First Attempt At Fantasy Mapping (Digital)

[TJLuke]

So I have been messing around with a few books on drawing maps but mostly have fallen short in the art skill department. I decided that digital may be the way for me to go, easy to edit, easy to start over, and no pencils to sharpen... I looked at a few examples here and found Candacis' post for making antique styled maps: https://www.cartographersguild.com/s...ad.php?t=15011

I dusted off the Gimp and used a cheat for my land masses: http://fantasynamegenerators.com/map...p#.V7-Z9vkrJhE

... And got to work... After a few false starts trying to convert what I had to what I was seeing in the instructions this is what I have so far:

WIP_Map.PNG

I still have a few steps to complete and the text is really throwing me one on the visibility and getting the details in but any advice would be great! Also, as much as I like Times New Roman does anyone have some good free alternatives that look a little more fantasy and not so typewriter?

Thanks for the view!

[ChickPea]

Hi TJLuke, this is shaping up to be a nice map.

One little issue I noticed is with the rivers on some of your land masses. You have a couple of rivers that split as they get nearer the coast, but rivers don't generally do that. They flow down from high land and join together as they flow towards the sea. Take a look in this thread for some info on river placement.

For fonts, we've got a thread that lists font sites/font suggestions, though some links may possibly be obsolete now. Alternatively, www.dafont.com is a very popular destination for free fonts. They've got about a gazillion there, and you might be overwhelmed with choice!

[TJLuke]

 

Hi TJLuke, this is shaping up to be a nice map.

One little issue I noticed is with the rivers on some of your land masses. You have a couple of rivers that split as they get nearer the coast, but rivers don't generally do that. They flow down from high land and join together as they flow towards the sea. Take a look in this thread for some info on river placement.

For fonts, we've got a thread that lists font sites/font suggestions, though some links may possibly be obsolete now. Alternatively, www.dafont.com is a very popular destination for free fonts. They've got about a gazillion there, and you might be overwhelmed with choice!

Thanks for the feedback, looking at it now after taking a break for a day or so some of them do look a little off. I was more worried about getting the tutorial steps correct (Gimp Novice) and less on the realistic aspect of the map. Since I was using a generated landform I was trying to simulate delta drainage but I think at this scale they would not really be visible. I also noticed that my mountain ranges look a a bit anemic and some of the lines look pretty bad. All with practice but I do like the output of the steps that were in the tutorial for the general appearance. This is one of the books I was using for reference when I was using pencil and paper: https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/14...?ie=UTF8&psc=1

[ChickPea]

I agree your lines could use a little work as they aren't especially sharp and clear, but, hey, practice makes perfect!

I haven't actually read Jared's book, though I quite fancy it. He posts here occasionally, and we did an On the Map interview with him a while back that you might enjoy. His work is fantastic, and I can certainly think of worse people to learn from!!

[TJLuke]

Thanks again for the feedback!

Some of my challenges I think with line sharpness are using a mouse to do line work, figuring out the brush fades and using the Gaussian blurs effectively. Since I am still getting used to Gimp in general I think these types of projects are great, using the same tool repeatedly to get different results is great practice and gives a good idea of the capabilities.

I will read the article, I know some of the Amazon reviews were a little harsh but overall I think it is a great reference.

[TJLuke]

So I broke down and purchased a drawing pad, a Wacom Intuos Draw. I think that having something basic that will help me get used to drawing digitally will be a great start. Hopefully it will help with line control too. I am working on another project that is going to be a little more basic than this one so hopefully I will have it up soon.

[ChickPea]

Look forward to seeing what you do. I think the tablet will help you a lot.

[ajrittler]

So I broke down and purchased a drawing pad, a Wacom Intuos Draw. I think that having something basic that will help me get used to drawing digitally will be a great start. Hopefully it will help with line control too. I am working on another project that is going to be a little more basic than this one so hopefully I will have it up soon.

curious to what you think of the wacom. i had looked at the same one but ended up getting something else to start with. so far, i've found it MORE awkward to use than the mouse

map is shaping up nicely!

[- JO -]

The map is nice.
I just have a question about the political limits (green, yellow, etc.) : are they necessary around the lakes inside a country ?

For the wacom, I too bought one... and it's only that equipment that allows me to draw on the computer : I can't draw with the mouse... Impossible to get what I want !

[TJLuke]

The boundaries were built from the tutorial. Since I am still getting used to Gimp I was more trying to get the process down than fine tuning the instructions. I am working on cleaning this one up a little bit and modifying some of the details and hope to put the revision up soon. I have to get the settings right on the Wacom so that it gets me the results I am looking for, it seems like using the tablet for pressure sensitivity also slows the drawing WAY down.