Aventurien (Probably the map I'm most proud of yet =))

[SteffenBrand]

It's been a while... =)

I am so proud I’m finally able to show this since it was featured during RPC 2015 in Cologne! It was A LOT of work, but it was worth it. Together with the map of Markus Holzum (check him out) this is a depiction of the continent Aventurien. While he had a more realistic approach I aimed for a more ingame-looking one. Let me explain:

The map was fictitiously ‚made‘ by a sophisticated cartographer who tried to capture the real shape of the continent he is living on. He did this by collecting all maps he could find and arranging them, re-measuring them and completing it. This means:

- The map is a little bit changed based on the ideology of his faith, how it should look like and what makes sense to him. This is especially visible if you look at the shape of specific areas or the arrangement of mountains.
- Not all parts are completely correct in terms of having the correct north. This means single areas of a tiny map he used as a reference could have been not completely pointing north.
- Since the people on this continent are measuring from a fictive point in the south, the whole continent tends to be broader overall in the north due to measuring reasons of a sphere.
- The referenced maps he used hadn’t all the same measurement. This means, the measurements he corrected tend to be a little bit wrong. Since it is not easy to measure exactly everywhere, the coasts difficult to ship tend to be bigger (since the poeple sailing there took longer). Vice versa, good roads tend to shorten the area travelled since it is went faster. In relation to each other this means that some areas are not the correct size.
- Cultures which are heavy into nautical business tend to have more precise coastlines.
- The origins of the cultures the painter knew of are indicated on the map, too. He used assumptions to paint that in.
- The painter used icons he found on the original maps he used. This means he found specific types of ships on individual maps and used this in his version, too. Leading to things like a hand on the discus near ‚Maraskan‘ (sign of the dual faith), the ‚Uthurische Rose‘ in the south, ‚Eissegler‘ in the north, etc. You can find A LOT of that stuff in there ;)
- Finally, he drew the border. In this he included every culture he knew of roughly on the height of the culture on the continent if you would draw an invisible line to the middle of the map. Honeycones of the ‚Norbarden‘ in the northeast, Shadif-horses in the southeast, the ‚Praiosmal‘ (sun) in the south, the printing press in the west near the ‚Horasreich‘, the northern lights on the nortwest, elvish archery equipment, the swan of Ifirn, the Madamal (moon) with the most important cycles, etc. There is so much more, try to find out ;)

Feel free to ask questions. This is the map I’m most proud of yet and I hope to get the chance to do something like this again. Even though it was hard work I really had fun with this. Also, it would be a shame not to share my thoughts on the map here, too =)

Soon I'll show another kind of made like this. Sadly I'm not allowed to show this larger, but the original file is about poster size.

Feel free to rate or rep if you see fit =)
This is also on my Deviantart-Account.



Made with Wacom Intuos 4, Photoshop 6, a lot of research and coffee.
Stay creative everyone! (c) Ulisses Spiele & Distribution GmbH, 2015


Edit (July 13th 2016): And here is a Making-Of... =)
Use this link: Here you go!