3d Vaeya, 2d's showing part of the Arkaeyan Rim

[dsfargeg]

Fantastic work, I am thoroughly impressed. Impressed and jealous in equal measure to be honest.

[Vigilus]

Wow thank you all for the great responses, it really makes my day!

@ Lingon

I will definitely paint the globe to look as perfect as humanly possible. The globe itself was actually a necessary side project because I was having trouble scaling the larger features of the map to work (look at tiles 36 and 37). So I HAD to do the globe, the glorious, massive time sink that it is, just to have the precisely drawn features for the map tiles.

@ J. Edward

I was inspired by Google maps and thought, why not make a fantasy project with similar attempt at scale? I want to make sure that resolution wasn't going to be a problem at any practical scale.

@Tonnichiwa

I'll try to keep to a promise of a couple posts a week just for you guys.

@Josiah

Right now I am doing slow build, getting myself back into the production process. When focused, I usually crank out one or two map tiles a day, depending upon what life allows me. With some rough estimates, the 9 continents , likely averaging 50 map tiles with a rough 3-4 hours per tile, minus the approximate 300 for the work already done, means that I have about 1200 more map hours to go. The Globe project is an unkown time sink, I have spent so much time designing the story of the world in the planetary features that it could take a while longer.

The advantage of this obsessiveness is that as the creator, the whole time you draw the map you are thinking of new things to put into the landscape, and how things on the world happen; avoiding the plague of a world that feels empty. It's like you brainstorm the whole time, which is so fun!

@ dsfargeg

Hey, use that jealousy! That can be turned into inspiration and used for your own project! If instead you are keen to help PM me. When I was thinking of starting this project, I found this website really quickly and looked at every map that was in the archive. Thoroughly impressed and a little jealous myself, I felt like I could try to stand on the shoulders of giants. Just go for it!

So as of a few days ago, I have restarted the project. You guys rock!

[weitnum]

Since you restarted the project: I have an idea. You know how on some globes you can feel the mountain ridges as raised edges? You might be able to do the same thing with some modeling epoxy. Magic-sculpt would work great for that sort of thing. Though you might need to rough up the edge of the globe to get it to stick - easy to do with some low grit sandpaper

[Vigilus]

Hey Weitnum,

Yeah it's a good idea, one that is already in the works. I found that using paint thickeners allows for good mountains that look cool and give the impression of realism, and this allows me to keep all the chemicals in the project "friendly" to the project.

[Vigilus]

Hmm I haven't kept that promise, LIFE HAPPENS! Left a job (they weren't paying me what they promised, OOPS!) yet I have a much better one (I hope) lined up. So yeah, everything has been on hold. Happy Cartographing!

[iraheinichen]

Hey Bro! Those pictures are *awesome* - more please

[vorropohaiah]

this is great, and i love the land colour (the sea colour is a bit dark fr my tastes, but there's no pleasing everyone ).

A question on the projection though (which you mention on post #3) is which is accurate - the 2d paper maps or the globe? If you're actually using the paper maps as the normal maps you're going to end up with a lot of warping in the poles (distances stretched). Or is the 2d map accurate and already 'projected' so to speak. so that once its applied to the globe with the grid, it maintains roughly he same shape?

[Vigilus]

@ vorropohaiah

I'm managing all the different mediums with different strategies to bend the rules in my favor.

Yes the translation from 2d to 3d will result in slight changes to the 2d. I solved this by positioning my mostly completed 2d continent to the center of the globe to reduce this distortion(it has large desert features anyways so it made sense). I then created all the other continents on the 3d globe, as I needed to solve an issue with my large scale magic system rule set that required a globe to solve. So, I've only created maps of a 2d of the first continent and a 3d of the whole planet, and then I'm planning on either doing more 2d or upgrading my process into something more user friendly(aka digital) now that I'm slowly tiring of making original works by hand.

So you could say, I bent the rules a little bit. If you design a game, translating from flat to spherical can be as simple as an equation so I'm not too worried about performing all the calculations. I am planning on using the flat terrain as just a "fog of war" effect anyways, inspired by the use in the games Shogun: Total War and Elemental. It could also be the base of a minimap or larger map pieced together by players, i'm sure there are a lot of uses for this art asset.

Also, the color of the water is my primary concern at this stage of the project. I wanted the base coat to be deep and dark feeling, I'm not afraid to contrast sharply and an ocean should have good contrast as the best breathtaking pictures from space can prove. So the blues, light and the dark, are the two colors I used ahead of time to set the color range i'm going to use for improving the oceans past the continental design phase. The initial light blue was just about gauging the rough scale I wanted to make my continents on the actual physical piece. This is a harder choice than it may seem at first glance, as the entire quality of your art piece will depend upon that early decision as it will make your continents look too big, or too small and insignificant in relation to the total water space. Considering I had no precise idea of what my continents looked like at the time, this problem caught me off guard and so logic dictated that I should punch my art. Not my finest moment, but hey learning isn't always fun.

luckily, I only made a small dent that repeated application of paint can hide!

Don't tell anyone!

[vorropohaiah]

Id go crazy working like that! I'd need to know both versions are as perfect as possible thats why i started with digital and then I'll convert that to the physical globe as both have their merits

[Vigilus]

Id go crazy working like that! I'd need to know both versions are as perfect as possible thats why i started with digital and then I'll convert that to the physical globe as both have their merits

I have gone a little crazy... just a little...

Honestly, working my continents by hand with a free form artistic feeling was a really great way to produce continents with a lot of character. Obsessing over every little bit, energy flows of the lines and all sorts of weird thought patterns allowed me to think differently about map making and world design and get out of the box a little bit. Also, you get a bit more of that "creator god" vibe going when you make everything with your hands. You can look at every little detail and know that you made it, no computer algorithm or assistance required.

That feeling seems to be diminishing in the art world, so we have to design our projects to keep us inspired.

That is how I do it anyways.