[WIP] Dor-en-Ernil - The Land of the Prince: ...Yes, another ME map ;)

[Midgardsormr]

Here ya go, me dear.....beautiful, isn't it? Does anyone know about the provenance of this map?

The artist's name is Daniel Cruger. http://iguanaslair.blogspot.com/2011...in-strife.html

[J.Edward]

Midgard - at the bottom it lists his name, Daniel Cruger.
I checked in some of the old MERP books and found his name as well.
That was a good find too.

Abu - any further updates on the map?
I'm interested to see where you're at with it.

[Abu Lafia]

Hey J., not too productive atm maybe i'll find some time this weekend. For now, with the adaptation of the coastline to imply Rav's from Dol Amroth, i only decided to redo the coast/water lines(?) (dunno the right term). I'll let you know if there is some progress .

@midgard: Great find! A shame the original hand drawn map got lost... The other maps are wonderful too.

[ravells]

Thanks Mid! I'm not surprised he's an architecht by training. Such a talented guy. It was great to see his other maps too. Hope he finds the guild! I might write to him.

[Abu Lafia]

Just a small update:
DorEnErnilWIP7.jpg

- I redid the coastal waters and think they look better now. In the process i also darkened the sea a bit.

- I added the roads, before i continue with the forests, so i dont need to adapt them later. I used dots, although i wanted to go for dashed lines before. But i couldn't find a good way to make them. Drawing them by hand was too time-consuming as was the option to stroke a path that doesn't look too "straight". To use a rectangular brush with larger spacing and the "Track direction" brush-dynamics wasn't perfect either. Other ideas how i might do this are very welcome!

- I also determined the locations of the other settlements i still have to draw.

Suggestions, critique, comments, etc. are appreciated as always!

Cheers,
AL

[ChickPea]

It's looking good. I'm very fond of dark seas contrasting with lighter coloured land masses. It's very striking and visually appealing.

With your roads, I guess you tried the Gimp 'Stroke Path' option? What was the problem with it? Were the dashes too widely spaced or making odd bends? I tend to do stuff like this in Inkscape because I find it much easier to use. Then I export a PNG and bring into Gimp and position it. Don't know if you've used Inkscape at all? Might to be too much of a learning curve for one little thing (though probably worth it in the long run!) I do think your dotted roads look fine as they are.

[Abu Lafia]

Beside adding more forests and doing an icon for "Galibur" a mountainfolk's town (in the center of the mountains), i came up with a solution, to give the mountains more plasticity without adding linework . I used the smudge-tool and set the layer to "addition". Here is the result. Would love to hear what you think about it:

The first version is with full opacity. It brings out the conturs very nicely but it's maybe a little bright.
Attachment 74299

The second with lowered (50%) opacity wich is more subtle.
Attachment 74300

@ ChickPea: Thanks a lot, for bringing up Inkscape. I think there is a "draw freehand paths" function, which might do the trick? To manually do the very curvy paths in gimp is very exhausting

Cheers,
AL

[Ilanthar]

Nice! I would go with the second one. The first one is indeed too bright in my opinion.

[ChickPea]

Abu, agree with Ilanthar that the reduced opacity version is best.

With Inkscape, there are two tools you could probably use. The first is the Pencil tool, which is a freehand drawing tool. The second is the Bezier tool. I'd try the bezier tool first. Draw straight, angled lines, going roughly in the direction you want (press enter when you're finished). Next, just grab one of the lines and start bending it to the precise route you want. You'll get nice smooth curves with the bezier tool and it's very easy to shape without getting bogged down with too many nodes. Just google Bezier tool or 'drawing paths in Inkscape'. I'm sure there's tons of tutorials. (I have no idea if you've used vector software before so you might know the basics already!) To get dots or dashes along the line, you need to open the Fill & Stroke Properties dialogue box, then click the Stroke Style tab. There's lots of different options in there.

Any problems, just holler!

[J.Edward]

That looks good Abu. I would agree on the second one with lower opacity.