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As far as I know the hard drives are fine. My friend is putting my d drive into an external hard disk and giving to me on Monday, but I have it backed up to about 2 weeks ago on another external hard disc if worst comes to the worst.
Yeah, wives have been known to hold such suspiscions
I guess congratulations are in order then, on the upcoming new compy. Is your data safe, at least?
As far as I know the hard drives are fine. My friend is putting my d drive into an external hard disk and giving to me on Monday, but I have it backed up to about 2 weeks ago on another external hard disc if worst comes to the worst.
The Beast Cometh
I've ordered my puter and it's a bit of a beast. Should arrive in the next week or so. Once I've got her settled in and dosed up with software I'll continue with the map.
Ohhh.....I can't wait!!!
Cool beans! I'm sorry your computer gave up the ghost, but it's so exciting to get a new one.Thank you very much for keeping me posted!
No worries Duerma, thanks for hanging in there! I have grand plans for your map!
Tell you what, after I've finished this, I can do you a map of Elduun. I've enjoyed reading your site and I prefer doing continental sized maps anyway.
Last edited by ravells; 07-23-2009 at 02:58 PM.
Hello World!
New compy arrived and this is the first message from it.
Now to load up Crysis and see what this baby can really do. After I've done all the boring stuff like taken a clean disk image etc etc.
Hee hee....hang in there Duerma, not long now....
Ravs
Ii've rethought the map and gone back to basics.
Fiddled with Alfar's code on context free so it produces a thousand buildings per pass with a bit more variation. Also, been struggling to find a legible style so I went into vector and this is the result. What's good about it is that dunjinni type objects which are pre-made should (ha ha) fit in easily with it to add interest to various bits. What you can see on the detailed map are the buildings which I've dragged, rotated and dropped into the begingings of the district and the 'raw material' below that.
It's a more traditional 'fantasy style' city feel (which is good). I also like how you can make city blocks and still keep the stroke on individual habitations within the blocks. As it's vector it's very easy to highlight individual buildings, play with the style attributes etc. Hence the red and orange buildings, but with Vector you can 'layer style' each individual object. It's also easier to suggest multi story buildings buy putting one shape on top of another but I've yet to experiment with that bit in detail.
This is still at experimentation stage and I'll probably scrap it and start again once I've planned the district better, but I'm just working on getting the negative space of the roads right, relative size of buildings etc. Working in vector means that working with individual objects is easier so I can highlight important buildings. As I'm going through this I'm finding faster ways to get through the work but it's still pretty slow as you have to fit the buildings together like bits of lego, but it's still a LOT faster than having to draw them individually.
The second picture is the Tanner's district, the first picture is the whole city (tanner's district to the SW). :: cries:: . I think I'm finding ways to make the process faster like using the eraser to cut through objects to make small windy streets. There's a small block on the extreme left of the map where I've done this - they look a bit different to the 'lego' ones.
For the final city to be legible at the detail and scale at which its being drawn the map is going to be huge and this is where vector wins out again (I hope).
I'll post more WIPs as I go along but I'm quite excited about this although I think it's going to be a bloody long slog.
Not sure about the texturing or whether the city will even need it once it's complete.
Duerma, I don't know if you're reading this - it's going to take a while but it'll be worth it in the end! Time to take your players on a diversion somewhere!
C&Cs welcomed as always.
Last edited by ravells; 08-05-2009 at 05:03 PM.
Hahah. That's a great quote, spoken by a true cartographer.Originally Posted by ravells
I think this is a really interesting idea. I like the "lego" concept of building the blocks. One thing to consider: rotation and image flipping can definitely be your friend. Maybe make a few "blocks" and then just rotate/flip chucks of blocks. I'd be surprised if anyone could find the pattern.
Working in vector is nice -- much easier to make adjustments to building shapes. CS4 I think now supports "smart" vectors, so you could theoretically import the entire layout for texture-goodness in photoshop.
Welcome back and good luck!
Thanks Redstar, part of the reason why I went for vector is that my copy of CS4 which is supposed to be winging from the States I bought from Byte Sized Deals - They were cheap! Unfortunately after I'd shelled over my cash it turns out their reviews are abysmal. Of course I checked out the reviews after I spent my cash.
From the reviews it appears that if you push them hard enough they will send the stuff or refund your money but I think building the city is going to be easier by comparison
I've been doing lots of rotation and flipping which is again, so much easier in vector.
I am reading with excitement!
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