October 2017 Challenge: The Story of Golthra and Iriana

[Mouse]

Ok. I might not get all the way home on time with this map, but I've learned how to make an animated pipe brush (the trees), and managed to get the hang of drawing with the default brush to redo the detail on the rocks.

I'm now working on a smaller original. The GIMP map was 7000 px on the long side, and reduced to 4500 on the long side to upload here to smooth out any rough bits. I'm now working at 4500 px and uploading at 100% the size of the original. I thought that would mean the quality of the work would be worse than before, but I was surprised at how much smoother the pen draws in Krita.

I've learned how to make my simple animated tree pipe brush, so the only slow bit will be the rocks/muntains.

Here is a sample patch of the way things are going in Krita. The trees are new, and the rock texture on the lit side of the hill has been mostly re-drawn.

Golthra and Iriana KRITA 01 extract.jpg

(no WIP tag because this is just an extract )


EDIT: ninjad by Warlin! Hi!

Oh don't worry about me - I'm fine now things are working again. Just don't talk to me about Windows, or Updates, or corrupted Wacom drivers for a few days and the steam will eventually stop coming out of my nostrils! LOL!

I'm not very good with Krita yet, but what I have learned is very encouraging. I think that even if GIMP does start to talk to my Wacom again in another couple of updates time, I will probably stick with Krita now.

[kacey]

Wow Mouse! Those cliffs looks great! I'm glad Krita is working out for you and hopefully the rest of the issues are sorted out soon I'm still cursing my computer too.

[ChickPea]

Sorry for all your woes, Mouse. Windows can be a nightmare when it's not working properly. Although I boot into Windows infrequently, must admit, I don't actually run anti-virus. I rely solely on Windows Defender, an adblocker & gmail checking/filtering my emails. I also don't install random crapware. I feel the anti-virus programs are worse than the problems they're supposed to fix. They slow your system to a crawl.

Glad you're getting to grips with Krita. I keep meaning to give it a serious go. I've heard many people report that tablets work much better with it, probably because it's designed more as a drawing tool, rather than an image editor. I'm a little intimidated by the brush editor thingie. So many options! :O

[Mouse]

Wow Mouse! Those cliffs looks great! I'm glad Krita is working out for you and hopefully the rest of the issues are sorted out soon I'm still cursing my computer too.

Thanks Kacey

Have you tried opening your Wacom Preferences thingumajig where you can make your tablet right or left handed etc? (I get to mine through my retro Win 8 style start menu, so I don't know how you would get there). If when you try to open it you get a popup message instead saying the driver is corrupt, then you are having the same problem that I was having when I couldn't unstick the move tool from my pen in GIMP and just kept moving the map around. Windows updates corrupt Wacom drivers. I've had to reinstall mine after every single update in the last 2 days. I mentioned the order in which to do things above in comment 149 if it turns out that's what's gone wrong with yours.

I wonder how many people out there are struggling tonight with corrupted drivers without realising what the problem is - or what caused it?

Sorry for all your woes, Mouse. Windows can be a nightmare when it's not working properly. Although I boot into Windows infrequently, must admit, I don't actually run anti-virus. I rely solely on Windows Defender, an adblocker & gmail checking/filtering my emails. I also don't install random crapware. I feel the anti-virus programs are worse than the problems they're supposed to fix. They slow your system to a crawl.

Glad you're getting to grips with Krita. I keep meaning to give it a serious go. I've heard many people report that tablets work much better with it, probably because it's designed more as a drawing tool, rather than an image editor. I'm a little intimidated by the brush editor thingie. So many options! :O

Thanks ChickPea

I was relying solely on Defender before all this nightmare began. Of course, you never imagine that the update is the cause of the problem. To me it seemed as if I had a virus in the system - especially when I couldn't let go of the move tool in GIMP and started getting messages about drivers being corrupted. I really thought the number was up for my PC. I got Avast to double check there were no viruses. I figured that if there was a virus then one or the other of the two unrelated AV apps would get it, since it would be a pretty slim chance that different AVs would have exactly the same deficiency in their virus lists, but I never found anything wrong. Not surprising really, since it was the actual update causing the havoc.

I purchased the cheapest version of Avast at 80% price reduction. Needless to say I will cancel the automatic repurchase set for next year and go back to trusting Defender, but in a sense Windows owes me that £20 I paid for Avast when their update scared me into thinking I had a virus I didn't actually have.

So yes, quite a lot of steam still escaping my nostrils at the moment, but it will pass

As for Krita? Before the Win update I had a duff version installed (in my personal opinion). It never worked very well, and when Win 10 updated I got that strange invisible doodle problem as well. Now that I have the newest version available, and I've reinstalled my Wacom (again) Its working like a dream. The brush system is a little frightening, but its ok once you get used to it a bit at a time. I had to do some fast learning earlier this afternoon. I needed to re-make my tree pipe brush to carry on with the forests. There are lots of videos on U-tube about managing and making Krita brushes

Krita will also open GIMP files, which made the transition relatively painless. I just had to reduce the file size, but as I mentioned above, you can work in Krita at 100% final size and it still looks ok. That's a new one on me! LOL! The detail is much better in Krita than it is in GIMP.

[kacey]

I don't use Wacom, I just had to get the new drivers from Microsoft for my surface pen, unpair it from the Bluetooth and then pair it back to my surface tablet...Unfortunately that doesn't fix my on screen keyboard which has made typing anything a real pain in the a**. I'm not sure if my desk top computer is having issues though, I do have a Wacom tablet on it but I never use it so I haven't even checked yet, but if I do decide to use it and find this issue I'll know where to look for help

On a side note...Aside from all the awful updates that reek havoc on my computer periodically Microsoft customer support has been very good to me. I had a problem with my pen not responding before and they sent me a whole new surface pro 4 after I'd already been using it for a year and they kept in contact to make sure I wasn't having the same issues with the new machine.

In the past when updates have caused me issues it normally doesn't take long before a new update comes along and fixes it.

[Mouse]

Maybe the keyboard has also been corrupted by the update. If its possible to reinstall it, it could be worth a try... unless you've already done it since the very last update?

[Mouse]

Ok. I'm not learning this fast enough to finish on time - not after all that messing around with Windows. But I am really impressed with Krita. This is actual size direct from Krita.

Labels I'll have to add in the morning, but that there is the wandering road - doing its thing . The forest on the mainland is carnivorous. That's why the wandering road wanders all over the place to avoid it.

### Latest WIP ###
Golthra and Iriana KRITA 01.jpg

Lets see how much I can manage to get done in the few hours tomorrow

[Mouse]

9.5 hours to go?

Not sure whether my calculations are accurate, since we are on winter time in the UK.

Been working on the left hand side of the map under the text. Moving on from there I will attempt to get the distant background and the rest of the mountains finished. The fields and labels need work, but they aren't going to get any.

### Latest WIP ###
Golthra and Iriana KRITA 03.jpg

[ladiestorm]

This is looking fantastic, Mouse I hope you get a chance to finish the mountains. The ones on the left look great, the ones on the right look.... unfinished Of course, you could give them just a minute of detail, and shadow them, make it look like the darkness encroaching... just an idea....

[Mouse]

Thank you, Storm

The time limit seems to be destabilising my vision of the mountains. I think this is what other people call 'panic'? They are currently undergoing a huge re-draft. I don't like the ridges any more - they're too straight and unnatural looking.

I'm just going to have to go with it, and hope I have something I like before the deadline. Otherwise the previous WIP will be the last one on this thread.