The Dragon's Backbone

[Caenwyr]

Hi all!

With my Faltorn city map finished, it's time I move on to a different part of my fantasy world. And to make sure I don't get bored, I went for a regional map again. Hah! I love this freedom!

This one will depict the most important region in my novel, the mountain ridge between two political power blocks where much of the action will take place. It's called the Dragon's Backbone, for if you look carefully on the larger scale map of the Twin Kingdoms, you should see the contours of a humongous dragon in the distribution of the mountain ridges: its back in the middle, its tail pointed towards the south, its head in the northwest, its claws below that and its wings outstretched throughout the entire eastern half of the subcontinent. Whether or not these are the remains of an actual dragon or just a happy coincidence will remain a mystery - especially for my readers, because everyone in the story has their own idea of course!

I might use this one as the seed of a higher-resolution Twin Kingdoms map if I ever find the time and the motivation - which isn't very likely

work my way outward, eventually piecing the Twin Kingdoms together in this hand-drawn style - map by map. I'm not sure if I'll ever get to that though: large parts of the subcontinent are completely irrelevant for the story, so I probably won't need most of them in this amount of detail

Alright, enough jibber jabber. Time to show you what I got!

dragonsbackbone2.jpg

(don't mind the frame and the title, those are just place fillers for the time being!)

Already done at this point:

• part of the mountains (there's more of them hiding in the white on either side), and
• the entire coastline with some terrain squigglies. Yes - I keep using that silly word!

Still to do:

• so much I don't even dare to write up a list just yet!

So, what do you guys think?

[DanielHasenbos]

Looks really nice! All these maps of your fantasy world are triggering my curiosity. Is your story published anywhere?
My only comment about the map so far would be that the squigglies around the coast seem top down while the mountains are certainly not. Then again, it might be to early to make that call. Curious to see this develop!

-Dan

[paulotutu]

Very nice! The mountains/hills blend quite nicelly!
Looking forward to see it develop!

[Caenwyr]

Looks really nice! All these maps of your fantasy world are triggering my curiosity. Is your story published anywhere?
My only comment about the map so far would be that the squigglies around the coast seem top down while the mountains are certainly not. Then again, it might be to early to make that call. Curious to see this develop!

Thanks Dan, and so am I! The story hasn't been published yet - as a matter of fact I'm a big slacker when it comes to that. I've been working on it for over 16 years, and even though the first book is now ready and being proofread by a bunch of friends, I feel rather iffy about actually going to a publisher! Fantasy is not the easiest style to get published here in The Dutch-speaking world...

Regarding the coastline: yeah, that should get sorted once I get to shadowing. Or so I hope

Very nice! The mountains/hills blend quite nicelly!
Looking forward to see it develop!

Thanks Paulotutu! Me too as a matter of fact! I guess it's gonna be a suprise for everyone

[paulotutu]

Thanks Dan, and so am I! The story hasn't been published yet - as a matter of fact I'm a big slacker when it comes to that. I've been working on it for over 16 years, and even though the first book is now ready and being proofread by a bunch of friends, I feel rather iffy about actually going to a publisher! Fantasy is not the easiest style to get published here in The Dutch-speaking world...

Have you ever considered self-publishing? Amazon has a great service!
Self-published myself two books using their services.

So we're kinda in the same boat here hehehe. I'm currently working on a book that I had the first ideas eleven years ago, it's a fantasy medieval story, but only now I'm confident enough to write it down.
If you never tried or peeked about self-publish, have a look!

[ThomasR]

I love them squiggles ! Glad to see you back with a new project. Can I ask what resolution you're working at ?

[Caenwyr]

Have you ever considered self-publishing? Amazon has a great service!
Self-published myself two books using their services.

So we're kinda in the same boat here hehehe. I'm currently working on a book that I had the first ideas eleven years ago, it's a fantasy medieval story, but only now I'm confident enough to write it down.
If you never tried or peeked about self-publish, have a look!

I really should consider that one! Never actually thought of. Thanks for the suggestion!

I love them squiggles ! Glad to see you back with a new project. Can I ask what resolution you're working at ?

Hi Thom, thanks! I'm doing this on A5 resolution, or one page of a book, but scaled it down to 70% before posting it here (sort of a middle ground between the full 300 dpi for print and the lousy 72 dpi suggested for the screen)

[Caenwyr]

Hi guys, I'm back with a small update for you!

Done since the last update:

• finished most of the macro terrain (mountains and hills),
• drew in the first few rivers in the upper right quarter of the map,
• started with the micro terrain (aka squigglies) in the open spaces and around the rivers to give them some depth

dragonsbackbone4.jpg

Still to do:

• finalize natural environment (terrain, forests, marshes, grasslands, ...)
• take care of the "human" part of the map (city icons -- not sure if I'm gonna go for simple dots or squares, or tiny cities -- , roads, borders)
• labeling (everything!)
• colouring (everything!)
• non-cartographic elements (scale, compass, legend, title, .... in short: everything!)

Now that I'm looking at the map on another display, I noticed the mountains in the upper right quarter are darker (the linework fatter) than the others. I must have messed up with my brushes somewhere. Will have to look into that, and if necessary redo them! Awww

[Caenwyr]

Hi all! Another update for you. Still working on the physical geography here!

dragonsbackbone5.jpg

[Matthew VE]

Wow. Just with linework you bring out so much depth in the land. Looks great so far.