September 2008 Entry: Archean League

[Lord]

you know the hand drawn touches really make this map. The mix of digital and non-digital is a bit off putting, but I know its your style. I think you should give a shot at hand drawn textures and such for the trees etc, you never know what could happen, and you have the skills.

[Gamerprinter]

you know the hand drawn touches really make this map. The mix of digital and non-digital is a bit off putting, but I know its your style. I think you should give a shot at hand drawn textures and such for the trees etc, you never know what could happen, and you have the skills.

Thank you, Lord. Truth tell, I've been creating RPG maps for over 20 years for my own games, and in the beginning they were strictly hand-drawn, not digital in anyway. I'd create mostly as drawing only, no color, rarely I'd add colored pencil to the work.

As an artist, I am lazy. I work hard to create the image of the final map in my mind to viewable format as fast as possible. The key here is "as fast as possible." I don't want to spend the time, perhaps that the art deserves. So, I don't care about the method, I care only for the result. So I work very fast, to get the result I require. I really don't want to spend the time to do it entirely by hand. Digital brings my work to light speed.

I may yet find the project that deserves doing it the old fashioned way, in the future.

Lord, you may have planted a seed...

GP

[Lord]

Thank you, Lord. Truth tell, I've been creating RPG maps for over 20 years for my own games, and in the beginning they were strictly hand-drawn, not digital in anyway. I'd create mostly as drawing only, no color, rarely I'd add colored pencil to the work.

As an artist, I am lazy. I work hard to create the image of the final map in my mind to viewable format as fast as possible. The key here is "as fast as possible." I don't want to spend the time, perhaps that the art deserves. So, I don't care about the method, I care only for the result. So I work very fast, to get the result I require. I really don't want to spend the time to do it entirely by hand. Digital brings my work to light speed.

I may yet find the project that deserves doing it the old fashioned way, in the future.

Lord, you may have planted a seed...

GP

I think the challenge then, is how to achieve speed and the hand drawn method. I know a little front end work creating 'hand drawn' brushes for digital work can really move the pace along. No one really wants to craft every little tree, but I think hand drawn and digital can be more integrated than you have already...

[Gamerprinter]

Well, I do have some hand-drawn trees here, perhaps a bit more detailed than I'd require for this Challenges regional scale. But that's certainly something I could do.

Actually, I have several commercial mapping projects to work on, and I'd hoped to get a more than decent entry this month, and still have loads of time to get working on maps my clients need.

Say in the next month or two, I'll get a more integrated digital/hand-drawn map for something to post somewhere here.

And here's a link to the "hand-drawn trees" I was speaking of...

http://www.cartographersguild.com/showthread.php?t=2001

GP

[Gamerprinter]

I know Del's going to jump on me, for updating my map, when I said I was through. However, the more I read Lord's posts the more I thought the forests in my final map did kind of jar with everything else.

I removed the bevel - in hindsight, I didn't think it truly belonged. I copied the color shape then filled with a hand-drawn texture of foilage, applied transparency. This gives the forests a distinct hand-drawn effect.

The forests on the islands of the previous map, had a serious bevel glitch, that I wanted to get rid of - that's what really started my thinking for this change.

I kept the color, though, because in truth I hate to paint. I need the control of vector - same in hand-drawn, I prefer pens to paint brushes. Besides the color with a plasma filter has a watercolor feel to it - which works fine for me.

What do think? Too subtle? You do have to view map up close to see the pen strokes in the forests.

I hope this is my last update (plus this "bumps" my thread for more looks!)

GP

PS: I just caught a problem with the bottom border, so I fixed it and uploaded again.

### Latest WIP ###

[Badger]

AHA!! I knew it!!

The fix does look better... the forest in the middle near Faraday ... has a blocky look to it and very noticeable compared to the rest of your forests....

[Gamerprinter]

Yeah, I sort of cheated there. I forgot to draw that portion of forest originally, so I drew the outline in Xara, instead. I really ought to just hand draw that tiny piece and upload again, corrected. So I will tomorrow.

Nice eye, Del. Then I'll call it an entry and post no more...

GP

[Badger]

riiiiight... I'm sure that's the final ... final entry

bumping is good tho... I like to bump

[Sagenlicht]

Its a real nice map GP, as allready mentioned before those lables making the map even more interesting. Great idea

[Midgardsormr]

I'm glad you did bump it up. I hadn't taken a good enough look at this one the first time 'round. Fantastic job!