Norumbega Continent (World of Eldoran)

[Diamond]

Of those two samples, I agree with Raptori; I like the first one better.

[- Max -]

Same here...

[Lingon]

Me too! The second feels too grainy compared to the rest, in my opinion. Though if you end up using a different mountain style, I might change my mind…

[Ilanthar]

Thanks a lot! I suppose I should have guessed that the first one would look better, since it is by far the most time-consuming

By Raptori
..yeah I get the feeling I'm not being very helpful here D:

You are, I'll give it a try. I've seen this fading rings on maps, and it looked quite good (plus, it's not a lot of work to do!).

By Lingon
Though if you end up using a different mountain style, I might change my mind…

Yep, I haven't got convincing results so far... I did not gave up yet, but I may go with the same mountains...

[Ilanthar]

And here it is, with the first option and a choice of three fading lines. I've done a fading gradiant between the lines (left), is it better than without (right)?

Norum CLGrad.jpg Norum CLF.jpg

[Raptori]

I prefer without, since there's already a big enough contrast between the water and the land. A shadow like that makes sense when the colours are similar, but it's unnecessary otherwise. Both options look great though

[Ilanthar]

Thanks, I'll go for the option "without"! I'll do some tests with possible other mountains (which could take me a lot of time...) and will add the rivers right after.

[Ilanthar]

Ok, I've tried a lot of things to get an other appropriate kind of mountains (despite the fact I was quite busy at work), but nothing was quite to my taste... I suppose the only way would be to print the coastline and "draw" what I want. But it would be difficult and won't match exactly my present mountains... So, I'll just keep the old ones.

That said, I've tried different things (rivers, railroad, cities, borders), but don't quite know if it's working well. A note about borders, the colour zones are meant to represent both "well-known and populated areas" and the big administrative regions.

Norum tests part.jpg Humm... seems better with more dots for the big administrative regions borderchange.jpg

What do you think? Everything will be useful at this point - I'm just testing!

[Ilanthar]

Ok, I changed my mind a little bit and put a uniform color for the inhabited areas plus a hatched colored border. And added some labels. What do you guys think?

Norum test suite.jpg

[DarthChicago]

I think it's really coming along well. I think the different colors are a big help in breaking up the areas. I would consider changing the largest typeface you're using... appears to be Rosewood? As a typeface, it's a bit intricate, which hurts legibility esp when it's faded, and has a bit of an American west feel to it. Might be a nice font choice to use as a main title for the entire map continent/world. Really a beautifully shaped continent and a great map. Enjoying watching it progress!