My first map try

[jbgibson]

The main font is okay - it's a bit hard to read, but if it's your peoples' typical script, I'm sure the locals read it just fine :-). One way to get the variety you need to distinguish easily between feature types is to vary size, weight, color, and style, all within the same font family. If that's only available in the one variant, you will have to be creative, but with most graphics tools you should be able to gen a reasonable outline version, as you might want for the city state label. You could gen an initial cap variant just by upping the font size on first characters. Area labels are well done by spreading a typical font for the map out w i t h w i d e r s p a c i n g. If you can master text-on-curve you'll improve your look; I've used free tools like Inkscape JUST for that one capability and imported the resulting labels back into my prefered main app.

I understand where you're headed with the embossed ownership mark - my city library does the same thing. A different font there is fine, since one would hardly to expect the Bureau Of Bureaucratic Engraving to match the Cartographer's Department standards.

If the sea-filling texture is supposed to just be parchment, I'm puzzled why it is almost invisible across land.

The rivers are nicely tapered, the forests are pleasantly scattered, the mountains show as much variety as you could expect from ones not hand-drawn. Postulate a map department that uses literal stamps for such symbols, and you're golden :-). THe land outlines are OK, and river placement works. I like the overall effect a lot. I do have to agree the tilty text is askew from a design sense too.

[ukie]

Postulate a map department that uses literal stamps for such symbols, and you're golden :-)

Sorry sometime my English understanding is... how should I put it... thickheaded what do you mean by that?

I also wanted to ask you: Do you make makes in PS or GIMP and then hand draw the mountains or do you draw them with tools available in those programs?
I'm really interested in doing my own original art for my maps but just don't understand the process of combining generated maps with hand drawing. Help!

BTW awesome maps, man!

[jbgibson]

Sorry sometime my English understanding is... how should I put it... thickheaded what do you mean by that?

Like the rubber stamps used for printing with ink. Or the stone seals used to print signatures in old China. Or the carved potatoes used to print in art class. :-) Moveable type, only with cartographic symbology instead of text. Who's to say that the mappers of another society than ours might just value uniformity of neatly stamped mountain-symbols over our valuation of cleverly uniquely hand-drawn mountains?

[Freehand 5.5]

ukie, you could do a separate layer for the rivers. If you have that, you can soften the edges, redo color or reposition parts anytime as you please.
Do you know how to do that?

[ukie]

ukie, you could do a separate layer for the rivers. If you have that, you can soften the edges, redo color or reposition parts anytime as you please.
Do you know how to do that?

Funny you mentioned it. I just started having problems with it. I did some free transformation and now when I Ctrl left click on the layer of landmass and do Select>Modify>Smooth This is what happens:



To make things even worse now all the brushes are acting weird (painting beyond the selected boarder and in general creating havoc. Spend 3 hours trying to figure out what's going on and... nada. Any ideas?

[ukie]

Like the rubber stamps used for printing with ink. Or the stone seals used to print signatures in old China. Or the carved potatoes used to print in art class. :-) Moveable type, only with cartographic symbology instead of text. Who's to say that the mappers of another society than ours might just value uniformity of neatly stamped mountain-symbols over our valuation of cleverly uniquely hand-drawn mountains?

Gotchya thanks for the tip!