Unnamed Islands

[FroggEater]

Hi everyone!

Here's my very first map, hand drawn and scanned afterward. As it is now i won't rework directly on it, but redo it entirely, with more application and everything. Consider it as a "layout" for what is coming next

Here's what i noticed that isn't good so far:
- Scaling is way too small for what I wanted to make
- Forests are ugly
- There isn't any river, but two lakes
- The perspective is a bit flawed at some places
- The old paper effect is quite ugly
- The vortex is also strange

Feel free to comment and tell me what is wrong with it, this way the rework will be even better!

[torstan]

First off - if this had been my first map, I'd be a happy guy. So good job.

A couple of things:
That background is as bad as you say it is. This looks a lot like a Gimp clouds filter? I'd recommend just getting an actual old paper background, and using that instead. www.cgtextures.com has a bunch under Paper > Paper Old (or plain, or a few others). Just drop that in behind and it'll look a lot better.

Its not so much perspective that's off (the map is more a 3/4 view, so there's no real perspective at play). Instead, you have an inconsistent direction for up. This is super simple to fix going forward. Note that your whirlpool on the left is tilted from the horizontal? And it's tilted to the right. Now look at the jagged spikes in the land to the north - those are tilted left. That causes a clash (and slight sea-sickness) to the map. If you focus on keeping a consistent direction for up, this goes away. It's tricky with 3/4 view maps, but you'll pick it up quickly. It's a small fix.

Overall for these views there's a good trick to try - draw the map top down first. Just the coast lines, and ripples of water. Add other outlines (forest outlines, a river or two). Then get that into Gimp or photoshop, and scale vertically by 58%. You'll see what the map would actually look like in a 3/4 view. This will help give you a feel when you're trying to freehand the same view from scratch.

And forests? This one takes time. There are lots of styles to try. Here's my approach: http://www.fantasticmaps.com/2012/04...-draw-forests/
I find that not having a hard outline for forests on maps like this goes a long way to solving the problem you're seeing. But there's a ton of reference for forests. If nothing else, get a few aerial photos of forests and use them as reference when sketching.
http://www.citypictures.net/data/med...t_Colorado.jpg
http://ak8.picdn.net/shutterstock/vi...time-lapse.jpg
http://www.fs.fed.us/psw/ef/stanisla...st_shorter.jpg
http://www.traveltrack.in/Dimages/113.gif
https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikiped...eroad_edit.jpg

[Ilanthar]

Yep, it's really good for a first one! I would just add that I think your mountains would really get better with some shading work. But you may have planned it already. For the rest, Torstan has already given its excellent expertise.

[FroggEater]

Thanks for your replies!

To start with, yup, it's a cloud filter :/ I'll use a texture next time. The tip about forest edges seems to be a good solution to my problem, I'll make some experiments. Also, I'll use thinner outlines to make something a bit cleaner

Shading is planned for the final version, I'm still not sure about colouring (if this word exists, I'm not english and it looks like a langage-trap...).

[torstan]

Yep, colouring is definitely a word. Looking forward to seeing the next version.

[FroggEater]

Here's a quick update. I'll maybe add icons/legend this time, but later. I'm happy with it so far because it looks a lot bigger, and my forests aren't as ugly as before (thx).

[FroggEater]

I finished the first island, I just have to place rivers.

It still needs some hills and maybe another forest tho.

[Eld]

Now it looks quite good I think. The view-problems seem to be solved.
I'm especially a fan of your cliff-coasts, I never got that far but maybe I'll try it on one of my next maps. Looking at the way that you draw the mountains I'd suggest that you should implement shadows later on, that would add much to this style.
I'm curious how the forests will come out later on. Keep up the work and maybe you could scan the image later on, the quality of the photo is a bit low.

[FroggEater]

I'll scan it and try shading, the resolution is quite low here because I took the photo with my phone

[FroggEater]

Shameless self-bump with my progress so far. The line is mostly finished (I'll see if I add something) and I'll scan it soon to work on shading and colours.