I took things in a bit of a new direction today as I added in a frame and side-panel. I decided to go for a tablet-style presentation, something Captain Jean-Luc Picard might look at while he's sipping his "Tea, Earl Grey." The Activation button is a variation on my personal logo.
I added in some button-style city logos and eliminated most of the big continental labels. I kept the western continental label, but changed it to "Western Hives". The idea with this continent is that it's got big populations broken up into small city-states who engage in petty conflicts while currying favor with the superpowers. This is analogous to some parts of Europe and the Middle East during the Cold War. I tried tweaking the settlement logos for the client states of each superpower that are on the western continent, and I'm concerned that they may be hard to tell apart. I'm having trouble seeing the difference at 100% zoom, but I'm red-green color impaired, so it's a bit tricky playing with that kind of subtlety to begin with. Regardless, I don't think I'm really conveying the full extent of what I had in mind for the western continent, and I'm out of ideas on how to play it up without detracting from the strategic super-weapons picture, which is the main effort for this map.
Any ideas on refining this map and its presentation further?
### Latest WIP ###
This is awesome I get the idea of a cold war very well. Something that I'm not getting on others in this challenge. I take it the Western Hive is not under either ones control, with both having alliances there. I think the framed sign panel works well here. Not crazy about the overall colors. Nice Job, you'd get me vote if it ended today!
Green and red... you don't like Christmas?!As I said, I'm a bit color-impaired, so sometimes colors that seem fine to me need adjustment. Is it the choice of colors, or something about the saturation/brightness of them that bothers you? I'd appreciate any help/insight in this matter. I thought of going for Red vs Blue, but given the fact that it's an ice planet, I tried to keep my use of blues to a minimum in marking the map, and use an obviously-artificial green instead.
You got the idea of what I was going for with the western hives. I just renamed it "Western Fiefdoms," in my ongoing draft, which I think conveys the idea a bit better.
Here is my latest revision.
### Latest WIP ###
I re-did most of the city icons. The Genomian and Vulkanian cities now have unique shapes. Their client states have icons with colored central stones to denote their affiliations. I re-balanced the colors in the left panel and the continental icons to tone down their color saturation. I also changed the tablet's background color from black to a very dark grey to show its shadow effects along the bottom and right.
As always, I welcome suggestions and thoughts/critiques. The only other feature I've thought about adding in is some settlement ruin icons in the western continent, but I think that would overly clutter a region of the map that's already pretty crowded.
Good call on the different city shapes (although I don't like the Genomians quite as well as the Vulkanians) - makes it easier to see who's got what.
This might be my favorite of all the entries. It fulfills the letter AND spirit of the Challenge.
For the curious, here's the original image I used to make this map:
It's Stephen's Quintet, as photographed by Hubble.
Also, here's the video tutorial I made for how to create this type of map. I meant to put this into last month's challenge, but my old laptop died as I was editing it.
Last edited by Coriolis; 09-27-2015 at 09:46 PM.
Thank you! I'm inclined to agree about the Genomian icons; my issue is that they don't stand out as much as I thought they would. I'll try playing with the brightness/contrast and maybe doing a bit of highlighting.Originally Posted by Diamond
Incidentally, is it possible to re-name my entry? I'd prefer something like "A Cold, Cold War" or "A Literally Cold War"
The original title seems a bit too hokey to me now.
Let me know what you want it changed to and I'll take care of it.
"A Cold, Cold War" would be my preference. Thank you!
