ProFantasy Community Forum - Cartographic Resources

Compass Rose and Lines: How do they 'work'?

kolyana — Sun, 07 Mar 2010 21:05:59 -0500

This is ore of a generic mapping question rather than using CC3; I want to know the 'logic' behind compass roses and the navigation lines coming off their 32 points. I've done a little research, but it's not really winking in.

My specific need is to know where the compass roses should be placed and if the lines coming off them mean something, if the intersections mean something, and how the resulting 'web' of lines are actually interpreted and used?

I want to add compass roses and lines to some of my maps, but I don't want to throw them down randomly, I want to follow the logic behind them.

Medieval English Town resource

bearclaw — Mon, 22 Feb 2010 15:30:58 -0500

I was trying to find a source that would say how much area different medieval towns took up. I wasn't able to but did find this site:
http://users.trytel.com/~tristan/towns/towns.html

Thought others might find it interesting to see. There are actually a bunch of John Speed maps on this site too. Though I didn't find what I was looking for, I did find all sorts of other information that was useful in my CD3 maps.

BTW, anyone know of a resource that lists the actual area covered by medieval towns?

lots of symbols

isirion — Fri, 19 Feb 2010 21:54:52 -0500

before I knew of CC3 i tried a free mapping program (it didn't worked all that well) but like with Profantasy it had a forum (wasn't good, either) but they had these competitions, making new symbol for the program. I wondered if there was some "symbool" sharing here as well.?

Installing CSUAC files

AlexChristo — Sat, 06 Feb 2010 08:52:52 -0500

Hi,

greetings from Germany (and sorry for my english ;-) )

I want to install the CSUAC files, but i don't know, where i have to copy the files.

For example:
Folder: BL_1cc_Creatures
contains
Folder: Art Files (that contains other Folders that contains PNG's)
and a lot of FSC-Files.

I tried, but when I open cc3 and choose one FSC-File, he shows me only red X.

Thanks for help

Axel

Displaying Maps on a Projector - Solution - Plus some maps.

skow — Thu, 17 Dec 2009 17:15:59 -0500

If you are interested in projecting your maps simultaneously on your PC and onto the tabletop using a projector for your players, you can check out GMScreen - available for free at:
http://gmguild.com

It is doesn't have a lot of features, but works pretty well for my gaming group.

There are also a few full-resolution maps available for your use as well. They are linked off of the home page.

Wanted - cartography articles

Simon Rogers — Tue, 26 Jan 2010 08:32:37 -0500

We will be doing a series of articles on cartography for rpg.net. While they can feature CC3 and other ProFantasy products, they should also be of general interest to other rpg players. If you think you could produce such an article, please email me, simonwork@profantasy.com.

Statue/Idol Symbols?

TypeONegative — Sat, 09 Jan 2010 06:20:45 -0500

Hi all,
New to CC3 but great software. Have been making some crypts with DD3 but the statue/idol symbols are limited. Have downloaded CSUAC and that doesn't really offer much more in the way of statues/idols. I have done a search on the forum but receive zero hits with "statue" and "idol"....and as such I was wondering if anyone has come across any symbols of these in their travels?

cheers

problem pages fixed: My Crestar site

JimP — Sat, 13 Dec 2008 18:57:20 -0500

The blog entries, I am presently uploading the html, js, etc. files I had to wait on until I was done making corrections, are now in progress.

The Movable type blog is gone: The new link is http://crestar.drivien-jim.net/crestar

Where to find/how to make an extinct volcano?

moomin — Sat, 07 Nov 2009 18:26:23 -0500

Hello all,

I'm new to mapmaking and have just installed this software. I'm currently creating an island to create a game board. I'm watching the very helpful video tutorials on creating an island.

Anyway, I wanted to have an extinct volcano in the center of my island and I was wondering if there are existing resources or a tool to create this kind of thing with whatever comes with CC3?

Thanks,

Brian

A book on the Normans and their castles

JimP — Mon, 12 Oct 2009 10:36:02 -0400

I was in a Barnes and Nobel bookstore recently and I found and purchased this book. 'The Normans Warrior Knights and their Castles' by Christopher Gravett and David Nicolle.

Besides tactics and politics, there are a number of photos of ruins, drawings that show archeological re-creations, and floor plans. The floor plans are donjons and entire castles, like the castles at Dover and Chateau-Gaillard. I haven't read the chapter on castle defense, but it looks interesting. I found two drawings in the book that show fields of fire for bows.

256 pages, including index and glossary. Lots of color photos and drawings. Cost is $18.95 in the US. ISBN: 978-1-84603-218-9 Printed by Osprey publishing.

I recommend this book.

Looking for Wagon Symbols

bearclaw — Tue, 03 Mar 2009 13:33:54 -0500

I'm preparing a battle map but need symbols for various wagons and such. I downloaded the CSUAC catalog which has all sorts of symbols I was looking for (tents and market stalls in particular) but no wagons, carts, chariots etc.

I've got CC3 and CD3 loaded. Are there other sources that have these sorts of symbols available?

What would an Arabian mining town look like?

Zem — Thu, 10 Sep 2009 20:17:42 -0400

I haven't made anything because I haven't figured out what makes sense. FWIW, I don't own City Designer just yet, but I was about to download it when I realized I don't know the answer to this question.

Imagine an oasis owned by nomads in the desert right at the foot of the mountains. This is in Forgotten Realms, specifically near Calimshan. They have tents and they move in and out, but it's also along a road that is somewhat useful for trade. They make one or two small buildings and make a little money by charging travelers for lodging and water.

Then nearby someone discovered rubies. A lot of people come out to mine this place, and the oasis has no choice but to grow into a small town to support mining operations. It is profitable, and there's a good bit of trade going through. Ten years pass... What does it look like? What's the equivalent of an old west mining town in an Arabian setting? It will have to remain small because the water supply is limited by the oasis and kind priests.

I know this is a fairly stupid question and that it can be whatever I want it to be, but I want something that makes sense. Would it remain primarily tents? Permanent structures build from... umm... rock? Yurts? Assuming deep wells would help pull up some water, would it be isolated groups focused around these wells? I'm picturing a wealthy sheik building himself a smallish palace, but that's the only constraint I have right now.

I'm planning on ruining my adventuring party's day here, so I'm just trying to come up with something that makes sense and is interesting. Thanks.

Printing your maps - in Europe

Ralf — Thu, 16 Oct 2008 10:23:33 -0400

My favorite online printing service has become more widely available in Europe - they take orders from a variety of countries now, including the UK and France.

It's Posterjack. They' got a real easy interface to upload your source files, a quick turnaround (in Germany at least), excellent quality and awesome prices - especially their 80cmx60cm format is extremely cheap.

Palette from Mappa Harnica

sdavies2720 — Fri, 28 Aug 2009 18:56:59 -0400

I have an old map that was created using the Mappa Harnica add-on for CC2. I don't need the rest of the add-on, but I do need the custom palette they used. Does anyone have a copy? I'd prefer not trying to risk screwing up my CC3 install in order to install Mappa Harnica just to get that one file.

Thanks for any help in advance.

Steve

Mapping natural resources

kristof65 — Tue, 01 Sep 2009 00:40:35 -0400

So I've used FT to create my campaign world, and mapped out the political boundries and major cities, which can be seen here:
http://iskitaan.heismann.net/PoliticalMap

Next up, I'm working on demographics, etc, and as part of that, I'd like to determine what each nation has as far as natural resources - like where a lot of gold, copper, silver, etc is likely to be found. FT has helped with climate, and as such, it's a little more easy to determine where cattle, sheep, etc are raised, where lumber, corn and grapes are grown and so on, but FT doesn't help much in the minerals department.

Are there any good resources out there to help me determine this? Preferably something like S John Ross' wonderful medieval demographics article (and associated calculators), but I'll take any sites that can go a long way towards helping me match my FT terrain to the types of minerals likely found there, even if it means a bit of research.

Map of Europe/Meditterranean Area

AzSteven — Thu, 27 Aug 2009 16:01:17 -0400

Has anyone here done, or know of, a map of Europe. I am looking for a base map to start from for a fantasy campaign set in 400 BC Greece which will involve travel to Lithuania, Turkey, Egypt, Itlay, Spain, France and England (or rather the areas that will become those states). Duid some searching on the ProFantasy site and a general Google with no huge success, so I thought it might be faster to check here.

Thanks in advance!

Please Set up a Style Gallery or Library

sdavies2720 — Thu, 06 Aug 2009 15:41:07 -0400

Profantasy should set up a "Style Library." That would showcase maps of different styles and give an overview how it's done. I'm not thinking step-by-step instructions, but instead something along the lines of, "Annual #15 as a base, with tree symbols from SS#1, and Mountains from CSUAC."

I'm in the process of reworking some of my maps, and I'm getting overwhelmed by the number of (wonderfully) different styles available. The choices are only going to multiply. As I was looking at skaryn's wonderful overland map I realized that having a gallery of styles that gave some insight into their providence would go a long way toward helping me make choices.

Of course, the gallery should have the annual maps as-is, but also showcase individuals' work.
Steve

Interview at Kobold Quarterly

Ralf — Mon, 03 Aug 2009 11:24:51 -0400

Yours truly had the pleasure of giving an interview on fantasy mapping for Kobold Quarterly magazine. It contains some tidbits on the Cartographer's Annual. If you're interested, you can read it here.

The interview is part of an on-going series on fantasy cartography and I hope there's more to come on the topic.

Trouble With Making Bodies of Water

freundfam — Mon, 27 Jul 2009 12:35:11 -0400

I'm just barely beginning to work with the Campaign Cartographer 3 program and making some of my own maps that i had come up with. So far I have found the program very frustrating at times, and I know that is due to not knowing how to really use it.

The main thing I have been having a problem with at the moment is creating some kind of body of water like a lake. I've tried selecting the default terrian, using 'Sea Lightest', and when I make the body of water, it remains until I click on something else, or even maximize the map. I know it is likely going beneath the landmass, but when I use 'Bring to Front', it doesn't remain, and then I am having a few other problems with other items coming up front. So it is constant redoing and undoing.

Is there any advise for me on how to make the bodies of water so they remain? Or anyone who can help guide me with some instructions? This newbie would really appreicate ANY help...just so I can keep my hair intact from pulling it out of my head in frustration. :)

Looking for more DD3 Icons

darkfenrir — Tue, 07 Jul 2009 00:56:00 -0400

I've been using DD3 to design dungeons except the default icons listed are a tad limited as there isn't much variety in what symbols are given other then tables and there are many things that I want, like a real bookcase for example, more torture equipment/armory/smithy stuff and the like. I'm just looking for some downloadable content to expand the Icon library for dungeon designer 3 if anyone knows of any?

Printing a Map to Poster Size

amdobritt — Wed, 17 Jun 2009 13:01:28 -0400

Anyone know of a company that prints poster-size maps from CC3 files? That have reasonable rates?

Old Ordnance Survey Maps Online?

sdavies2720 — Thu, 09 Oct 2008 15:20:32 -0400

I was reading through a book about medieval cities, and it mentioned that around 400 U.K. towns and cities were mapped in the late 19th century, at 1:1056 to 1:500 scale by the Ordnance Survey. It suggested that those maps are no longer under copyright protection, so the question is: Are they available somewhere online in a usable format?

I found the www.nls.uk/maps site, but you can only see a small part of the map at any given time if you want to see any detail at all. I'm hoping there is something more useable.

I am hoping to get some pointer from real-world cities, but I find it hard to make sense of the maps unless I can see the large scale and small scale structures at the same time (or at least with only a couple of mouse clicks)

Thanks for any pointers.

Steve

I need a map :)

Stordyr — Mon, 10 Nov 2008 07:00:34 -0500

and i'm willing to pay for it :)
Not much though... (i'm on a budget) but maybe we can find a solution .P

What I need:
- i have a map made by a computer game
- i want to have a CC3 Map (I really tried to make one with another product but I just don't have the time to learn it in the quality I desire)
The map contains a small island group with a main island. Don't know the exact size but it's not more that some dozend miles.

I would pay via paypal or bank transfer :P

price: don't know yet depends on time you need quality you can deliver and flexibility you provide :)

contact:
ICQ: 17777092
or
MSN: torgum@hotmail.de

kind regards

Stordyr

Oxford Lecture on maps

Highland_Piper — Sun, 26 Apr 2009 14:29:36 -0400

I just had to share this. I went to a lecture at Exeter College in Oxford today titled "From Gough to Google" by John Leighfield (creator of Get Mapping an aerial photography and mapping product business). The lecture was great and Mr. Leighfield brought in a few of his maps from his extensive collection.

All the maps where of Oxford or Oxfordshire and where original prints.

(I should have taken notes on the dates of all the maps but I fear I did not)

Christoper Saxton 1574 -

Amazing detail! It is thought the maps where painted by children, yeah Cartography sweat shops!

Saxton/Hole 1607 -

Another lovely map, much cleaner than the Saxton and I dare say even the John Speed map!

John Speed 1611-

This map of Oxfordshire was Beautiful! Lovely detail in the borders with the college heraldry and a city map of Oxford.

John Ogilby 1675-

Makes me want that May Annual right now! Great road maps! The background was of a ribbon that wrapped top to bottom left to right with the road drawn on the ribbons (not sure if I'm explaining it properly) I was so glad to be able to see it in person!

Dr. Robert Plot 1676 -

A bit over done on the Heraldry (sponsorship) but an interesting map
Many Ordnance Survey maps from 1800's on which are still nice to look at.

He even had a 1973 KGB (yes that KGB) map of Oxford which was VERY accurate and noted things such as Electrical and water controls and other such non-touristy things.

Mr. Leighfield also had several old Atlas books, and travel books which I unfortunately did not get to look at, some where called "The Miniature Speed" which are Speed maps made very small and bound in a book that included travel distances.

Great lecture, I learned many things that I did not know before such as most of Saxton, Speed, etc. maps are remakes of Agas maps so they (Saxton and Speed) did not even re-survey the area (Although the town maps Speed did survey himself). Sometimes town spellings where done wrong so you could tell who copied from whom by tracing the spelling errors. The example given was the village Ifley near Oxford which on many maps is spelt Isley.

In one of John Speeds maps he noticed that there was a picture of a town with no name, he wrote a note "Quaere" which is Latin for ask, meaning he was going to ask later to find out the towns name. Well he forgot and the town was labelled Quaere on his maps and consequently every one who copied from him until much later when the error was spotted and corrected!

It was an hour worth my time!!

Real Atlas with Translated Placenames

sdavies2720 — Mon, 13 Apr 2009 14:55:37 -0400

There is a nice set of modern maps with 'translated' & historical placenames. Good inspiration for anyone naming lots of locations.

http://www.spiegel.de/fotostrecke/fotostrecke-37310.html

Steve

Need help aligning two different maps

Lark — Tue, 24 Mar 2009 08:02:56 -0400

Hi! I'm working on a fantasy map based on a real place. I have two partly overlapping old maps of this area showing various ruins, important sites and such. These sites are going to be the locations for the biggest settlements in my fantasy map, and I want to get the coordinates fairly exact, so I need to combine the two maps to form a more complete basis for my new map. I need an application which lets me specify common points on the two maps and then calculates the right angle and scaling for map 2 to be superimposed on map 1 as correctly as possible. I would be happy if it was really easy to handle without a lot of extra functions. I'd really appreciate any help on this.

Kind regards, Lark

FYI....Average annual temeratures

dutch206 — Thu, 19 Mar 2009 20:12:42 -0400

In fractal terrains, the climate map is presented in terms of "average annual temperature". I did a quick Google (r) on a handfull of cities around the western hemisphere to give you an idea of what these numbers mean: Kingston, Jamaica 80 degrees (F); Miami, Florida 76; Saint Louis, Missouri 55; Chicago, Illinois 49; Alberta, Canada 35.

Nice Terrain Textures

Magnakanus — Thu, 19 Mar 2009 11:43:09 -0400

I found some nice terrain textures at the below link;

http://www.spiralgraphics.biz/packs/terrain_desert_barren/index.htm

Devin Night's Tokens: Now Free

Mogul76 — Mon, 26 Jan 2009 02:34:36 -0500

As announced on the Four Ugly Monsters forums:

----------

Hello fellow gamers.

I'm releasing all my tokens for free.
I appreciate every person who has purchased tokens in the past, you have made the FUM site possible.
Today I will change the store to reflect this, all token packs will be free.
http://fouruglymonsters.com/onlinestore/

By making the tokens free I will free myself from needing to make large tokens sets. I've always tried to make the sets as large as possible to give people the largest bang for their buck.
Now I can release One or two or 10 token packs. I can make a larger variety of tokens on unrelated themes.

Future releases will include both hi and lo-res versions of the token. I am also going to go back and center all tokens in a square image, having realized that some programs work better with a token that is centered. I might also make a set that has a round base under the tokens to give them a "mini" feel and look.

I will still be taking custom orders for tokens or map objects for $4 per token/object.

The same copyright limitations still apply, you may now distribute the tokens freely but may not use them commercially in any way without my written permission.
You may mod them as much as you want and freely distribute any modified files.

From this point on I will have donation links, one for FUM and one for myself. There will be no set amount for donations.

More information and links to donate will be added to my token site....
http://www.immortalnights.com/tokensite/index.html

In related news....
FUM is gearing up for iCon 09.
We are planning for a weekend in April to be this years greatest weekend for VT's .
Head to http://www.fouruglymonsters.com/ for more information.

----------

These token packs also include the "Map Objects: Qin Dynasty" set which I have used to create the following Asian maps:

QIN1

and

QIN2

The checkout process ends in an error but the downloads are made available through the e-mail account which you've used to register.

Scales in kms

thornrd — Sat, 14 Feb 2009 05:49:15 -0500

Hello, I seek scales to graduate in kilometers.
I find only scales in miles and I do not manage to modify the texts All that for CC3
Thank you