A new Project: Sembiarch

Hello fellow Mappers!

I've been working on my own big Project, Tolon, for a while now. The project was rather large and I have up till today invested around 120 hours of work into it.

And then, something bad happened. Just yesterday, when a friend asked me to "initiate" him into the mapping (ergo he wanted to know about it) I found out: My *.PSD file was lost. Nowhere to be found.

120+ hours of work lost. Completely.

What remains are a few JPEG files of my 40 megapixel monster I so dearly called "Tolon, my greatest Project!".

Honestly, I nearly cried - over loosing it and over being so much of an idiot that I did not backup the psd file anywhere.


le sigh.


But, who would I be, if I would stop now?


Heavy of heart I began working on something new today and after about one hour of work, I can proudly present the beginning of my new Project, which will - sadly - replace Tolon.

My new Project bears the name of Sembiarch.

What Sembiarch is? No clue. Maybe it's the name of the continent, the planet, a large swatch of land or just a small region. It will define itself whilst I work.

But without further ado, I present to you my first WIP after one hour of work:



http://i295.photobucket.com/albums/m...embiarch01.jpg



Note: The mountains are not finished yet, as are the grass layers. The grass layers will get a gaussian blur filter in the end to smoothen the colors and the mountains will get some in-depth coloration.




Opinions?
Tips?
Ideas?
Suggestions?

I'd like to know how the mountains, and the rest of the map really, are going to be done...what sort of style? The trees look like a hand-drawn style but the forests (I think that's what they are) don't match. So give us a bit more and it should be much easier to help ya out if need be. On the positive side you have good rivers...countless people get em backwards, so kudos :)

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Ascension

I'd like to know how the mountains, and the rest of the map really, are going to be done...what sort of style?

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Well currently the rest of the map is a green layer of nothingness ;)

The style is a bit experimental. The woods I used on this mape are done in Photoshop, the mountains are drawn and colored because I have no idea how to do them otherwise and still give them a look I like.

Basically I want the map to look like a cross between realistic and still fantasy. I especially want to do everything in Photoshop / Corel Draw / Inkscape if possible.

Anyone got links to some good and (hopefully not too hard) tutorials? :D

Quote:

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On the positive side you have good rivers...countless people get em backwards, so kudos :)

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I make errors. But each only once ;)

I watch out everytime I create rivers7seas that they never just split. Rivers grow downhill and on their way to the sea and I want to have that one right.

Really sorry to hear about the lost file. It's the most soul destroying thing when that happens. Good luck with the new project!

There are plenty of good tutorials here for numerous styles (including hand drawn).

Our tutorial subforum here has a bunch of great stuff, some hard, some easy, some long, some short. I would suggest looking through those and seeing what catches your eye and then follow along with the tut. The ones with the stars are generally seen to be the most helpful or best in some certain way. The authors of said tuts have their own style which they share with us but in the end we all make our own tweaks and mods to move our own style along. Pyrandon's city tut, Delgondahntelius' hand drawn tut, and RobA's regional tut are some of the best period. And if you like the satellite style then may I humbly suggest my continent tut :)