My map symbols

[Tonnichiwa]

Hi everyone,

So I've been practicing making my own drawings instead of using Campaign Cartographer for everything and this morning I just came up with this wizards tower for a small village. I know it isn't really good but I figured I would put it here anyway. This is probably the thread where I will put my artwork that I think is passable as a map symbol if someone wants to use it.

You are free to do whatever you want with this symbol.

[Lingon]

That's a great little drawing, and it's very generous of you to offer it to everybody! I could see it used in many contexts, a very nice building
A couple of suggestions, if you feel like it. When used as an icon, it might be shrunk a lot, and those thin lines will look hairline thin and out of place in many maps, and a lot of that great detail will just disappear. Bolder lines and less detail would make it even more useful.

[Tonnichiwa]

Thank you Lingon. Any suggestions for about how thick the lines should be to make it useable?

[Lingon]

It's difficult because people will use different line thicknesses themselves. But you can easily go a lot thicker. I'm gonna try something, brb

edit: so I got a bit carried away, but I took it into Inkscape and drew a bit on top of your image, just as an idea. This is obviously a different style and not the way you should do it, just to demonstrate line thickness. They could probably be even thicker. Hope you don't mind

[Tonnichiwa]

I don't mind a bit. Thank you for the demonstration. I've only been drawing my own stuff for about three weeks now so I really have no idea what I'm doing other than what I have been reading in books and watching on youtube videos so any help you can give is much appreciated. That certainly is a lot thicker than what I was doing. It reminds me of the black and white symbols on some of Campaign Cartographer's mapping elements. Nicely done too. I like it

Well, I'll keep practicing and putting my stuff in here so people can see it...but only if it is somewhat decent...

[Tonnichiwa]

Well it has been a while since I put something here but I made a small building with a walkway and thought I would place it here.

[jpstod]

Key to a Good Set of Map Symbols...

Consistency.....in Style, Coloring, and Angle of View.
A Good Map consists of Elements that look like the Belong Together...Not Mixed and Slapped from different sources...
Mixing Iso and Top Down don't look good nor does Top Down a slight perspective
Nor Does Cartoonish and photo realistics.

Being able to draw your own element gives you a style...Unlike me, where my Maps can easily become redundant using the Same Elements over and over because I rely upon other peoples artwork for elements.

[jpstod]

p.s Add a transparent background

[Tonnichiwa]

Doh!...I knew I was forgetting to do something. I recently stopped paying for photoshop because I am unemployed but I haven't downloaded Gimp again. Hmm. I guess I will have to do that sometime. Thank you for reminding me about all this jpstod

[jpstod]

I use this a lot of times.

http://www.online-image-editor.com/