Hey all... Thanks for the words of support/encouragement.
I think what's holding me up is the same thing I mentioned in a previous post in this thread... the sense of "scale" and proportion. I keep looking at the map after I've laid down mountains and think "man, that's way too much mountain space, compared to everything else...". I don't want to go with what I do, only to find later that I've painted myself into a corner and have run out of room to place important locales that I intended to place. It seems to me that, while you're "safe" enough early on, before things are filled in too much, it's easy enough to make corrections. But when you get into the latter stages, it seems it can be more difficult to "uproot" established locales to make room for others... Not sure if that makes sense.
What I'm thinking of doing is getting the blank map printed out in a large enough size to work with (maybe 2" x 2" or something) and then find a way to laminate it with a dry-erasable surface. This way I can "sketch" things out and quickly make changes where/when they're necessary. Not sure why but my brain almost always works better when I'm not on the computer. I can focus better. So that approach might just work. Anyone here who can maybe recommend a good approach to something like this, that's as economical as possible? I've seen such map sold in gaming shops, so it seems like it would be pretty common in tabletop gaming (though we never used it in my time playing them).
In the meantime, I've turned my focus to working on assets for the prototype of the game I'm working on (which I'll use to hopefully get interest in the project). Here's a couple shots of recent work; merchant stands for the market area of the town the prototype will focus around.
Everything in these shots is my own work, the modeling and texturing. It's done in Blender3D (though I'm sure most here will recognize the software ;-p).
The first shot is a test render of the first stand I've made. The textures are place-holder and, by no means, final. Far more weathering and detail is needed. I created a sort of "backdrop" to place the objects in. I have trouble envisioning things "in a vacuum" (which may also be part of my mapping issue), and so seeing the objects in a scene that resembles the environment they'll ultimately be in really helps give me feedback of how well they "blend" (I'm a consistency freak). In this case, the environment is going to be a coastal forest region, so of course wood is going to be a core component in a lot of their architecture. The sign isn't textured because I'm not 100% on using that style for it.
And here's the latest I'm working on... for a larger, more ornate merchant stand (I intend to have 3 different types and sizes, for variety, etc).
Anyway! Sorry to go off on a long post there... kinda hijacking my own thread, but figured I'd share something I am happy with :-p.
Thanks!
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