Hello and first map

[kresso]

Hello. I have been playing rpgs for a while and we are starting up a new d&d 5e campaign and I wanted to make my character a cartographer since exploration is going to be a big part of our campaign. I looked around and found this awesome form so I joined up. I made my first map using gimp and some brushes, but now as I have been looking around I see I used world map stuff for a city map which explains why is looks so cruddy. Hopefully in the future I can work out how to do it more like this style: https://www.cartographersguild.com/a...hmentid=102247 Anyway, thanks for all the great stuff that is already here and I am looking forward to learning more! Any tips on places to start would be great.

[Herone Bleu]

Hello and welcome!
Your map looks great, especially for a first try. I see what you mean about using the wrong type of brush though, and I found some brushes on DriveThruRpg.com made by a user on here, morgajel. http://www.drivethrurpg.com/browse.p...turers_id=6296 (they do cost about $2 though) Also, your map could be improved by making the labels a more readable color. I don't know if all black would be more or less readable though, so you might have to use a combination of white and black.
Cheers!
~Herone

[kresso]

Thanks. I will play with the colors. I did plane blank, and plane white and they were hard to read, I think I’ll switch to black letters with a white border and see if that’s easier to see.

Those brushes look like the right style for a city map. Thanks! I will try and redo it.

[Tonquani]

Hi Kresso,

I'm also pretty much a rank beginner although the learning curve with GIMP has been incredibly steep.

Something that you can try is to put a white copy of the text behind solid black or dark coloured text (on a separate layer), then blur the white bit by about 15 or so pixels (depending on the size of the map and the text). When looked at together this is often easier to read and brings out the text better. Also font selection makes a big difference, as does the placement of text. Text with the correct size and colour and placed against a relatively plain contrasting background, is often readable when it is surprisingly small.

Otherwise, really good first map

T

[Josiah VE]

Welcome to the guild! Nice first map.
Keep it up, you'll improve quickly!

[kresso]

Thanks everyone for your kind words and the info on writing the labels better. It does look a lot more readable with black lettering on a white background. I will have to work on the fading of it. I also saw a bunch of hand drawn cities so I went out and got some ink markers and a sketchbook (i've never had one of those before, I didn't even know there was paper weight and such) and made a black and white map. I found the ink much easier to draw with than pencil. I used a couple of tutorials here and one some on youtube. This place is awesome! I know I need a ton of work, but I never thought I could draw anything at all.

[TDEE]

Hi. I'm new also. I have the pen to paper pretty much down, I'm trying to update to the new fangled tec. lol. Your ink map looks really good.