Perspective cities

[London Balcita]

I need help. I have tried to hand draw multiple times, and I cannot get uniform, good looking cities from an angled perspective.
What I mean is that I do not want top down, but rather in between portrait and birds eye view.
I don't even know if I'm explaining that correctly.

If somebody has experience making city maps not from bird's eye view, please please help a guy out.

[Falconius]

Use isometric graph paper. It looks like a bunch of equidistant triangles arranged in rows. The vertical lines are your height value and the other two are the ground in x and y values. You can do more things than just square buildings and cities, but I suggest getting that down first. (but I'll tell you how anyways, to do odd angles you have to figure out its x and y position in relation to the first points x and y. You can figure this out by using a top down plan on regular graph paper and basically copy that floor plan to the isographic paper) It will probably look funky though because isometric doesn't really look natural)

[Mouse]

Hello Balcita

Are you drawing on paper or digitally?

[Azélor]

Use a 3d software to get the building shapes and shadows right, then continue working on the map with another software.

[London Balcita]

I'm drawing digitally.
What 3d software or tools would I be looking for ? I have Ps CS6. That's it.

[London Balcita]

Use isometric graph paper. It looks like a bunch of equidistant triangles arranged in rows. The vertical lines are your height value and the other two are the ground in x and y values. You can do more things than just square buildings and cities, but I suggest getting that down first. (but I'll tell you how anyways, to do odd angles you have to figure out its x and y position in relation to the first points x and y. You can figure this out by using a top down plan on regular graph paper and basically copy that floor plan to the isographic paper) It will probably look funky though because isometric doesn't really look natural)

Also, thank you for the tip. Is this something that be drawn over digitally or physically?

[Mouse]

You could try Sketchup?

The pro version is hellish expensive, but there is no time limit on the free trial version. You can set the camera up to take a shot in isometric perspective, as well as ordinary perspective.

You could use it like Azelor suggested - to make the right shapes and export the image to PS for further work.

I think (though I'm going far beyond my own experience here, since I've never used PS) that PS has some kind of transforming module in which you can make 3D landscapes from 2D plans and contours and such. You'd have to ask another PS user....

EDIT: Isometric graph paper can be either printed or a grid on a screen. I think PS has isometric grids? (not sure, but think I remember a PS user saying so)

[Azélor]

I used Sketchup, not sure if it was free or just a 30 days trial. You can export different layers separately (shadows for example).
You can also use Blender, it's 100% free but harder to learn.

Yea Ps has some 3d effects, but it's not real 3d. I'm using CS3, I'm not sure about CS6.

[Mouse]

The Sketchup situation with the trial version is confusing when you first look at it. A 30 day free trial is advertised, but what that actually means is that you get 30 days free trial of the pro version. Once that is over you can continue to use the same app free.

Limitations are that you lose the tools that are pro version only, like animation, and you can't sell artwork created in the app unless you purchase the pro version (even if you don't actually need the extra pro tools)

@Balcita - the centrepiece city in this map is Nexus City - an ISO city built in Sketchup and enhanced in GIMP.