WIP : Haerlech

[Larb]

I have to agree with the flying appearance although I can see what you are trying to do. Hopefully a wake will fix that a bit like you say. Also I have to agree - the water looks really lovely.

You know you are going to have a lot of labels to put on this though. =P

By the way - what sort of settings do you use for your linework in Photoshop? I am curious. I really like how this is turning out and I'm not sure whether I will make Argot a top-down map or an isometric one.

[J.Edward]

Err... I guess the wakes I did in that last update aren't showing well enough?
Hopefully you just hadn't seen that yet.
Sometimes it's hard to get the right mix of visibility at lower res and just overdoing it.

You're right - lots of labels, and I'm not looking forward to that.
I want to do road labels too but that might get a little small/tight.

I'll try to answer that about the lines though I'm not sure specifically what lines you're referring to.
Most of the time I am using a basic round brush at 90% hardness. It is mostly 100% opacity and between 50-70% flow.
I have pressure sensitivity and have shape dynamics on with size jitter set to pen pressure and usually angle jitter set to direction, though with a basic brush angle jitter doesn't make that much difference. I use a lighter than black tone for my lines. I can give you the info for that if you want it. I'd have to check in PS.

I also use another basic brush for soft stuff. That's set to 40% opacity and 30% flow.
I think other setting might be the same except hardness is way down, maybe 10-20 %.

And I use a smudge brush. Nothing special there. And that's really it for most all my work.
I have made some texture brushes I that I have used some but not as often.
I'm really trying to get to where I can everything with those 3 brushes. It works most of the time.

If all of that was not what you were asking about, just let me know more specifically what you're after and I'll try to answer back.

edit - I thought I should add - I do a lot with layer properties [multiply, soft light, etc] and layer opacity.
Sometimes I do that rather than change the brushes around.

Thought of one other thing to add regarding top down vs iso - I like top down if I'm trying to convey a lot of location info/labels and iso/perspective to get a better feel for the town and its architecture. I found iso to sort of block a lot of things that I wanted to show.

[Larb]

Yes, I hadn't see the reply when I posted. Thanks for the brush info. I am wanting to try some different line styles to see if I can achieve a different effect on some of my stuff. I also try to use mainly basic brushes too but for lines I use the brush in SAI which produces smooth black lines.

It might be worth adding the start of some agricultural fields on the south side of the city where the terrain looks a little flatter. Just to give some sense of fields being near the city. Gives the people something else to eat instead of just fish, razor clams, and seaweed... =P

[J.Edward]

I've meant to try SAI. It looks interesting. Every so often I try different programs to see if they might be better for certain things.
What sort of effect[s] are you looking to produce? I might have some input or have tried something that might be helpful.
I used to make a lot of different brushes in the past, for PS at least.

Actually, I started doing some fields and a vineyard north of town and was going to do some more fields south as well.
Might have an update on that tonight or tomorrow morning if time permits.
With a port that big, they could also import a ton of food from other areas as well I think.

[J.Edward]

I've started in on some forest, fields, trees and orchards along with a few more roads and paths.
Just roughing in right now. Forest and trees are just a base color. Loads more to do.
Haerlech 03a_004sirinkman.jpg

[Chashio]

Well, it's looking excellent so far.

[Ilanthar]

Yup, this is getting really awesome! Concerning the flying ships (he, remember I'm not obsessed with flying things in cities ), I think I got this impression because of the shadows. The wakes are really good, but I still have this feeling that they are flying. Why the shadow are so afar from the boats? Do you wanted to gave a sense of the water depth, like if we actually see the boat's shadow on the sand under the water (by transparency)?

[JonPin]

Wow! This is an amazing map. The level of detail is mind blowing. Did you use sketchup for the initial shapes?

[J.Edward]

Thanks Chashio.
Thanks JP. nope, just PS.
Thank you Ilanthar.
I may have to try something that 'grounds' the boats better then. I thought the wakes would help.
I did a quick pic to show why the shadows are as they are.
Light through water 01.jpg
Yep, shadow on the bottom sand. I wanted to try to convey the depth and transparency of the water.

[su_liam]

Yeah, I get what you're trying to do with the shadows, but it really wouldn't make sense unless you can see details of the bottom(sand, coral, fish, crabs, rocks, whatever…). With the kind of symbolic blue it's just confusing. Even with more realistically depicted water the deeper the water, the more caustics would obliterate the shadows. Rather than depending on shadows, maybe reflections on the water surface? Definitely the reflections or major shadows should be on the surface.