It's an annual issue for later this year, and was initially inspired by DD3, though I have already gone off on something of a tangent with the colour scheme to the point where Creepy Crypts is now distinctly different. That is not to say that you won't be able to use DD3 symbols and fills with it if you want to - just that I am no longer adhering as strictly to the colours and textures of DD3.
I've more or less done all the textures now, so the next few weeks should see some suitable symbols appearing in the test map.
Sorry, @JulianDracos! I got notification that there was a comment on my thread and only saw Dalton's at the bottom of the page.
Those two textures are indeed marble, and I was already thinking that they are too purplish blue. The strange thing is that this has only looked wrong since I made the rock a warmer grey than it was to start with. It's one of those curious things that happen when you start making lots of different greys to use together. They don't always look all that great unless you use the same kind of grey, or very closely related greys. In effect they are now a very dull mix of purple and orange together (the marbles and the rest of the stone stuff). No worries - it will look better when I'm done with it ;)
The grout on the flagstones is deliberately flat with equal shadow all around each stone. That is because if you give it a 3D effect the light has to come from a particular direction, so the floor looks odd if you align the fill to a different angle. We'll see how it goes.
There are other textures. I just didn't manage to get them all in shot. There's another surface dirt loam texture, green slime and the mud is there around the water's edge. There's not quite enough of it showing for you to see it properly. The textures in this shot seem to have been doubled up, even though I did a search for VH. I think it looked in a subfolder as well as the main fill folder.
There are two stone and two rock textures at the moment. I'm having to keep the number of variations down just a bit to compensate for the fact that these are some very large textures (as you can see from the info box on that rock texture - 3000 px square). That's so you don't get as much of the repeating pattern, but it does mean that every texture has to really carry its weight and be worth the expense on the cache memory in CC3. So it's best to start with just two of each thing and work from there ;)
Do you think it will make sense to turn a bit down the red in the rock texture inside the brick walls? I think it will help to blend the two (i mean the walls and the rock) even better... But it already looks amazing!😍🤩
@Quenten It was a built in symbol, but there is a variant that has no arrow.
Recently (today, actually) I decided that even though there are graphic issues with how well arrows render in isolation, they should all be separate. That means fewer symbols overall because you don't have to have two versions of each set of stairs.
Hard to tell. I've got a lot of brain fog going on at the moment through lack of sleep, so I can't remember if I read your comment before or after I started. It was about the same time, and that's all I can say. Though I have been working on the stairs for several days already. I think the main problem is that I keep changing my mind about the best way to do this or that.
(The arrows are twice the size they need to be so I can get them out of Affinity without them looking fury. Pixelated, that is to say)
@DaltonSpence Thanks - good to know, since I only have those 'public building' stairs to my flat, which are larger all over than most house stairs.
@JulianDracos The normal resolution for dungeon map assets is 100px per map unit, so that's 100px per foot. This is relatively high res. While I could draw everything at 200px per map unit, that would place a huge burden on both the MB size of the annual, and on CC3 performance - taking far more than twice as much cache per item.
The real problem seems to be that Affinity doesn't do a terribly good job of exporting bitmap images from vector graphic files (which is what you see above. So to compensate for that I make problem graphics twice the size, export them, and then reduce them again in GIMP. It seems ironic, really, but the free app GIMP makes a much better job of resampling than the purchased app Affinity does.
There have been too many requests for more flexible stair options in the past for me to ignore. Plus, I was doing the regular stairs anyway and had a few spare.
On thing to keep in mind is the growth of VTT and battlemaps. I think people are wanting more realistic and high quality art work for those. So, what may have been good for printable material for a GM to use or decent enough to print out for players, is not always suitable. For VTT and battlemaps, I think people are wanting not just a stair symbol, but a visualization of the stairs in terms of how they look.
So I think expanding stair and other options for symbols I think will help with the new uses people need from maps.
In many cases, you cannot apply affects to symbols. Do you know if drop shadows or other affects will work with the snakes and mushrooms? They just look a little flat to me so I was thinking some sheet effects would help with that.
Actually, Julian has a point there. I could very easily make them look more 3D at the flick of a switch (apply 3D filter), but the problem with doing that is they will look odd when rotated and their highlights are all over the place relative to each other.
Comments
Thank you :)
It's an annual issue for later this year, and was initially inspired by DD3, though I have already gone off on something of a tangent with the colour scheme to the point where Creepy Crypts is now distinctly different. That is not to say that you won't be able to use DD3 symbols and fills with it if you want to - just that I am no longer adhering as strictly to the colours and textures of DD3.
I've more or less done all the textures now, so the next few weeks should see some suitable symbols appearing in the test map.
Sorry, @JulianDracos! I got notification that there was a comment on my thread and only saw Dalton's at the bottom of the page.
Those two textures are indeed marble, and I was already thinking that they are too purplish blue. The strange thing is that this has only looked wrong since I made the rock a warmer grey than it was to start with. It's one of those curious things that happen when you start making lots of different greys to use together. They don't always look all that great unless you use the same kind of grey, or very closely related greys. In effect they are now a very dull mix of purple and orange together (the marbles and the rest of the stone stuff). No worries - it will look better when I'm done with it ;)
The grout on the flagstones is deliberately flat with equal shadow all around each stone. That is because if you give it a 3D effect the light has to come from a particular direction, so the floor looks odd if you align the fill to a different angle. We'll see how it goes.
There are other textures. I just didn't manage to get them all in shot. There's another surface dirt loam texture, green slime and the mud is there around the water's edge. There's not quite enough of it showing for you to see it properly. The textures in this shot seem to have been doubled up, even though I did a search for VH. I think it looked in a subfolder as well as the main fill folder.
There are two stone and two rock textures at the moment. I'm having to keep the number of variations down just a bit to compensate for the fact that these are some very large textures (as you can see from the info box on that rock texture - 3000 px square). That's so you don't get as much of the repeating pattern, but it does mean that every texture has to really carry its weight and be worth the expense on the cache memory in CC3. So it's best to start with just two of each thing and work from there ;)
At least after Thursday's livestream, you have the template for making the Creepy Crypt's Cat 😉
That's super cool @Loopysue!
Do you think it will make sense to turn a bit down the red in the rock texture inside the brick walls? I think it will help to blend the two (i mean the walls and the rock) even better... But it already looks amazing!😍🤩
Thank you :)
I would be more inclined to increase the red in the cobble texture, but there are two of those, and the other one is more red ;)
Looks fantastic already!
Is the arrow on the stairs a built in feature of the symbol, or its own separate symbol. I would MUCH prefer the latter.
@AleD Thank you :)
@Quenten It was a built in symbol, but there is a variant that has no arrow.
Recently (today, actually) I decided that even though there are graphic issues with how well arrows render in isolation, they should all be separate. That means fewer symbols overall because you don't have to have two versions of each set of stairs.
Good, I hope I contributed to that decision.
Hard to tell. I've got a lot of brain fog going on at the moment through lack of sleep, so I can't remember if I read your comment before or after I started. It was about the same time, and that's all I can say. Though I have been working on the stairs for several days already. I think the main problem is that I keep changing my mind about the best way to do this or that.
(The arrows are twice the size they need to be so I can get them out of Affinity without them looking fury. Pixelated, that is to say)
- Width of tread: 3 feet*.
- Depth of tread: 10 inches (including 1 inch nosing).
- Height of riser: 7.5 inches.
- Six steps between floor and landing.
- Depth of landings: 3 feet*.
- Width of landings: 7 feet*.
- Width of outer railing: 4 inches.
- Gap between railings: 4 inches.
- Newel post: 12"×4" (cap has 1" lip all around).
* Includes 1 inch wainscotting along outer wall at floor level.I hope this helps.
Setting a high DPI doesn't solve the furriness issue?
@DaltonSpence Thanks - good to know, since I only have those 'public building' stairs to my flat, which are larger all over than most house stairs.
@JulianDracos The normal resolution for dungeon map assets is 100px per map unit, so that's 100px per foot. This is relatively high res. While I could draw everything at 200px per map unit, that would place a huge burden on both the MB size of the annual, and on CC3 performance - taking far more than twice as much cache per item.
The real problem seems to be that Affinity doesn't do a terribly good job of exporting bitmap images from vector graphic files (which is what you see above. So to compensate for that I make problem graphics twice the size, export them, and then reduce them again in GIMP. It seems ironic, really, but the free app GIMP makes a much better job of resampling than the purchased app Affinity does.
@Quenten One spiral sans arrow (and a colorize effect on the cobbles to make them more similar to the rock)
I might be getting slightly off topic here, but I made some rocks that can double as cliff material.
But we do need the stuff to generate the right sort of mood, so maybe not?
I think adding more rock variety is a great idea !
Thank you, Jim :)
Those steps look fantastic too, the way you have done them.
I agree, more typical of what I think of dungeon stairs.
Thank you, both :)
There have been too many requests for more flexible stair options in the past for me to ignore. Plus, I was doing the regular stairs anyway and had a few spare.
I like the rocks.
On thing to keep in mind is the growth of VTT and battlemaps. I think people are wanting more realistic and high quality art work for those. So, what may have been good for printable material for a GM to use or decent enough to print out for players, is not always suitable. For VTT and battlemaps, I think people are wanting not just a stair symbol, but a visualization of the stairs in terms of how they look.
So I think expanding stair and other options for symbols I think will help with the new uses people need from maps.
Snakes, fungi, mould and guano...
Yet still no cat... 😁🐈️
Ill get there...
I also don't see a mouse.
Will rats do?
In many cases, you cannot apply affects to symbols. Do you know if drop shadows or other affects will work with the snakes and mushrooms? They just look a little flat to me so I was thinking some sheet effects would help with that.
Drop shadows, and some other effects will work with symbols.
Actually, Julian has a point there. I could very easily make them look more 3D at the flick of a switch (apply 3D filter), but the problem with doing that is they will look odd when rotated and their highlights are all over the place relative to each other.
I will see what I can do....
I would prefer you didn't because drop shadows and directional shadows work on symbols normally eg trees, furniture etc.