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Thread: Greetings

  1. #1
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    Help Greetings

    Greetings and felicitations from sunny Manchester, England, (Yeah, right!)
    I spend most of my time developing new creatures, plants, areas etc for Santharia (If you don't know it, call in and check out www.santharia.com they're just as free and friendly as you guys, and you'll find we have our own map section as well!)
    Anyway, I recently "acquired" a copy of Photoshop CS3 to help me get into developing maps for the frozen northern regions of Santharia. Trouble is, I seem to have "lost" my instruction book, so I went to YouTube, found some vids from you lot and, well, here I am!
    I have a particular interest in designing objects to place on the maps. You know the stuff, temples, stone circles, citadels etc. Our maps have a 3D-ish perspective on them, so, obviously, the objects have to have it too.
    Can anyone either tell me how to do this in Photoshop, point me in the direction of a program which is tailor-made for this, or just generally give me any advice to get me 'up and running'?

    Nice site, BTW, very informative. And inspirational. And I feel very inadequate all of a sudden


    Oh, I nearly forgot. my initial idea for designing my buildings is to draw them on paper (I have reasonable artistic ability), scan them, trace them onto a layer in Photoshop then add shading etc. Viable or no?

    Whoops! I just saw the discusions on the various drawing programs etc. Ignore everything I just said. Move along now, there's nothing to see here. *Ahem*
    Last edited by Wargrider@Santharia; 10-27-2008 at 03:56 PM. Reason: 'Cos I'm stupid and didn't see the list of stuff in the Program Discusion forum.

  2. #2

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    Welcome to the Guild, Wargrider. Although we have a few symbols here, the Dunjinni forums have zillions of them, but I'm not sure how many of them are isometric though. Your website is very impressive!

  3. #3
    Community Leader Facebook Connected Steel General's Avatar
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    Welcome Aboard Wargrider!

    @Ravells - Dundjinni does have an entire "forum" dedicated to ISO stuff, not sure how much is actually in there 'cause I never really looked at it.
    My Finished Maps | My Challenge Maps | Still poking around occasionally...

    Unless otherwise stated by me in the post, all work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial 3.0 United States License.



  4. #4
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    Why, thank you, Ravells. Having been used to working in such a friendly, co-operative envoironment as Santharia, it is a delight to find another such place which is ideally suited to my needs.
    I think you will be seeing a lot more of me around here, as and when my other development work permits. I'm currently starting a complete re-write and expansion of the 7 Orc tribes of Sarvonia (a northern continent), am partway through 'The Pyrates of the Northern Oceans', putting the finishing touches to the Eanian Warg (a joint project with our resident canine expert), as well as helping some of the newer members with their first works. OMG. I didn't realise just how busy I am until I wrote it down. Sheesh!

    Anyway, just to let you know, I've posted a message in Santharia to let anyone who is interested inmap design to come over for a look.

  5. #5
    Community Leader Facebook Connected Ascension's Avatar
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    As far as getting a 3d look out of Photoshop it's not very easy. However, if you know the fundamentals of perspective drawing, foreshortening, horizon lines, etc. then just apply that to drawing in PS as you would on paper. The hardest thing is getting the shadows correct as I can never get the shadows to follow the lay of the land (distortion filter maybe?) but can approximate the correct look (motion blur) instead of having things "floating around" (drop shadow). I haven't yet tried this but it's something I will be exploring in the future but maybe draw up architectural things in Sketch Up, which has a free version (which can provide more accurate shadows) then import the image into PS for the style and flair work. Any who, welcome to The Guild.
    If the radiance of a thousand suns was to burst at once into the sky, that would be like the splendor of the Mighty One...I am become Death, the Shatterer of worlds.
    -J. Robert Oppenheimer (father of the atom bomb) alluding to The Bhagavad Gita (Chapter 11, Verse 32)


    My Maps ~ My Brushes ~ My Tutorials ~ My Challenge Maps

  6. #6
    Community Leader NeonKnight's Avatar
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    Welcome to the Guild

    I banish your BLUE PIP 'o' SHAME!
    Daniel the Neon Knight: Campaign Cartographer User

    Never use a big word when a diminutive one will suffice!

    Any questions on CC3? Post them with CC3 in the Subject Line!
    MY 'FAMOUS' CC3 MAPS: Thunderspire; Pyramid of Shadows; King of the Trollhaunt Warrens; Demon Queen's Enclave

  7. #7
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    Why, Thank'ee kindly, NeonKnight.

    @ Ascension: If you call in at Santharia and go to the Developers forum (Click the big book in the top right of the screen) you will see a menu top left of screen made of small piccys. Click on 'Swap menus', select the paint pot (workshop) and you will see below you a guide to doing just what you are looking for! Provided by Artimidor, our Great Sage (the bloke who designed and runs the site).

    You don't need to be a member to peruse any of the forums or menu's in there. And there is a whole section devoted to the maps of our world which you can poke around in.

    And thanks everyone for your kind welcomes.

  8. #8
    Community Leader jfrazierjr's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by Wargrider@Santharia View Post
    Why, Thank'ee kindly, NeonKnight.

    @ Ascension: If you call in at Santharia and go to the Developers forum (Click the big book in the top right of the screen) you will see a menu top left of screen made of small piccys. Click on 'Swap menus', select the paint pot (workshop) and you will see below you a guide to doing just what you are looking for! Provided by Artimidor, our Great Sage (the bloke who designed and runs the site).

    You don't need to be a member to peruse any of the forums or menu's in there. And there is a whole section devoted to the maps of our world which you can poke around in.

    And thanks everyone for your kind welcomes.
    Welcome to the Guild!

    I can attest that the workshop has some very nice information it, and a very nice tutorial. This is where I learned my love of the smudge tool.

    For those who do not know, the Cartographers Choice map Manthria was created for this world and I love this map style (one day, I shall try to mimic)
    My Finished Maps
    Works in Progress(or abandoned tests)
    My Tutorials:
    Explanation of Layer Masks in GIMP
    How to create ISO Mountains in GIMP/PS using the Smudge tool
    ----------------------------------------------------------
    Unless otherwise stated by me in the post, all work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial 3.0 United States License.

  9. #9
    Administrator Redrobes's Avatar
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    Very nice website that - kudos to the web dev who put it together. I found it hard to get at the maps tho but locations and info on them was really abundant.

    Cool !, see you around.

  10. #10
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    @ RedRobes. Perhaps I should have explained that when you get to the main Forums page, which you apparently did, if you look adjacent to it on the left, you will see a list called 'Dev Maps' (you may have to scroll the screen down to find it). Click on any of the 15 or so maps for a look.

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