The land of Andoria & Realm of Telrith - [unpaid] commission (WIP)

[arsheesh]

Of all the styles shown, I think I like that of Telrith the best, followed by your second version of Forests and mountains. Telrith wins out for me both because of the nice subtle contrast between light & dark, and because all of the features of the map seem to be well integrated. Your second version of mountains and trees looks nice, but it seems a bit more busy. Perhaps if you had a bit less forest texture (aka canopy tops) it might be a bit less distracting. Overall though, I'd say this looks rather promising. Looking forward to seeing updates.

Cheers,
-Arsheesh

[grangarian]

I'm a very big fan of the hand-drawn style maps and i always try to find something to improve it. There are many forms of the mountains, trees, roads, etc; and it's always nice to see something unique. Telrith map wins. I'm looking forward to see more of it.
And i also have a question for you, how do you plant the trees? Click-drag until it looks nice or maybe you use some secret technique?

[rpgmapmaker]

... how do you plant the trees? Click-drag until it looks nice or maybe you use some secret technique?

Well, it's all starts with the little seed... add some love and tender care... They say that adding fish to the seeds can help (I am not a big fan of fish). Then you wait for about 300 years.........

After I draw the outline of the tree and shade it. I add a layer under the tree and color the whole thing white (and merge the two layers). This makes the tree icon have no "holes" in it for other trees to show through from under it. Then I start at the top of the forest and work down in rows (this keeps the trees lower in the forest on top). The layer order is important and I "alt-click & drag" to copy and move all-in-one step.

In Photoshop I use the layer folders to keep the trees all in one place and then once I have it looking the way I want it to... I merge the folder so that I don't have a file with thousands of layers

I guess in a way I am making my own little "Campaign Cartographer Icons" in Photoshop. I draw and keep all of the elements in a separate file then drag them into the main map as needed. I hope that helps.

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Both of you told me that the "finished map of Teltith wins", but this is not a contest... that map has already "lost" in the sense as it does not meet the intent of customer. Don't get me wrong he likes the map, but there are too many complicated textures in gray scale for someone in fantasy world to have actually drawn.

... nice subtle contrast between light & dark, and because all of the features of the map seem to be well integrated...

Thanks, this was supposed to be a more final version of this map.

...it seems a bit more busy. Perhaps if you had a bit less forest texture (aka canopy tops) it might be a bit less distracting. Overall though, I'd say this looks rather promising.

You are right about the extra details being distracting. I guess, that I just needed a second opinion. I will try using a simpler more consistent texture on top of the trees and see if that helps. Some of the detail lines on the mountains also just don't look right to me... I think I will try some sort of "line shading"

Thanks for the feedback, it really means a lot to me.