April Challenge Entry - Breweries of the World

[Jaxilon]

If you want to add to the 3d look of this I would think the labels near the front should be a little bigger than those in the back. Just a gradual shrinking as they get farther away. I know it's pretty much a math calculation and you'd have to do it for each size label but it seems it would enhance the illusion. As it is, with all the labels being equal it's like you have a 3d map and a 2d map on top of each other. I've never tried what I'm saying either, so mind you, it might look terrible but it's a thought you might want to explore.

Oh, and this is looking way cool man.

[Greason Wolfe]

I'll have to fiddle with the labeling sizes and see what I can do. I'm not sure if my decades old version of Paint Shop can handle such minute size changes, but I may be able to swing something with a few different sizes and a bit of perspective shifting.

And thanks to all for the words of encouragement. I'm really enjoying working on this map. It's nice not having to wait for erosion cycles to finish-up, or hours long renders to complete just to see some progress. And it's giving me a few ideas for another map in a similar style, but with more detailed features.

GW

EDIT - Okay, took a bit of time to re-work some of the labeling to give it more "depth." While I could change the sizes easily enough, the perspective shifts didn't really have much of a visible effect. At this point, I'm not sure if the different sizes have that significant of an effect on the map as a whole, so I'll leave it to other eyes to decide if the effort was worth it. Also made a slight name change from "Burlytoes Brewery" to "Barleytoes Brewery." As one might guess, it is a hafling brewery, though I'm not really sure about the nature of their brew just yet. I'm sincerely hoping that PlayinItCool doesn't mind if we take a bit of creative license with some of the undetailed brews and/or locations.

GW (again)

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[Greason Wolfe]

One last update for today. Had to shift the location of Burdisson's Brewery so that it matched up with the story. Then expanded the associated forest a bit and added in two rivers as well as Boar's Head and Sarath in an attempt to get all the references in place. At this point, I'd say I'm about half done with the map. I want to add in more places to visit and some notes along the side (suggested places to visit and brew rumors compiled by Stori) and finish detailing out another round or two of terrain features.

GW

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[Steel General]

This is some cool stuff GW!

[PlayinitCool]

I'm sincerely hoping that PlayinItCool doesn't mind if we take a bit of creative license with some of the undetailed brews and/or locations.

We're always looking for ideas from the community, that's what this whole thing is all about! Any new location ideas are always a plus, and if you have more in depth ideas than what you can put in the map, you can always stop by deviantART and submit a location or setting outline!

Great map perspective, totally looking forward to seeing how it turns out

[Greason Wolfe]

Well, seeing as how I couldn't sleep, which is going to make for a very long night at work, I decided to put a little more work in on this project. Added in some grasslands and jungles, expanded a forest and added in another mountain cluster. I'm not 100 percent on the grasslands just yet, but they'll be easy enough to scrap if the general consensus suggests that I do so. Still a ways to go, and now, in hind-sight, I think I should have used a bit more of the world for this, but then again, I might have lost some detail in doing so. It's hard to say at this point.

GW

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[Coyotemax]

I haven't said anything yet much on any of the contestants for this challenge, but I just had to say I love the way this is going.

[Greason Wolfe]

So I spent yesterday trying to catch up on my sleep and didn't accomplish anything with this map. This morning, however, I've managed a bit of work and made some subtle changes to the map that, I hope, better promote the suggested projection. Based on Jaxilon's suggestion about the text getting smaller as it moved towards the edges of the globe, I thought it would be even better if the terrain features did the same thing. About two hours worth of work to re-construct the terrain features in this fashion seems (and I must stress "seems") to have done the trick. I also made a couple changes to the Black Iron Butte area. I didn't really like the way it looked before and wanted that particular area to be dominated by a larger mountain. Again, I think I've accomplished that feat.

Beyond that, I'm a bit hesitant to fill in too much more of the map besides the main continent. I'll definitely do some work along the coastal areas, but want to leave the interiors blank as a suggestion of "un-tasted" areas. I'm gonna try to add in a few more locations on the main continent but need to find that balance between detail and clutter. Other than that, I think I'm very close to being done with this map.

As always, comments, suggestions and criticisms are welcome.

GW

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[Jaxilon]

I still like how this is looking. I haven't seen anyone do anything quite like it (I've only been here a few months though).

Now, I'm not saying you have to do this but as I was looking at this today I was thinking it's too bad the Labels don't curve more like the map. I think the straight lettering kills off a bit of the curved feeling. Like I said, maybe it's just me but if others agree you might want to see about making it look like the labels are written "on the map". To me it looks like the labels are there so we know what is what but are not really a part of the map. If you have access to a globe and took a look at it I think you would get what I'm so pathetically trying to explain I also know labels can be a pain and you would have to think about the curve of the globe as you designed each one but in the end I think it might look even better than it already does.

Anyway, just in case you wanted more work there you have it, lol.

Nice job GW, it really is a nice map

[Greason Wolfe]

As if I need even more work I'm still pulling mega-long days at work, just not as many of them in a row as I was pulling before. And I did think about that whole "curved along the plane of the globe" effect for the labeling. Unfortunately, the only way I might be able to accomplish something along those lines (with my ancient version of Paint Shop) would be to place each individual letter separately, and even in doing that, I'd still be grossly limited in terms of size and readability. Still, once I have everything finished up (and with these couple extra days before the challenge deadline) I may experiment just a bit. As it stands right now, I'm revamping a couple things such that the map does a better job of meeting the challenge requirements, which, I hope, to have finished up today.

GW