Jan / Feb 2016 Lite Challenge: The Tomb of Vrena and the Forgotten Poet

[Chick]

@Deadshade: You have such a good eye for these kinds of things! Wish I did.

I figured that since this is underground, any light would be coming from torches, lamps, or lanterns being held or in wall brackets when someone was in the room. So I just shaded the deeper recesses darker without the intent of any consistent direction of lighting.

[Chick]

I've finished the interior cave walls and steps. Now faced with two more challenges to my pathetic drawing, the stream/waterfalls and the outside cliff. All suggestions welcome!

### Latest WIP ###
Tomb 08.jpg

[Carnifex]

Nice layout. Cool cave. Where is the tomb?

I'd prefer to have only the hard technical llines and skip the soft stuff. Or are you planning to colour everything?

[Chick]

The tomb is going to be a pair of sarcophagi, probably in the top right cave. I'm not sure what you mean by "hard technical lines", but the inside of the caves is colored as much as I intend to, other than the stream which will be blue. The outside grass is already there, although I'm not sure I'm done with it, and I expect I'll color the outside cliff where the stairs lead up to the entrance, I just haven't figured out how to do that yet

[Vhey]

Looking good Chick! And by soft stuff, I think he means the wall textures and grass being soft as compared to the crisp line work and grid.

[xpian]

A few little notes about things I'm noticing:

1) I like the wall shading, and I'm not too concerned about the "light direction" discussion. As far as I'm concerned, this map could be abstracted enough from reality that we don't need realistic shadows, just the evocation of dimensionality and texture.
2) The entrance area with its wooden door feels a little too flat, like the wall around the door has no thickness at all. It takes the eye a little time to figure out what's going on there. Maybe giving the wall the door is set in some depth would be good.
3) The little square window that looks out over the external staircase is, to my mind, drawn at a funny angle. If you imagine a little person standing inside the cave and looking out the window, in line with the isometric grid, the window appears to look basically straight down towards the bottom of the map. In other words, it's not following the angles of your isometric grid, not if the window is actually meant to be looking down on the path and the staircase coming up the hill.
4) It feels like the vertical parts of the interior stairs should have some texture or shading on them, much like the vertical parts of the external stairs do.
5) I'm wondering if the columns/stalagmites inside the cave wouldn't be better represented as being "sheared off" or sliced through from our perspective.

[Chick]

Xpian, thanks for some great suggestions.

I've been debating if the entrance door needed a wall thickness, so I guess you've decided me I'll add that.

The window doesn't look right to me no matter how I angle it, probably just my poor ability at drawing things in perspective, but I'll play with it more.

The interior stairs are shaded, but I seem to have turned that off along with some outside cliff stuff I'm working on, was just in the wrong group. They'll be there on the next update.

As for the columns, all the walls are intended to just fade out of sight upward, so it seems like the columns should do that as well. I'm not sure how it would look for the columns to sliced off neatly when the walls aren't.

I really appreciate such good eyes looking at details here. I like this project and I'd really like to get it right.

The cliff outside ... ugh, I'm on my fifth try to find a good way to do that ...

[Gudern]

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The window doesn't look right to me no matter how I angle it, probably just my poor ability at drawing things in perspective, but I'll play with it more.

The isometric perspective has an advantage that all lengths on isometric lines (those that are parallel to one of the 3 isometric axes) have the same reduction factor.
It is very easy to draw as long as the planes are all parallel to the faces of the basic isometric cube.
On the other hand, non isometric lines or planes non parallel to the cube faces are impossible to draw without help of the 3 views (left side, right side, upper side). You surely don't want to waste much time with all this for just a small detail which has no impact on your overall composition.

The plane in which is your window is apparently roughly orthogonal to the line of sight which is not far from the diagonal of the cube.
That's why it is almost not deformed and looks like a rectangle. Because the plane is not exactly orthogonal to the diagonal, you see the thickness of the wall on the right and the bottom side.
What you see through is roughly in the direction of the diagonal of the cube what you surely intended because it is the floor of the hall behind.

Finally what you did is correct and looks right, one only needs to realize what the line of sight is or what is the normal to the plane containing the window what is the same thing.

Every time you decide to use an isometric perspective, just make sure that all or most planes of your composition are parallel to one of the 3 cube sides. Everything is then quick and easy. That's why most people who draw groups of buildings often use an isometric perspective and orient the streets so that they are all on isometric lines. If you have many non isometric lines, then isometric perspective is not a good choice.

[Chick]

That's a great explanation, Gudern, thank you for taking the time to write it

Just one question for this map ... I was trying to make the window look as if it looked out in a direction that is not square with the floor pattern. Since this is a wall of a rough-shaped cave inside and a rough rock cliff outside, it wouldn't necessarily be aligned with the floor as it would in a rectangular house. Any suggestions on that?

[Gudern]

Just one question for this map ... I was trying to make the window look as if it looked out in a direction that is not square with the floor pattern. Since this is a wall of a rough-shaped cave inside and a rough rock cliff outside, it wouldn't necessarily be aligned with the floor as it would in a rectangular house. Any suggestions on that?

Yes. You already did what you wanted to do
I join a sketch to show what happens.
You see the isometric cube. The most important point is O because the back bottom corner is exactly behind O. So your view in an isometric perspective follows the diagonal of the cube.
Now you want to draw a random plane. This plane cuts the cube in a triangle ABC. The wall you were looking for is the plane containing the triangle ABC.
Then you just draw the window contained in that plane.
So as you see, the plane and the window are aligned with nothing and certainly not with the floor. The window is inclined with an angle, looking down broadly along the cube diagonal.
In this example what you see through the window is the bottom hind corner of the cube. If it was a corner of a room you would see the corner, part of the floor and parts of the left and right wall.

I am sure the sketch is clearer than the words .

Isometric.jpg