Looking for an artist to work with me in creating a fantasy D&D world

[BandanaJesus]

First of all I am only requesting 1 map at the moment which will equate to 1 continent on the world, in total i am looking at commissioning around 5 - 6 maps over time. The last of which will be a full world map.
The style of map i am looking for is similar to this
Professional/ semi professional, i not that bothered as long as you have a portfolio or other maps that I can judge your abilities from.
The map will be atleast A3 size, either format(i have been enlightened that only vector is possibly not what i want)
The only time constraint is it must be done before the end of this year
Copyright - I will be using it for DND, mostly private home games perhaps the prospect of streaming in the future. I would like reproduction rights to the map

Please Email me At 512CommissionForNathan--at--gmail.com to discuss further and the rates i am willing to pay

[Wired]

Not sure if there are any cartographers here who can do that kind of map in vector format. Why vector format, by the way?

[BandanaJesus]

Not sure if there are any cartographers here who can do that kind of map in vector format. Why vector format, by the way?

Correct me if i'm wrong but i believe vector images keep their quality if zoomed

[Tiana]

The style of map i am looking for is similar to this
...
The map will be in a A3 size, Vector format

That map you linked is not a vector. I almost guarantee that is a Photoshop map done with stamps.

THIS is a vector map (minus the texture)


The colors are flat and made of shapes instead of drawn. You are limited to gradients or flat color shading without breaking the vector. Textures are almost impossible to recreate and maintain a vector throughout. Yes, such a map can be infinitely resized. If you think you'll want a map larger than A3 in print, you'd be best to commission an A2 or A1 map from the getgo, however, the font may need to be rescaled or have many labels removed for a smaller print or screen viewing experience.

That said, yes, we have vector artists, they're just not trendy, beloved and popular. Paging Eowyn Skywalker! Though I know they're not so much for the fantasy maps, most of our vector darlings like to do sci fi and modern work. You can hold out for a vector hero if you like, but for myself, I am a non-vector artist in most cases (that map above is an exception obviously). I can do like the map you linked, certainly, but I cannot do it in vector.

[Redrobes]

An approach you might want to think about is just comissioning a fairly rough map of the world to start with and then doing the detailed countries based on the outlines from the rough world map. Then only at the end, complete the detailed world map. I say this because you could put a lot of effort into an original detailed world map and then do the detailed continents which then have some differences from the world map. But once you have all of the continents you can use those maps to create the final world map and when you zoom in from world to continent it would be seamless.

Another thing you might want to think about is the scale. If your world is earth sized then to get down to RPG scale it may take more than one level down. It might be best to have a rough world, a rough continent and then a somewhat more detailed country sized map. Its surprising how much zoom you need to apply to get down to the level where you can plan RPG adventures with.

As a newcommer to this site I would urge you to look at our community world mapping where we have a rough world map usually outlined by our member J.Edward who then breaks its up into about 60 portions and we each draw one of the portions and we put it all back together again. We know that the styles across all 60 bits are dissimilar but thats part of the fun. With a single artist you could maintain the consistent style. But building the final map from the detailed bits is quite easy.

We then use Leaflet to make a zoomable world from it. See any of these:
https://www.cartographersguild.com/l...php?type=cwbp1
https://www.cartographersguild.com/l...hp?type=ansium
https://www.cartographersguild.com/l...ype=guildworld
etc

Its also a misconception that vector does not lose detail. It is defined by numbers of points to make up the lines and shapes which dont increase in detail as you zoom in. Whilst you can render the lines and shapes to maximum resolution the shape itself is getting rougher as you go in as the defining points are spreading out. Although a raster map has a fixed resolution if it is made large enough it can be zoomed in up to a limit. So it depends on how high the resolutions of the original is. The best option is a vector controller raster map but not many people do them here.

[greendino]

I have sent you an email, but like others have said It will take more than just an A3 to get that scale of detail! I agree with Redrobes, where your best bet would be to get various regions done in high detail then link them together.

[damonjynx]

I agree with the other posters; by all means have an overview map of your world, something not too detailed that can be easily modified and then build from the largest scale up;e.g. base world map (small scale)> encounter maps (largest scale)>local maps>region/country maps>final world map.

For a example have a look at my thread here. Once I'm done with some other stuff, I'll be doing the local (town/city) map and the initial encounter maps for where the players will start the campaign.

[BandanaJesus]

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