February/March 2014 Lite Challenge: The Capture and Recapture of the Princess Bride

[SJS]

Well, what the heck, I'll enter, since I put in some work on a map.

Here's the deal. I'm a rookie at mapmaking and certainly at challenges. I've posted a bit around the forums, but have zero experience with the kind of map I decided to make this time - a Tolkein-esque symbol-based map. My only previous maps were atlas-style regional maps and old-school TSR style dungeon maps.

I take credit (or blame) for the composition of this map, but very little credit for the artistic quality of the elements on the map. I used free brushes for the map elements (as far as I could tell, no copyright issues posting this) and public domain drawings (for the 2 ships).

I'm sure the rookie-effort shows, but I at least think I had a fun theme, which I hope matches the challenge theme: the Princess Bride. If you're familiar with the book or movie, this will make sense, otherwise, probably not.

I decided to not just make an "inside-the-book cover" map of the Princess Bride world, but rather a "playable" D&D style wilderness map complete with encounter areas. The encounters cover the first hour or so of the movie, when Buttercup is kidnapped by Vezzini and his minions Fezzik (the Giant) and Inigo Montoya (the Spanish swordsman). They are pursued by Westley, first in a ship (1) then up the Cliffs of Insanity (2), then the Princess Buttercup is recaptured by Westley after he successively defeats the Spaniard (3), Giant (4), and Sicilian (5). Buttercup temporarily betrays him at the ravine (6) but then joins him in the trials of the fire swamp (7 a-c) before she is recaptured by Prince Humperdinck and his men (-8-).

This is a WIP if I get some good feedback/suggestions. If it's too amateurish to be saved, I'll take my lumps happily.

### LATEST WIP ###
Princess Bride.jpg

[arsheesh]

Very cool, and great choice on the story. The Princess Bride has got to be one of my all time favorite books.

Cheers,
-Arsheesh

[Bogie]

It is a very good start. Clean it up a little, put in a little more detail and you are on your way.

[madcowchef]

Love the style. The diversity of trees is a bit distracting to me, but that might be personal taste. The variety of line sizes seems a tad high also. The story, layout with the strong diagonal, and colors are all very pleasing.

[SJS]

Thank you for the encouragement folks. Bogie, I think I know what you mean by "clean it up" (I'm not especially married to the texture I chose for the paper of the map, and the edges are too burned I think) but I'm wondering about "more detail". I mean, I agree the map feels a bit empty, but I wanted to focus on the encounters in the movie and so avoided extra detail. But if you had a specific idea, I'd love to hear it!

Madcowchef - the Fire Swamp in the movie is very thick, weird, and scary, so I went with a diversity of symbols to try and capture that. But I agree with you - I don't think my attempt here was especially successful at doing so. I hope I can think of a more clever way to do this. It was also a challenge to make the swamp seem dense without obscuring the 3 encounter areas in it. By "variety of line sizes" do you mean the height of the symbols, or do you mean the thickness of the symbols? This sounds like something I could address easily.

Thanks again.

[madcowchef]

The thickness. IT feels like a bunch of different levels of size or detail losing some consistency.

[schattentanz]

Is this a kissing map???

[arsheesh]

Is this a kissing map???

That gave me a chuckle!

[fabio p]

I think you should work a little bit on the consistency of all the elements of the map; eg: ships and land features are really represented in two different styles; also the legend seems to me not well integrated with the rest of the map.

[SJS]

The thickness. IT feels like a bunch of different levels of size or detail losing some consistency.

You have a good eye (no surprise). With some of the brushes I needed to hold them down to get a dark enough symbol. My timing was variable from application to application. Inconsistent indeed. I'll see what I can do about that.

Thanks!