I am also new!

[Gowienczyk]

Hello, there or something! I IS NEW GUIZ. I'm Mike, I've been doing this roleplaying thing for 7 years at best and mapmaking I guess maybe 5 or 4. Though, really my first maps were paint jobs with no real artistic value; purely some imagery to go on with the story. I've currently been working on a few campaigns on my Sathis world, which entails several details of Tromania and watnot. I found a place on EN or some other website and they namedropped this site and I'm glad that's the case. So much I can learn from here; even if I do my maps in Adobe/Macromedia Flash Pro, while most of you are akin to Photoshop or GIMP from my understanding. But yeah, I was wondering if I could access any tips, advice or hell any comments watsoever. I couldn't really figure how to bring forests to life on the map so I didn't paint them on there. Mountains were resized several times before I was happy. Those lighter liens are ****ty territorial/county borders I made, not rivers.

Heres a map in question: http://i6.photobucket.com/albums/y20...04/Sathis3.png

I have a intereactive version here: http://mike1204.deviantart.com/art/S...-0-A-102333489

Feel free to say hello, give a comment or whatever.

I think I'll like it here.

[Steel General]

Welcome Aboard!

NeonKnight or someone will be along eventually to banish your 'Blue Pip of Shame' - more about that later.

Interesting maps - I couldn't view the interactive one (Firefox or my ISP was being a pain-in-the-posterior) but the other one was nicely done - simple, nice color scheme, just wish I could've zoomed-in a bit more.

As for tips, etc. depends on how you want your maps to appear. Folks here all have their own tastes and styles so give us an idea on what you're looking to do and I'm sure some one will speak-up.

You may want to create a thread for your stuff in one of the WIP forums - rather than posting them here.

[Gowienczyk]

Fair enough. A lot of my maps usually take the same smooth style, I think. I like to use flash and I've always preferred it's undo feature (among other things) to photoshop so it's a bit harder to do some of the more interesting thing I've seen the photoshop mappers do. Right now I want to figure on how to make rivers look nicely on my map (which is obvious as there are no real rivers outside of the Dracori Marsh/Delta). I also want to figure out how to make forests look better on this map. I tried using icons and it just didn't sit right with me; I tried making a solid color section akin to the desert scheme, but that didn't work either. I also, wanted the mountains to be different but I'll live with them how they are.

Haha, I'm not even too fond of the city markers. I loved my lineart, color schemes and 'railroad' trail quite a bit. Not so much on paths, but I think they are necessary.

My banter is a bit of a mouthful, I'm sure.

But basically I want to improve in my flash mapmaking overall when it comes to everything but the lineart, scheme and mountains. Hm. But thanks for the welcome. Yeah, the PNG is a bit distant and zooming in would be nice - but that's why I always put .swf versions on my deviantART, I think. In case people want to zoom and explore.

Heh.

[Redrobes]

Hello Mike, Nice political borders on your maps there

Welcome, im sure you will gets lots of good comments around here.

[Gowienczyk]

Hello Mike, Nice political borders on your maps there

Welcome, im sure you will gets lots of good comments around here.

I think they are quite sloppy, personally! Haha.

Sounds like a plan.

[jfrazierjr]

Welcome to the Guild!

[NeonKnight]

Yes Welcome to the Guild! I hereby Banish the BLUE PIP 'o' SHAME and make it all nice and green!

*Steel General, You can also banish the blue pip if yuou are here first

[ravells]

Welcome to the guild! I think you're going to become our resident Flash expert!

Enjoy your stay at the site!

[jezelf]

Welcome! - great looking maps love the clean style, fonts icongraphy. The only comments I have on them is they are very pale not making it easy on the eye to read (takes a bit of adjustment ) and wish they were bigger for me to pour over, so subjective things really.

good to have you here!

cheers
jez

[Gowienczyk]

Thanks for the welcome guys! I know my maps have a bit of a clear and light contrast, I think that's become part of my art style actually. Doesn't hurt to adjust your monitors anyway, amirite?

But yeah, I understand the complaints. I do hope to be a flash expert, but we'll see. I'm glad you like the "glyphs" I used, too. I had to find some icon for the nation's crests; and my only option was webbidings or whatever the font is called. I might color in the nations within it's counties, too as suggested.

Also, I'll see what I can do with tips in due time! At that note, I've added the ongoing wiki I've been working on for my setting in my signature. Feel free to browse on that and tell me what you think via a PM, IM or comment. I love chatting. Also, I would love to find more co-writers for the thing here. Because unlike other GM's my storytelling project, my Roleplay is not based on technical dynamics, dice or a DND system. Pure storytelling. All you need is some logic and a little literacy.

...and read the wiki, but that's obvious! Haha.

Cheers.