November/December 2024 Challenge: The Lands around the Aldesund

[Abu Lafia]

So, by chance i stumbled upon Kell's Challenge announcement in the CG discord and was hooked immediately. The base image shows a ton of interesting potential coastlines / landforms so i could easily find an area that really sparked my imagination. The lore isn't flashed out fully and as always a lot of the world literally builds itself in the process of drawing all the terrain and settlements. Maybe more on it in another post.

My last mapping adventures were by pen and paper (and a bit of watercolour) but given the nature of this challenge i thought i'd go back to the trusted old Gimp and Wacom Intuos S to draw this map digitally... wish me luck.

After tracing the coastline i started adding texture and colour with some old background parchments i had lying around on my harddrive. Usually i can't stand working for hours and hours doing linework on a blank canvas. It gives me some flavour and ideas of how the map could look later. It might be a bit dark and muddy for now ... but i like it like that XD

The frame is a placeholder for now. Maybe i try something fancy with it later on... time will tell.

I blocked in the areas of possible mountain ranges and started to draw in the terrain of the northwestern landmass. Even got some preliminary settlement icons placed.

### Latest WIP ###
Abu_Lafia_ShapeCallengeWIP1.jpg

Comments, suggestions and critique are very welcome!

*** Damnit, i forgot to add the proper Challenge Title to the thread...it's been too long sorry! Can someone who has the rights change the title...pretty please? oo ***