned about are the program's ability to do overland maps and the actual look of the map. I'm not too worried about the learning curve or price (although i'm not gonna spend 300$!) Looking forward to posting maps here in the future!

[Gamerprinter]

Gorgeboy, welcome to the Guild!

By your price limitations, I'd say go GIMP as its free. Photoshop is something like $800, maybe less, haven't checked lately. I use Xara Xtreme Pro 4.0, but Xara offers a perfectly adequete version at $70 to make all the maps I do. I use the pro version, as I do other kinds of graphic design using the more expensive application.

Also, if I'm not mistaken Campaign Cartographer 3 is only $40 - if you get all the supplemental software: Dungeon Design, City Designer, Cosmographer, etc, you're talkin' more money, perhaps $300 (though I wasn't aware of that.)

If you go the free route with GIMP, also consider Inkscape which is a vector drawing application - great for labeling, river creating and other features on top of a map generated in GIMP. Like GIMP, Inkscape is free - though both have learning curves.

Good luck on whichever way you decide!

And again, welcome!

GP

[Steel General]

Welcome Aboard!

[gorgeboy]

Looks like i'll get GIMP and inkscape then since theyre free anyways. Thanks for the help! Also not to ask too many questions but I heard from a few different sources that CC3 is considered the best for people wanting to make overland maps. Is this true? Because overland maps are really all I want to make right now. I'd be willing to pay almost any price really it's just that if i'm gonna spend a huge amount of money I want to know if it's worth it.

Thanks again!

[Midgardsormr]

I recommend Gimp, and spend your money on a Wacom tablet. The Bamboo Fun is a good model for the casual artist--it probably has the best price-to-functionality ratio available right now.

CC3 itself costs only $45. The add-ons and supplements, though, can push the price up rapidly. The entire collection from PF costs over $600 if you buy it all at once, but you wouldn't need most of that stuff. I'd say CC3 and one of the Annuals would be plenty for what you're looking at doing. And really, you could possibly get away with skipping the Annual, depending on what you want to do. For instance, this map: http://www.bryanray.name/maps/vendria.jpg was done with CC3 alone, with the exception of two textures I borrowed from here and the line drawings.

Anyway, welcome!

[gorgeboy]

Great map! It always seems to me that the CC3 maps I see are the best. Oh well I think i'm gonna go with GIMP for a while and see what I can come up with. Thanks for helping everyone and I hope to submit lots of maps here in the future!

[arsheesh]

Welcome Gorgeboy! Sounds like you've already decided on GIMP so I won't pun in another plug for it. I will however direct your attention to the tutorials page where you can fined walk-throughs on how to do maps in GIMP. Here's a link to my map:

http://www.cartographersguild.com/sh...9-Style!/page3

If this is in the vicinity of what you are wanting to do, then I recommend the Ascension Atlas Style in GIMP tutorial which you can find here:

http://www.cartographersguild.com/showthread.php?4084-[Award-Winner]-My-atlas-style-in-PS/page15

Cheers,

-Arsheesh

[NeonKnight]

Welcome to the Guild!

[gorgeboy]

Thanks for the advice Arsheesh. Right now i'm working on a map using Roba's tutorial, but I will definatley take a look at that tutorial some time. By the look of your map i'll be just fine with GIMP!

[TheMarcus7]

There's another good tutorial over on the newbiedm.com blog site for using GIMP to make battlemat style maps.