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Thread: Schematic town mapping using Keynote...

  1. #1

    Default Schematic town mapping using Keynote...

    I've been using the simple drawing tools in Apple's Keynote, along with some fantasy icons, fonts, and clip art to generate simple, schematic maps for a campaign I'm working on.

    The buildings in this one started as a Victorian house from Open Clip Art (http://www.openclipart.org/detail/49117) that was modified in Photoshop to create 4 or 5 different sizes and styles. Pieces of the map can be easily shuffled around as individual elements in Keynote... much simpler than using a drawing program.

    Thoughts?

    Click image for larger version. 

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  2. #2
    Community Leader Facebook Connected Ascension's Avatar
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    Reminds me a bit of early American maps of towns...just a lil bit. Interesting and simple = nice.
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  4. #4

    Default Keynote...

    Keynote is the presentation program that is part of Apple's iWork suite - think PowerPoint but with more Appleyness.

    Basically, my point was - to think about using a presentation program as a workspace for mapping instead of a drawing program. Keynote has the advantage in this regard over Photoshop, becuase it has things like built-in Alpha channel and transparency, which I don't think PowerPoint is capable of yet.

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    Community Leader mearrin69's Avatar
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    Pretty cool. NB I think PowerPoint does handle transparency; at least for on-screen display though I've had trouble in all Office apps when printing to PDFs. I've never tried using PP for mapping, though I have imported a pre-created map and dropped built-in symbols on top of it to use it as a gaming prop (part of a mission briefing for a sci-fi game I'm going to be running.) It's great to see the range of tools you can use for mapping.
    M

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    Publisher Facebook Connected bartmoss's Avatar
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    I like it - one minor issue: Church Street doesn't seem to be near a church; I guess it could be a name that was given to the street from the past but the style looks very "founding father era" so this town probably doesn't have a lot of history yet.

  7. #7

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    Actually, the building w/ the star on top *IS* a church!

  8. #8

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    I love those labels on little pieces of parchment, and the color scheme/inked/hand-drawn look is great. Those roads are really nice too - great wet-ink/dry-brush effect. Any history regarding the town and inhabitants? It'd be interesting to hear; and would they use this map for navigation, or is more of a representation of the town and a rough idea of locations?

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