Van der Aa: A Free 18th Century Cartography Brush Set for Fantasy Maps

[KMAlexander]

Hey hey hey! Today I’m releasing Van der Aa, my twelfth free brush set for Photoshop (and GIMP). This set is extracted from a beautifully rendered version of the Mingrelia region of northwest Georgia. The map was made by Dutch cartographer and publisher, Pieter Van der Aa and it’s a little larger than most which lent itself to larger nicely detailed brushes. It also comes with a wall! A staple for fantasy lands and failed defensive policies since time immemorial.



As with all my brushes, these are distributed under a CC0 license, which means they’re free to use for personal or commercial work, no attribution required! Let me know what you think, and if you end up using Van der Aa, I’d love to see what you made.



You can read more about Van der Aa and download the set over on my blog.



Detailed example:


featuredvanderaa.png

Some of the symbols:
vanderaasampler.png

vanderaasampler2.png



Van der Aa in use:
examplemap_vanderaa_decorated.png

[Rwhyte]

Nice! I like the cracked and damaged wall section, that’s cool. All good additions. Overall this is becoming quite the collection of mapping material!

[DrWho42]

loving the detail and composition! especially the symbols

[Greason Wolfe]

Really dig what you've been doing with these brush sets. Haven't had a chance to experiment with them yet, but what I've seen of them so far look great.

[KMAlexander]

Thanks for all the positive feedback!
Really excited to see what masterpieces people create with this stuff.

[jshoer]

This set looks really cool - I love the walls!