Reply With QuoteLooking good so far.
After numerous hand-drawn sketches, I've put together a rough layout of the city in Illustrator.
The orange buildings are temples (I still have to decide where I'm putting the third one, and the shrine), and the white boxes are scale placeholders for buildings. All of the elevation shading and colors are just for my own reference at this point.
I'm still deciding whether or not to keep the north & south walls around the regular city area; they're pretty restrictive for building placement and I suspect they don't make as much sense as they should. I may also include a bridge between the merchant area and the opposite bank.
Any feedback (especially from GP!) at this point is appreciated. Is this a believable enough layout for the city?
### Latest WIP ###
Last edited by armoredgear7; 08-15-2009 at 11:14 AM.
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Looking good so far.
My Finished Maps | My Challenge Maps | Still poking around occasionally...
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I like what you got there armoredgear! The soft colors work really well together.
Check out my City Designer 3 tutorials. See my fantasy (city) maps in this thread.
Gandwarf has fallen into shadow...
Yeah, another good entry.
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
I also like the colors and the clean lines. My one thought is that you might want to reverse the green colors... my eyes interpret darker colors as lower and lighter colors as higher in a topo map.
I've adjusted the road widths and laid down some more building placeholders for most of the map. The samurai district still needs to be done though.
Colour coding on the buildings is also reference for the time being - orange buildings are temples; yellowish are shops/commercial areas. white is obviously residential.
I've decided to keep the outer walls - the moderately wealthy and merchant class live within them, while the surrounding area is mostly slums. The area across the river will be mostly farmland when I get to it.
@msa: I did a test, reversing the coloring on the topographic levels and it wasn't really working for me. The lighter colours everywhere else look really strange up against a darker green for the sea level elevation. From what I can tell looking at other maps online, topographic gradients are usually light green -> dark green -> dark brown -> beige -> white, so I think my current system is works for now. I might still change it later.
### Latest WIP ###
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Alright. This update marks the end of the placement phase - I'm pretty happy with the overall layout and scale of everything. From here, I'll be adding the actual graphics for the buildings and walls. When that's done, it'll be taken into Photoshop for texturing & lighting.
### Latest WIP ###
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...Or so I thought. I decided to tweak the city to better match the chase map from Tanaka's challenge; the route is shown in red. I also made a few changes to the roads to improve defense and I made the castle cliff steeper.Originally Posted by armoredgear7
I've also attached an image of the buildings I've done so far - they're all done with a pattern brush. The colored ones were an experiment. The shading & additional texture is to be added to the buildings in Photoshop. Trees, ponds, gates & low walls around the alleyways will also come later.
### Latest WIP ###
Last edited by armoredgear7; 08-20-2009 at 03:56 PM.
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Looking very nice.
I'm still struggling with mine.
My Finished Maps | My Challenge Maps | Still poking around occasionally...
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Here's an update for tonight's work; a couple hours' worth. Using a pattern brush makes this part pretty quick, although working to make sure everything lines up still takes some time.
### LATEST WIP ###
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