Barovia

Inspired by the Ravenloft game setting, what better choice to follow up a real world Transylvania map created in the same style :)

Between the practice map and this one, I actually caused hardware damage from all the clicking :) This one is done with a number of handdrawn mountains, those turned into brushes to save the new mouse. Trees and town markers are brushes I created for the Transylvania practice map. I played around with the brush settings until I found a convincing watercolour stroke for the colour layers, i think it worked out well (the main things being Opacity set to Fade, and wet edges - when opacity sets to fade, it has a rather nifty effect if you look at the brush stroke itself, not only does it fade out, it fades in a bit first). The large font is Teutonic #4, the smaller is Carmilla. Neither of them did numbers the way I wanted, so those are from Calligraphic421.

This is also the first map that I used Smart objects on as a matter of course (didn't think about it, just did'em) plus layer masking by reflex :)

100% photoshop work. I brought in other tools for a few things, though I ended up discarding the results in favour of a more consistent look.

It's been a long time since I played, so the journey to find an accurate map to work off was was time consuming - there are a lot of re-imaginings out there, some well done, some very cluttered and.. completely wrong as far as I'm concerned. Anyhow, I did research and find as many existing town names as I could (i know there have been books written in this setting that I've not paid attention to) to add in. Anything within the borders is mentioned in either a book or supplement, anything outside the borders is borrowed from Transylvania.

I know at least one person has been waiting for this to use in an actual game setting, let me know how it goes :)

Thanks for the helpful commentary to everyone who commented as this grew from a simple border into a full out map :) (even if i set things to the side for purposes of this map, it will certainly be taken into account for future projects)

Dude that's really good stuff!

It is very much in the style of those olde tyme maps :)

Awesome...and you did it quickly too!
M

Probably just the lowered resolution but it's kinda hard to read. Sort of blends together, you know?

It does look good, though, and I have no doubts that when printed out onto the right paper it will be fantastic.

I keep looking at it trying to see how it's hard to read.. Maybe it's a monitor setting thing, because everything looks very clear from here *shrug*

Great work... but I have come to expect that from you :)

mearrin: btw, thanks for the comments, and I expect updates from you on the use of the map :P

Very nice C-max, I think you have the style 'nailed down'.

I don't really like the style but I love the map because you have executed that style with exceptional consistency and talent. Wonderful work!

Yes, kudos to you, oh howling one, on teh awesome of this map.