WIP - Aronbor... or Perdon

[Gidde]

The trees ended up the perfect size, and I love that wall!

This is turning out beautifully.

[Ramah]

Thank you Gidde.

That wall is the first time I've ever tried drawing anything on the tablet that wasn't just a few small lines or some shading. I found it very tricky, especially as the wall is far longer than my screen when zoomed in at a comfortable drawing size, so hard to gauge direction etc. In the end I just had to learn to embrace the roughness.

The tablet has a learning curve for sure but I really am loving it.

[Gidde]

It does. It took me weeks to get comfortable with mine, but now I can't imagine using anything else.

[Coyotemax]

Wow, that's coming along very nice. I can't think of anything on this map that I don't like, and a long list of "i love the way you did X" is much simpler to say as "omg that's great".

I was looking at the mountains a bit more closely, and the hills.. are you drawing them all indivdually by hand? that or you have an incredibly varied set of brushes

and yes, that wall is very nicely done!

[Ramah]

Thanks for the compliments CM.

The outlines of the mountains and hills, for the most part, were traced over from the original blown up section of map to keep the position true. I changed some, added some new ones and reduced the size of many of the original hills and then they are all indvidually shaded by hand. So I can't really say they are completely hand drawn but I haven't used any custom brushes on them.

[Coyotemax]

The final result is very impressive, and that's where it really matters (even with my current leaning to do as much hand-done work as possible, i found myself breaking down and using brushes again for some things - you gotta draw a line somewhere - pun intended, i think)

I'm defintiely keeping a copy of your map around for inspiration for when I do get the graphics tablet

[Ramah]

Ok, another quick update.

I've finished all the original forests now except for the daunting Ruhks. I think I might not actually place too many more trees in the Ruhks actually as I don't want to lose the colour change in the base map and I think it will be hardly noticable if I cover it all with trees. I might just put a ring of deciduous trees around what I have and then maybe try fading them out. I originally tried fading the forests and hills out where the base map colour changed towards the edges but I didn't particularly like the effect. Ah well.

I've also started to place some labels in. I've not done too many at the moment, just a handful and I haven't put any markers down yet. This was basically a font test and to show you the results and the fonts I have decided to go with. It's strange, I really loved the ilShakefest font I used on Vaniya but for some reason it was just sticking out to me on this one, demanding to be changed.
Anyway, I've gone for two fonts which I hope will keep the hand-drawn feel/look that I am trying to achieve for the most part.
The labels are only roughly placed at the moment and will be moved, twisted, resized etc. for better flow/legibility when I get down to it in more depth.

Anyway, this is where I am at the moment.

Aronbor9.jpg

[Gandwarf]

Great stuff, Ramah. It's still very much alike to the overland map and that's a good thing I think. There's not a huge difference in style. The smaller font you used is awesome!

[Tom_Cardin]

That is a beautiful hand drawn look you have achieved! Of course thats because it is hand drawn! hehe. Your shading lines are very nicely laid in for the mountains, hills and forests. It is hard to keep that kind of consistency and you did a really good job of it.

[Ramah]

It's still very much alike to the overland map and that's a good thing I think. There's not a huge difference in style. The smaller font you used is awesome!

Yeah, I never intended there to be a huge difference in style. In fact, with the colouring change to the ocean and around the outside it's already varied more than I anticipated. I just intended it to be a zoomed in map allowing me much more room to add towns and details and hopefully improve the general appearance of what was already there.

Oh and yeah, I really like that small font.