February 2021 Challenge: The Realms of Aivak

[Kisachik the Wanderer]

Hi Tonquani!

I like your new map. The grid has a nice, classical feel to it, I also like the font you chose for the continent name. I don't think it fits with the other font though, because one is clean, and the other rough. I would recommend combining two fonts that have the same feel, or just stick to one.

I also feel the mountains are too heavy... wait, what a ridiculous thing to say... What I mean is, they make the mountain ranges look as if they were drawn with a very thick line. This steals all the attention from the coast lines, rivers, labels, everything. It makes the whole unbalanced. One possible fix may be to make the oceans dark as well, but I don't know if that would look good. Another solution would be to use a set of mountain brushes that looks lighter; with hatching instead of block of colour for the shadow side, for example. Or you could lower the opacity of your mountain layer, see how that looks.

The rivers and roads look nice, but I only noticed them after looking several times at the map; I do hope you'll find a way to make those mountains less distracting, cause it's a very nice map otherwise.

[Tonquani]

The grid has a nice, classical feel to it, I also like the font you chose for the continent name. I don't think it fits with the other font though, because one is clean, and the other rough. I would recommend combining two fonts that have the same feel, or just stick to one.

Yep, I completely agree. I was trying for a contrast between the two, but also feel that the caps text is a bit too "clean". I did look for something a bit more suitable but really couldn't;t find anything. I was going for something a little more like this:
clip1.JPG
I will probably try to bleed/distort it once I have put all of the text on.

I also feel the mountains are too heavy... wait, what a ridiculous thing to say... What I mean is, they make the mountain ranges look as if they were drawn with a very thick line. This steals all the attention from the coast lines, rivers, labels, everything. It makes the whole unbalanced. One possible fix may be to make the oceans dark as well, but I don't know if that would look good. Another solution would be to use a set of mountain brushes that looks lighter; with hatching instead of block of colour for the shadow side, for example. Or you could lower the opacity of your mountain layer, see how that looks.

The rivers and roads look nice, but I only noticed them after looking several times at the map; I do hope you'll find a way to make those mountains less distracting, cause it's a very nice map otherwise.

Yes, again I completely agree. I really like those mountain brushes, but they are a little overpowering. I have tried a few adjustments and think it looks quite a bit better - what do you think?
clip.JPG

Thank you so much for the feed back Kasachik, it is really appreciated.

[Kisachik the Wanderer]

Hi again!

That's a pretty sweet vintage look on that Sweden map. Distorting the font might give it a similar look. You could also try this free font family. It has that old print feel as well, though I still like the one you have there currently.

With lowered opacity on the mountains I can definitely see the coastline better, it looks like the element with the most contrast now. The rivers also show much better, good job.

[Tonquani]

Hi again!

That's a pretty sweet vintage look on that Sweden map. Distorting the font might give it a similar look. You could also try this free font family. It has that old print feel as well, though I still like the one you have there currently.

With lowered opacity on the mountains I can definitely see the coastline better, it looks like the element with the most contrast now. The rivers also show much better, good job.

Thanks Kisachik, I tried that font and I think it is a massive improvement. Tried distorting the previous font and it didn't look anywhere near as good.

I have done a little bit more playing around with opacity levels etc and come up with this:

### Latest WIP ###
New Aivak.jpg

The continent to the North West is now pretty much complete apart from a few more names of bays, islands etc.

[Kisachik the Wanderer]

Looks great. The challenge is far from over and already there's beautiful pieces like this one. Looks like voting's going to be hard this month.

[ChickPea]

This is lovely! Really like your colour palette, and that font looks great.

[EricPoehlsen]

This is a really nice map that is coming

[Adfor]

It feels authentic. Definitely turning out to be gorgeous.

IR

[Tonquani]

Looks great. The challenge is far from over and already there's beautiful pieces like this one. Looks like voting's going to be hard this month.

This is lovely! Really like your colour palette, and that font looks great.

This is a really nice map that is coming

It feels authentic. Definitely turning out to be gorgeous.

IR

Thanks for the comments guys - really appreciated.

This feels a bit like a marine map that I did a couple of years ago where I spent about half the challenge time on soundings. I now have a couple of weeks worth of labels to get the right density that I want. The North Western Continent (Tagranello) is pretty much finished apart from the inevitable fiddling, and possibly a handful of labels. Just need to continue the labels throughout the rest of the map now.

### Latest WIP ###
New Aivak.jpg

[Tonquani]

Here's another little update - a bit more labelling and tidying up details etc

### Latest WIP ###
New Aivak.jpg