Fantasy map. Problem regarding rivers...

[rapatuan]

Hello,

I'm workin on a fantasy map using techniques learnt mainly from Pasis and Ascension's tutorials, and although I'm fairly happy with how it's coming together, I have one important concern: river rules violation.

This is a commision, and the client brought a map with some inconsistencies, mainly relating to rivers: Rivers that finish in a lake rather than on the sea, rivers that flow uphill, rivers that divide rather than join, rivers that end nowhere... the usual as you see. I spoke with the client and we both agreed to make some changes to avoid those flaws, but he insists on keeping with rivers that doesn't end on the sea and justifying it by saying that they go underground... I can live with that, and to stay on common ground, I was thinking of drawing some features on land to show the underground course of the river.

There's no much more I can do about it, but wanted to share my frustation just to alleviate its weight.

As for the map itself, the base map was done by the client using Autorealm, then I added some textures in PS, an underwater texture was made inspired by Ascension atlas style tutorial and mountains and forests were done a-la-pasis. I made my own forest texture, because I found pasis' one to be lacking on resolution but used his mountain texture together with some others downloaded from CGtextures. I then applied shadows, just like I were shading a miniature with ink, using a soft brush at 50% opacity.

Mapa Kellon WIP_8.jpg

[Sular]

Regarding rivers that either vanish or finish in lakes; both do indeed occur here on earth. A fairly large number of rivers empty into places like Lake Balkhash, the Caspian Sea, and others and there the water remains. These drainage areas are called endorheic basins. A lot of Central Asia is like this apparently, as are parts of Africa, Australia, and the Americas. And concerning rivers just ending in the middle of nowhere, there's always the example of the Okavango Delta which ends in an inland delta in the Kalahari desert rather than draining into a lake or a the ocean.

[rapatuan]

Thanks a lot for the answer and for the links! I'll try to draw some features to make clear it's an endorheic basin, like a salt texture of some kind around the lake.

[atpollard]

Here in Florida, lots of small rivers and streams end in a sinkhole that drains to the aquifer.

[tilt]

as the other have already commented on the river-ending-in-lake "problem" I'll jump to the graphics ... very nice looking map - one thing I would change is to vary the width of the rivers. They mostly start of thin and go wider as they near the sea and of course when they connect with other rivers. So I'd taper those rivers a little ... imho the ocean floor is a bit dominating it is like there is no water - I'd tone that down a little ... looking good though - keep up the good work

[rapatuan]

Thanks for the answers about my concerns regarding rivers, they really ease my mind.

And thank you very much for the comment on the map. It is a capture of the whole map and you are absolutely right about the rivers, I just sketched them to rest a little from making mountains. I still have to work on them and on the lakes also. I need to adapt them to the mountains shape, paint shadows to add depth, vary their width and add some features like river banks, falls, small islands and some affluents (if like in spanish that's the english word for small rivers joining the main one).

Regarding the coastline, although I was very happy with how it came and really enjoyed the method used to draw it, I think it's, as you say, too dominant right now, even after having blurred it to some degree... Maybe I have to obscure it a little or blur it even more. However, you have to take into consideration that this is a capture of the whole map.

Here you can see a capture of 'the inner sea' to better see the effect of the coastline:

Mapa Kellon WIP_11.jpg

[Hai-Etlik]

affluents (if like in spanish that's the english word for small rivers joining the main one).

"Affluent" is valid usage in English, but "tributary" is much more common, at least among non-hydrologists.

[tilt]

to me it looked like you removed the water - I think I'd add another layer with semi-transparency so you look through that and see the bottom of the sea

[afters]

The word "affluent" in English is usually an adjective describing a rich person or someone in high society

[rapatuan]

I thought that would be 'influent'... (You may be joking of course, and I'm just false-starting...)

tilt: good idea, I'll give it a try. Thanks.