Medieval looking map project - The lands of the West

[Cèsar de Quart]

Hi there!

This is my first post, after looking around, picking tutorials, ideas, techniques and resources, I could begin the digital creation of a map I wanted to create some time ago. It's far from finished, but I hope that when my exams are gone I'll have time to work on it. The setting is a pseudo-historical world based on the XIIIth Century, of my own creation. This map is only the western part of the "European" continent. There's no scale yet, but to have some reference in the size, from the top to the bottom there's the distance from Edinburgh to Lyon. More or less. The main kindgoms represented are noted in the map, in the heraldic roll I included.



Take care!

[Coyotemax]

Wow, that's looking pretty darn fine so far, I love it!
The only comments I can think of so far (besides can't wait to see it filled out and finished) is to watch out for the consistency - at the moment some of the heraldic symbols look pretty crisp and clean compared to the rest of the map. It can take a bit of work to move those into a consistent look and feel with the rest of the map.

Still, from what I see so far, it's looking pretty darn fine!

[ExMachina]

The thumbnail caught my attention and the full size did not disappoint.

Your map style looks great, but the best part is all the accouterments you've added to really bring forth the medieval feel. I echo Coyote's comments however, the first thing I noticed was the disparity between the sharpness of the shields vs. the border, etc. I look forward to seeing how this develops.

[Mark Oliva]

I can't agree with the comments about sharpness. I blew this beautiful map up to 100% and looked at it carefully. The disparity that's mentioned here is precisely what I've noticed in similar but true historical maps in museums here in Europe. It's the difference between what a cartographer did with fine brushes and what he/she did with pens. I'd leave it the way it is.

[ExMachina]

I can't agree with the comments about sharpness. I blew this beautiful map up to 100% and looked at it carefully. The disparity that's mentioned here is precisely what I've noticed in similar but true historical maps in museums here in Europe. It's the difference between what a cartographer did with fine brushes and what he/she did with pens. I'd leave it the way it is.

I suppose I'm just a stickler for clarity and sharpness. I did consider the historical nature of the map style; in reality it's a very minor issue either way and the map will look beautiful no matter what I'm sure.

[Rongar]

Looking good so far. My only critique goes for the background/ocean layer, which kinda looks like jeans. That aside, it's looking really good.

[a2area]

Great colors.. overall just really nice map.. i love the border and shields.. as far as disparity between sharpness & blurrines it's one thing i notice in a lot of maps and am getting more sensitive to in my own. I have found that for me what helps is, when i'm done i group the layers, make a copy of that group so you still have your layers if you need to edit them later and merge the copy and flatten it (turn the orig group "off"). Then apply a couple subtle effects to that... noise, blur or unsharp mask, maybe a photo filter (or all of those) to unify the composition. Sometimes it looks good to even duplicate that flattened layer, place it above the finished one and set it to color burn or multiply at a low opacity (try them all, try combinations).

[Sapiento]

Looks very good so far. I'm interested how this will develop.

[Zard]

This is better than the map I had imagined for a project I am working on. I was looking for a feel of this period but this goes way beyond. Excellent work and thanks for raising the bar and providing the inspiration. I'll be doing a lot more research from now on. Wonderful!

[Cèsar de Quart]

Wow, thank you all for the support!

About the disparity between cleaness of the heraldry and the rest of the map's texture, I must agree. The coats of arms need to be more "battered", just a little bit more dirty. I want it to look like it's been drawn years ago, perhaps some watercolour effect. but I still doubt about the system I should use. I'd like them to look more or less like those rolls from the Armorial de Guelre:

Attachment 21451

About the sea looking like jeans, maybe a little bit, but I used the sea texture from the Tabula Rogeriana, a map drawn by great Arab cartographer al-Idrisi, in the XIIth Century. So I guess I'm gonna keep it.

I still doubt about how should I handle some things, like the grid (or even if I should draw one), and I won't be able to work on it for a month, so there won't be any update until then... now that I've seen the reaction, I'm a little upset because of that, but there's nothing I can't do about it.

Anyway, all of it was possible because of the wise advises, tutorials and map developements I found in this page. Thank you all for commenting, that really cheers me up!

Take care!