Howdy!

[Sendrith]

Hi there,

I've seen the Cartographer's Guild sites a few times when I've been looking for mapping resources and have decided to join the community.

I've been doing pencil & paper maps for years (probably closely tied to my on-and-off fantasy novel addiction) and want to move to digital methods. I have done some limited digital mapping before, including the bones of a large world-map project but I've never been happy with the results.

I'm aiming at a classic fantasy (Tolkien-esque) map style so if anyone has good tutorials or resources I'd love all links!


I'm going through the free software options and I am messing around with GIMP, Krita and Inkscape currently to figure out what I like and what I want to finish the project in. GIMP is PS-like enough be familiar once you set it up, Krita has a neat right-click palette menu (but sacrifices other right click options for it) and I've only opened Inkscape once so I have some investigating to do there. I have a Huion pen tablet and want to get comfortable with it and with one good piece of software before I really get into it.

If anyone feels strongly about one or more of those, or has other suggestions, I'm all ears. I don't want to pay for PS-- I don't have enough time for this as it is and I'm by no means a power user. CC3 looks interesting but maybe a little dated?


I'll be checking out what's going on in the Guild!

Cheers

[ChickPea]

Hi Sendrith and welcome to the Guild.

Gimp or Krita should easily do what you want. Inkscape is vector so great for labelling, but not really for drawing. My suggestion would be to start off with Gimp. I hear great things about Krita, but since you're only getting started, there are more resources and help for Gimp here at the Guild right now, since Krita's still a moderately new program. For example, there are a ton of Gimp tutorials to make a map from scratch, but I don't believe there are any for Krita (though much of the functionality is probably similar and could be adapted).

Head for the tutorials area of the forum and have a look at this Quick Start guide, and have a browse through the downloadable PDF tutorials too. This tutorial is very popular and produces nice results. Another easy cheat to get the Tolkien look is to use Star Raven's brushes. That'll allow you to generate mountains and forests with little effort.

Hope that'll get you going but don't be afraid to ask a question if you're stuck.

[Sendrith]

Chickpea,

That tutorials thread is phenomenal and will keep me busy for a long time, thank you very much for that link!


I think I have some reading to do.

Cheers