WIP: An Experiment

[mozltovcoktail]

Hey Folks,

After working through a few tutorials, I'm trying my hand at a somewhat original style, or at least a deviation on a tutorial. I think I'm going to go for a colorful hand-drawn look on this one, which should really stretch my drawing and painting skills.

I started using the jezelf tutorials as a base, especially his blurring technique for coloring the land masses, but I drew in the rivers by hand instead of patching them together for the clouds as he shows in the tutorial. I also faded them less than he recommended. Lastly, I've added an outer glow to the land masses, which I may or may not keep. Probably not.

This will most likely change quite a bit as I progress, and it may turn into a hot mess. Either way I'll probably learn a thing or two in the process. Here goes nothing!

Software: Photoshop

### LATEST WIP ###

[mozltovcoktail]

Removed the fade from the rivers. Played around with the colors. Tried a bunch of different stuff that I ended up undoing because I wasn't happy with it.
I may end up scrapping everything but the land shape and rivers and coloring by hand, or just using this as a base and coloring on top of it.

### LATEST WIP ###

[arsheesh]

I wonder if the temperate color for your map may be a bit too dark green for a hand drawn style. That is, the darkness might compete somewhat with any hand-drawn elements (unless they were colored more lightly), and whatever forests you placed in that region would probably have to be fairly dark (forests are usually darker than grasslands). Otherwise I'd say this looks like a good start.

Cheers,
-Arsheesh

[mozltovcoktail]

Good point. I have to think of it as the ground color and not vegetation. I wasn't thinking of that.

[mozltovcoktail]

Well I decided to sketch out the features before coloring, which I think makes more sense. I added an outline to parts of the land masses to indicate height, and managed to rework the alpha channel to it. It was pretty rewarding to figure that one out.

I've sketched in some basic semi-placeholder features, but others remain unsketched. I'm not really sure what style of shading and such I'm going to go with, but I guess I'll cross that bridge when I come to it.

There's going to be some sweet pyroclastic flow coming down from the three volcanos, which I look forward to figuring out how to draw.

I also tweaked the rivers. The water is just temp to give me something to look at.

Feedback is welcome, though I know it's not much to look at so far.

### Latest WIP ###

ImageUploadedByTapatalk1335580325.914408.jpg

[Gidde]

Looks like an interesting layout! One small note: A pyroclastic flow is almost instantaneous; it explodes out of the volcano, travels outward at speeds reaching 700mph, and then is done -- so I'm not sure if it's something you really want to map. Bet it would look cool though

[mozltovcoktail]

Hi Gidde,

Thanks for pointing that out. I think what I meant was a *cooled* flow. I'm not sure what that would be called. Solidified magma?

Anyways, that's the idea.

[Gidde]

Oh right! That makes more sense I'm not sure what it's called either.