My First Fantasy Map Grasaidin

[eldritchdawn]

Hi everyone!

I started working on a fantasy map called Grasaidin. Yes, it have a bit strange name. So, I created 4 land part. North and South glacier lands; left side green land and right side desert land. I'm not decide names for these 4 lands. As I talked in my "introduce thread", I finished two stories called Nobles of Torhurm and Cave Kingdom. They are written with Turkish language, and I have one more project called Legend of Luadun'Dal. It's fantasy novel. I'm creating Luadun'Dal world myself; characters, their biographies, world, items, magics, weapons, armors and etc. So, for this reason, I decieded to learn cartography for fantasy realms.

First of all, of course, I have to learn cartography. Then I want to create myself Luadun'Dal map.

It's not Luadun'Dal map, just working on it.



What I used for this map until this time?

Sketchy Cartography Brushes by StarRaven
Aged Paper Pack #1 by Blaidd--Drwg
Land Brushes by Bonvanello
...more coming.

Well, what you think?

[Tomalak]

First, welcome! We're so glad to have you sharing your work with us! I look forward to seeing what you develop as you learn your way around, and you've clearly already got a good start.

That said, I'm going to jump straight to my observations & advice - but understand that my opinions may not be based on the same values, to take what you like and ignore the rest!

1) Your map here has hard edges - so some of the world isn't shown. That's okay, but it's notable. You have northern and southern continents, but east/west extend off-map.

2) You have a lot of closely-placed continents, with a very small amount of water. Earth is 80% water, so if your world is Earth-Like, you might want to space out those landmasses a bit.

3) If the world you are drawing here has climates & weather like Earth (which it doesn't have to - fantasy worlds can break the rules) then your climates are a bit off. Each climate is created by the sort of weather that occurs there, like how wind passing inland over a coastline brings rain. So, if your map has a west-to-east wind blowing onto the eastern continent, there would be a wet & fertile coast. Deserts are created when high elevation blocks the wet wind, in what is called a Rainshadow Effect. There are some tutorials around that explain climate patterns, and many of us here can give you more details.

That said, you should decide for yourself if you want broad-stroke 'fantastic' terrain like you have above, or if you want to have the climate determined by terrain like it is on Earth.

Either way, thanks for posting, and keep at it!

[eldritchdawn]

First, welcome! We're so glad to have you sharing your work with us! I look forward to seeing what you develop as you learn your way around, and you've clearly already got a good start.

That said, I'm going to jump straight to my observations & advice - but understand that my opinions may not be based on the same values, to take what you like and ignore the rest!

1) Your map here has hard edges - so some of the world isn't shown. That's okay, but it's notable. You have northern and southern continents, but east/west extend off-map.

2) You have a lot of closely-placed continents, with a very small amount of water. Earth is 80% water, so if your world is Earth-Like, you might want to space out those landmasses a bit.

3) If the world you are drawing here has climates & weather like Earth (which it doesn't have to - fantasy worlds can break the rules) then your climates are a bit off. Each climate is created by the sort of weather that occurs there, like how wind passing inland over a coastline brings rain. So, if your map has a west-to-east wind blowing onto the eastern continent, there would be a wet & fertile coast. Deserts are created when high elevation blocks the wet wind, in what is called a Rainshadow Effect. There are some tutorials around that explain climate patterns, and many of us here can give you more details.

That said, you should decide for yourself if you want broad-stroke 'fantastic' terrain like you have above, or if you want to have the climate determined by terrain like it is on Earth.

Either way, thanks for posting, and keep at it!

Hi,

Thanks for your precious advices. I'll consider all of them. You're right that 3 points. I'm beginner, but in time I'll learn more feature about it. I would like to add climate effects to my map. I'm checking tutorials everytime, and my Photoshop talents not very good, for now of course. I'm trying to learn new things about Photoshop, and creating fantasy maps.

Thank you again for your advices.

Bests,

[eldritchdawn]

I think, I did not get out of in the first map. I tried to make good things on first map, bu I can't. So for this reason I created a new one. Sorry for the double message by the way.