World of Skenth WIP

[Maiar]

Love the style. It looks amazing.

[Viking]

Thank you Maiar!

[Viking]

I have called this done and put a thread up in the finished map section. Please feel free to take a look!

[Luxferre]

Hi Viking,
my english is bad, please apologize.
You did that map with PS, right? PS CS6?
Did you use one of these tutorials, or did you paint everything by hand?
Did you use brushes fpr this very nice color of the ocean?

Maybe you can give us/me a little glimpse in your art of working.
That would be nice

[Viking]

Hi Luxferre,
I do use photoshop, currently CS5. Most of what I do you could probably do with far earlier versions however. I did paint everything by hand including the borders and the designs of the floating bits above. Obviously for some aspects I duplicated aspects such as for the borders. I definitely did use some brushes for the ocean colours.
I don't really recall looking at any specific tutorials. My previous familiarity and ability with Photoshop allowed me to create what I did although the guild has many excellent tutorials without question and I draw inspiration from the other artists here. The feedback I received in the WIP thread was without question a definite asset.

I will post something here that I also just posted in another thread to similar questions:

I don't use filters much at all when painting. I don't really use a specific blending tool other than the Photoshop brush. I set the opacity of the brush somewhere between 10% to 100% depending on how strong I want the impact of what I'm doing to be. Most painting is done at maybe 50 to 70% opacity. I pretty much leave the flow at 50% or so and let it be. A major part of the blending process is the colour picking/eye drop tool. I may lay down two strokes at 70% opacity or whatever and eye drop the colour created between them, lower the opacity and then paint out the area between.

As for layers, with this style I tend to use only a few layers. Sometimes the landmasses and the ocean are a single layer but sometimes separated. Both options have pros and cons. The rivers may but the trees definitely will have their own layers on top of that. For painting the land however I do tend to keep things on a single layer if possible. if I create a gap due to moving something with the selection tool I'm likely to fill it in with a layer under the main one and merge it later. If I am trying something out otherwise I will create a layer on top and if I elect to keep it, merge it down into the main one layer.

There are pros and cons to using varying amounts of layers:
1. Fewer layers:
-Simpler to keep track of.
-For me, it is a more fluid and satisfying process.
-Smaller file sizes that load and save faster and can be worked on more smoothly.
-Manipulating landmasses in a big way is in some ways easier. You can move land around and the mountains or hills on top come with it. If they are on separate layers you need to move them around individually.
-Less flexibility with revision (though I find this minor most of the time)

2. More Layers:
-Far more control and flexibility to refine, but the process is more tedious.
-More to keep track of and the possibility of painting on the wrong layer is larger.
-Larger file sizes, more system resources use to work with the file size.

I will use custom brushes to get textures, usually on oceans or when creating parchment looking areas. I tend to paint directly over earlier sketches and outlines although this is not always the case. When I create landmasses I like to block out the masses with a 100% opacity brush instead of focusing on outlines.

I hope that offers some insights

[Llannagh]

Thanks for sharing, Viking, and thanks for asking Luxferre! Very insightful.

[Viking]

My pleasure Llannagh!

[tripleoh]

Brilliant work, Viking!

The WIP is quite educational for a newb (non-artist) like myself. Thanks for sharing.

[Sylkin]

it's a beautiful map, you painted it?

[Viking]

Tripleoh: You're quite welcome and thank you!

Sylkin: Thank you Sylkin. I created the map, yes. The only element I did not personally create is the fonts.