Arudien & The Stormlands

[Tilby]

After my short introduction in the new members section, I wanted to show you the first two maps I made for my D&D campaign.

Both maps were initially drawn on a piece of paper, before being scanned and then worked on digitally using GIMP.

The continental map only includes major features. The purpose of the map was not to provide a detailed representation of the terrain, but rather give an idea of the political situation of Arudien. To that end I didn't really colour the map, as I did not want to establish the climate for the different regions from the get go.
Overall, I am quite happy with how the map turned out. The labelling could be prettier though.

Arudien.jpg

The Stormlands is the region where takes place, and provides a more detailed topographical representation without showing every single hill, tree or village. However, I wanted to give the players a few points of interest, which they might want to visit. The clouds on the edge are there to cover up the adjacent regions which I haven't designed yet. Overall, I am very happy with the result, I especially like my floating forest. However, there are also two things that still bother me: perspective and labelling. The mountains are drawn from a slightly tilted perspective, while the rest seems to be a top-down view. I think that makes the map look a little weird. And again, I am not too happy about the labelling, as it does not always follow the feature perfectly (especially rivers), but I find GIMP to be extremely clunky in that regard.

Stormlands_web.jpg

[Mouse]

I think they're really pretty - lovely colours

Nice to see you've got text to path feature sorted out. I have a lot of difficulties with this myself. Its not the easiest thing to do! LOL!

[XCali]

A tip or two that I can brainstorm about. I think the perspective weirdness lie in that your Islands look way more top down than the main land and that gives that distinc weirdness.(I think the mountains on the islands is also less tilded and so it feeds that effect.) Also try darker shading on your forest the closer to you it gets.

This might give some insight into how stuff needs to be angled to have the overall same look.

MoreISOvsTopdown.jpeg
Okay, both those are quickly drawn lines, yet the one looks more tilted, why? It is in that answer that you can make your forests more in line with the mountains.

Hope that helps a bit.

[Tilby]

Thanks for the tip Xcali,

I'll have to give shading the forests closer to me a go on one of my next maps. Never thought about doing it that way, but it does provide a more tilted feel.

Thanks Mouse, I'm glad you like them. I wouldn't say that I have the text to path feature sorted out, as some still do look off. But I was nearly going mad trying them to curve the way they do now

[XCali]

Thanks for the tip Xcali,

I'll have to give shading the forests closer to me a go on one of my next maps. Never thought about doing it that way, but it does provide a more tilted feel.

Pleasure, Tilby.

Goodluck with the next project.
P.S. If you tilt that skew compass even more, it becomes more and more ISO. Then it is just about getting the shading right to sell the idea. Like for instance, while I was working on my cliffs it became apparant that a highlight promotes something that protrudes out or up, and shading enhances the intensity of it.