[WIP] My First Work in Progress! GIMP

[Sharpe]

Hello!

Thanks for stopping by my first work-in-progress thread.

This is only my second map I've ever made on the computer. I'm not familiar with anything in regards to making maps on a computer, let alone my image editing software, GIMP.

The map is for a role-playing game. Right now, the game uses the map as the game board (just like any other pencil-and-paper RPG), but also has decks of cards. When your character finds one of the several treasure chest located around the maze, you draw a treasure card. The card might have a treasure, or, it might have a trap, in which case you must draw a trap card.

It's not a board game, though. It's a regular RPG played with regular rules (GURPS 4e). There are role-playing encounters and several monsters located around the maze. I just use the cards as a bookkeeping and time-saving method. Don't have to write down what's in every chest! There are also doors that can only be opened by specific magic keys found in the treasure chest (blue key to blue door, etc.).

Ignore the sandy area in the lower right. It will be a tiled white marble floor. I used a sand texture under my grass texture and used a light eraser on the grass texture to spice it up a bit.

There will be more chests and plants as well as statues and fountains and stuff. It's a long way from done. Most everything I have texture-wise is from RPGMapShare.com.

As for the black walls, I'm not 100% sure what I want to do. Perhaps I'll figure out how to make them hedges.

Well, thanks for looking!

-Sharpe

[Sharpe]

Oh, and I forgot to mention that my first ever map can be found here: http://www.cartographersguild.com/sh...pad-in-MSPaint, and that this project started here: http://www.cartographersguild.com/sh...-GIMP-for-Maze.

[Sharpe]

Okay, I think you can see where I'm going with this now.

I didn't notice how extremely hard on the eyes that grid was until I turned it off on accident! Turned that layer's opacity down to like 30.

[tilt]

yeah... I've seen the shadow thread, nice to see it progress.. if you need a marble floor, check out the tiles in my signature

[tilt]

ah... took so long to post that I didn't see map version 2 and have some rep for your first WIP

[Jaxilon]

Woot! It's coming along nicely now. Looks like we have another Gimper in the making. Shadows working and all that.

Applause for another Gurps player too

Without the grid is much easier on the eyes too.

[Sharpe]

Thanks for the encouragement and rep.

Next time I do this, I'm going to make the image two or three times bigger. I just chose 1024x768 for no reason at all. I'd say 3000x3000 would make things much easier.

I've been using a lot of Dundjinni objects and would like my hex grid to print out at "1-inch." For one thing, the treasure chests are huge at this current low resolution.

What canvas/image size would you suggest?

Thanks!

[tilt]

What you can do is this: Calculate from the printers size... so for instance A4 which my printer can handle is 21 x 29,7 cm .. then I subtract a cm for border leaving 19 x 27 cm (rounded down) or about 7 x 10 inches (rounded down again) - now I know the image will fit on my paper. Then I choose my resolution - 150 dpi is enough for a decent print - but as I'm used to working with professional printers, I usually go for 300 dpi.
7 x 10 inches at 300 dpi gives a document size of 2100 x 3000 pixels.

[Sharpe]

Cool. Thanks!

Didn't do much today. I made all of the treasure chests the same as it looked like someone flying overhead dropped their luggage out of the plane's cargo hold. The chests are more like symbols for treasure now.

What I think I'm going to do with the hedge maze part of the labyrinth is select the walls, then grow the selection, then use Select>Distort. This will give me hedge like shapes for the walls when filled with dark green. But, it won't have little leaves. Anyone know how I could turn a hedge-shaped green blob into leaves?

Also, I'm looking for a top-down obelisk. Anyone have a link to one? I might just try to make my own. Not like they are all that complex. A square with a smaller square pyramid on top divided into four parts.

Thanks!

[tilt]

try adding some noise to make leaves.. they are after all small ... or perhaps noise and a very slight motion blur