Here's an update on the volcanic Island in the middle of the sea on the left side of the continent and an update on the peninsula in the north of the continent. And I also did the mountain range on the right side of the continent, between the equatorial and the desert area.
Racial groups can differ very markedly from cultural groups - look at the wide differences in UK, Ireland, Australian, NZ, Canadian and US cultures, yet all are basically Anglo-Irish. Or take the Vietnamese, Cambodian, Chinese and Japanese - yet all are of the 'Mongoloid' race. And the Slavic cultures differ a lot too. Finally, why do those of 'Chinese' culture have to look like present day Chinese - they could look like Amerindians or Australian Aboriginals, or Maori, or even - gasp - English!. My point is that cultures do not follow on racial lines, but on different localities and history. Why, even orcs may have become civilized - though they would be like the Mongol hordes of Genghis Khan, or the Viking raiders of Europe - yet the last two did become very civilized - the latter founded Russia after all (though whether modern day Russia is civilized is another point altogether). Regardless, your work, and your historiography are superb. I look forward to every HadianVII installment each day.
I was not sure whether you ment fantasy or human races. But I do see what you mean. I hadn't consiously thought about this before, but I thought about changing the appearance of some of the people to better fit with the setting. Therefore, thank you for pointing this out. I'm not sure whether I'll make a seperate overlay for the races or whether I'll just describe the races in the description. I tend to feel a bit uncomfortable with the concept of explicitly naming races and drawing racial borders for them.
Regarding modern day Russia and the fact that Viking raiders founded Russia: If one applied the modern day Russian logic regarding Crimea on this fact, then the Scandinavian Countries could claim that large territories within Russia actually belonged to them.:P
For the volcanic smoke I used the light and dark versions of the standard CC3 "evil lands" fill, which I put on two separate sheets. I then added a strong blur, transparency, directional wall shaddow and a slight texturize effect. And for the Lava I actually used the standard light brown mountain fill and increased its saturation until it looked like lava.
Here's yet another update on Continent D. I think this one will be finished soon. I'm not sure whether I should go more into detail with the names. So far I named the rough regions and the mountain range in the south, but the latter is hardly readable.
I hope you guys like it and if you have any suggestions or comments please let me know.
Here's another update. I added the contours of some of the other continents to further emphasize the size of the continent. I also started working on political borders but they are not finished yet hence I hid the sheet.
Mind an advice? Try to play with rivers colours or definition.
To me they look too shiny and don´t help on looking the map as great as the other parts of the map do. Maybe a bit more "blurried" so they fit better? Not sure, i guess it needs experimentation. They are too sharp compared with the rest of the map. Maybe with some transparency (low percentage transparency probably) it would work.
Just my 2 cents and maybe i´m just the only one thinking that heh. Otherwise, a top notch map.
I agree with you. I noticed this too, especially in full view. Adding a slight transparency effect will most likely resolve the issue. I use an inverted bevel effect on the rivers, hence blur is not my first option. Anyway, thank you for pointing that out. I probably would have forgotten to rework it.
Here's a quick update on the river issue.I added a 50% transparency to the rivers sheet. What do you guys think? I'm not sure what is causing the rivers to be this dominant. Most of them are in fact very small but they seem to appear larger in full view for some reason.
I like the transparency, but maybe a bit less, 40%? The river that runs along the north edge of Qaras must be very interesting. Almost 3000 Miles from head waters to mouth.
I agree that this is looking really splendid now. Since the surrounding continents appeared, it's definitely helped tie it into the whole world as well, I think.
That has though made me wonder if perhaps the Tobruq desert needs "greening" a little on its western side, because looking at Alarius, the facing shore of that continent isn't desert. While the sea between them is quite wide, and yes, this is a fantasy world, it could be more likely the near-coastal areas at least wouldn't be quite so brutally desertified as it currently seems. The Dungroth desert seems to fit quite well across the still wider sea belt to northwestern Kumarikandam's Maluk Almayta desert, by contrast, for instance.
However, I realise too that this is still WIP, and Scalica has been recently "greened", so perhaps I'm just a little too eager!
Thank you pvernon, Quenten, Charles, Medio and Wyvern for your comments.
Thank you very much, Wyvern, for pointing this out. I did not consider this so far. I will rework the northern desert tomorrow (and maybe the southern too - the climate zones seem a bit rectangular atm).
Here's my latest update. I think I am nearly done here. I'll do some minor tweaks and then send it in tomorrow, unless someone has any further suggestions. On this map I won't go further into detail with names or map notes, so the mappers who work on the next level have more artistic freedom.
Thank you very much, Quenten. Now that you say it, they do seem a bit large. But I will probably not change it anymore, because I have 3 different sizes of cities of which only two can be seen in full view. If I wanted to change the size, I would have to replace every icon and there are over 300 of them. If I could figure out a convenient way to change it without having to replace all of them manually, I would most likely do it.
I found a simple way to make the cities smaller: I just hid the outline sheet. This way the Icons don't look as beautiful, but they aren't as big as before. I'm writing the map notes right now. And then I'll hand it in.
Edit: The map has been handed in. This is the final version.
Comments
@Quenten: What do you mean by racial groups? The cultural borders also indicate races to some extend.
@Thank you, Monsen, I did not know that.
Here's an update on the volcanic Island in the middle of the sea on the left side of the continent and an update on the peninsula in the north of the continent. And I also did the mountain range on the right side of the continent, between the equatorial and the desert area.
And the Slavic cultures differ a lot too. Finally, why do those of 'Chinese' culture have to look like present day Chinese - they could look like Amerindians or Australian Aboriginals, or Maori, or even - gasp - English!. My point is that cultures do not follow on racial lines, but on different localities and history. Why, even orcs may have become civilized - though they would be like the Mongol hordes of Genghis Khan, or the Viking raiders of Europe - yet the last two did become very civilized - the latter founded Russia after all (though whether modern day Russia is civilized is another point altogether).
Regardless, your work, and your historiography are superb. I look forward to every HadianVII installment each day.
I was not sure whether you ment fantasy or human races. But I do see what you mean. I hadn't consiously thought about this before, but I thought about changing the appearance of some of the people to better fit with the setting. Therefore, thank you for pointing this out. I'm not sure whether I'll make a seperate overlay for the races or whether I'll just describe the races in the description. I tend to feel a bit uncomfortable with the concept of explicitly naming races and drawing racial borders for them.
Regarding modern day Russia and the fact that Viking raiders founded Russia: If one applied the modern day Russian logic regarding Crimea on this fact, then the Scandinavian Countries could claim that large territories within Russia actually belonged to them.:P
For the volcanic smoke I used the light and dark versions of the standard CC3 "evil lands" fill, which I put on two separate sheets. I then added a strong blur, transparency, directional wall shaddow and a slight texturize effect. And for the Lava I actually used the standard light brown mountain fill and increased its saturation until it looked like lava.
I think this one will be finished soon. I'm not sure whether I should go more into detail with the names. So far I named the rough regions and the mountain range in the south, but the latter is hardly readable.
I hope you guys like it and if you have any suggestions or comments please let me know.
Here's another update. I added the contours of some of the other continents to further emphasize the size of the continent. I also started working on political borders but they are not finished yet hence I hid the sheet.
Mind an advice? Try to play with rivers colours or definition.
To me they look too shiny and don´t help on looking the map as great as the other parts of the map do. Maybe a bit more "blurried" so they fit better? Not sure, i guess it needs experimentation. They are too sharp compared with the rest of the map. Maybe with some transparency (low percentage transparency probably) it would work.
Just my 2 cents and maybe i´m just the only one thinking that heh. Otherwise, a top notch map.
I agree with you. I noticed this too, especially in full view.
Adding a slight transparency effect will most likely resolve the issue. I use an inverted bevel effect on the rivers, hence blur is not my first option. Anyway, thank you for pointing that out. I probably would have forgotten to rework it.
Here's a quick update on the river issue.I added a 50% transparency to the rivers sheet. What do you guys think?
I'm not sure what is causing the rivers to be this dominant. Most of them are in fact very small but they seem to appear larger in full view for some reason.
The river that runs along the north edge of Qaras must be very interesting. Almost 3000 Miles from head waters to mouth.
That has though made me wonder if perhaps the Tobruq desert needs "greening" a little on its western side, because looking at Alarius, the facing shore of that continent isn't desert. While the sea between them is quite wide, and yes, this is a fantasy world, it could be more likely the near-coastal areas at least wouldn't be quite so brutally desertified as it currently seems. The Dungroth desert seems to fit quite well across the still wider sea belt to northwestern Kumarikandam's Maluk Almayta desert, by contrast, for instance.
However, I realise too that this is still WIP, and Scalica has been recently "greened", so perhaps I'm just a little too eager!
Thank you very much, Wyvern, for pointing this out. I did not consider this so far.
I will rework the northern desert tomorrow (and maybe the southern too - the climate zones seem a bit rectangular atm).
Here's my latest update. I think I am nearly done here.
I'll do some minor tweaks and then send it in tomorrow, unless someone has any further suggestions.
On this map I won't go further into detail with names or map notes, so the mappers who work on the next level have more artistic freedom.
Now that you say it, they do seem a bit large. But I will probably not change it anymore, because I have 3 different sizes of cities of which only two can be seen in full view. If I wanted to change the size, I would have to replace every icon and there are over 300 of them. If I could figure out a convenient way to change it without having to replace all of them manually, I would most likely do it.
I'm writing the map notes right now. And then I'll hand it in.
Edit: The map has been handed in. This is the final version.