New member, new map

[EerieA]

Hi all, very pleased to have stumbled upon this forum. From only a brief perusal I can see there are a lot of talented members here. In my spare time, I have recently drawn my first fantasy map and I guess I'm after some kind of feedback, since I really enjoyed this project and would like to make more of these eventually. I come from a background of cartooning rather than cartography, so this was definitely a learning experience for me and ended up taking the better part of three days.

Obviously I am going for a sort of whimsical, Tolkienian look rather than striving for complete geographical accuracy. The place names were made up by me, and I'm pretty much a fantasy novice outside of Tolkien, HBO's Game of Thrones, and a few other things, so hopefully they haven't already been taken by earlier (and presumably better) fantasists hehe. On my part, I think the map gets too busy in places and is rather messy in parts as well. I made the mistake of doing this on a scrap of 9"x5" paper, next time I will definitely work larger. The lettering could certainly be improved as well. I drew it first in pencil and finished with pen and ink. Would love to hear any comments or criticisms from you guys. Hopefully I'm posting the image correctly...

img035.jpg

[TimPaul]

Welcome and nice map. A little rep to start you out.

[arsheesh]

Welcome to the Guild! Great map too btw, it's got loads of character.

Cheers,
-Arsheesh

[- Max -]

Nice map, I like the crowded details feel of it.

[Freodin]

You do have a little problems with splitting rivers... take a look here for some good advice.
There is also a thing with consistency in the icons... most objects you used pictorgrams, some (the forts, for example) have geometrical forms.

But overall: an awesome map! I love the style, the execution and the variety.

I definitly do not think it is too crowded or busy... it is just full of interesting details to discover!

[EerieA]

Thanks very much to all for the warm welcomes and kind comments. Very pleased you guys enjoyed looking at this map. Nice to see there is still appreciation for this sort of unrealistic, hand-drawn style. Thanks especially for the link re: rivers Freodin, I was thinking of adding some little tributaries veining the plains etc, but obviously I did not, I will plan out the next one a little better I think. As far as the pictograms go, originally I was just going to mark cities etc with small dots as in Tolkien's Middle-Earth map (the one found in the 50th anniversary LOTR omnibus was my reference), which kind of gave me a style outline to go off. It looked sort of bland to me with just the markers so I went back and added the pictograms, I guess as a kind of short hand to indicate the various cultures throughout the continent, I tried to do some medieval architecture, Greek, Persian, Viking etc, but mostly I just wanted to give the map a bit more visual spark I suppose.

[Havercakes24]

This map looks amazing. Very finely detailed and everything but looks old school as hell 10/10 would view again. Keep posting more stuff.

[Exadore]

Good stuff! Lots of terrain and places to visit...

[AslanC]

Love the look and feel of this map, it has that "cobbled" together from various people's views of where and how things are! Very evocative.

[Lyandra]

Looks good. I like that you've drawn the city icons in different styles to indicate various cultures. Just as the others I like that there is so much detail in this map - so many interesting places to look for. I'm certainly looking forward to your next one!