Novelist/mapmaker at your service :)

[keithrgordon]

Hello

My name is Keith, and I'm another new cartographer here... it seems like there's been surge the past few days! I discovered this site recently as I was searching for tutorials on fantasy map making as part of the novel I'm in the process of writing. I originally came across Hapimeses' post about creating simple mountains in Photoshop. Although in the end I settled on hand-drawing mountains, finding this site was a great first step in the process!

I made these maps with Photoshop CS4, with some hand-drawn elements. The world map and the regional map both showcase those hand-drawn mountains, which I actually had to photograph since I was living in Europe at the time and had zero scanner access! Although it took more time than just scanning, in the end it worked out quite well. The magic-wand tool saved the day, as usual. I also spent a lot of time tweaking the coastlines to get the shadowing/waves just right (zoom in to see!). In the Eldeholm map I used the VERY simple program Paintbrush (for Mac) to make the buildings, and then I added a lot of shading and brush-strokes in Photoshop.

World Map
Andan (regional) Map
Eldeholm (city) Map

Also check out this map video that a good friend of mine made for me using Adobe AfterEffects! It also features music I created for the project.

These maps were created as part of my novel, The Keys of Illath. I am publishing it chapter-by-chapter online, and if you like these maps I'd love it if you checked out the novel too! Here is a brief write-up of the novel from my website:

The Keys of Illath is a cross-genre journey that draws from the realms of fantasy, science-fiction, action-adventure, unsolved mystery, martial arts, epic romance, spiritual exploration and magical possibilities – all while (hopefully!) transcending the expected forms and attempting to arrive at an entirely new understanding of who we are, and what we’re capable of.

Because these maps are part of a copyrighted novel, I sincerely hope that they offer inspiration but I also ask that they be respected and used fairly under the copyright! I intend to be making some tutorials soon to offer up the tips and tricks that I used.



Cheers, and thanks for making this community so awesome! I look forward to getting to know you guys.

K

illath.wordpress.com