Newbie Questions - One General (best way to learn) and One Specific (Inserting image files)

DigitalLogic

Hi everyone!

I am an orginal D&D'er (white box, 3 pamphlets, 3x5 index cards, skipping dates with my highschool girl friend to go an 'epic adventure') and long time DM. I have been 'kicking it old school' for a while with my world and dungeon creation with 17" x 22" graph paper.

But when I got an idea for a new world (think 17th century Carribean with contesting empires, freebooters, pirates, ancient civilizations, etc.), I decided this was the perfect time to 'update' my tools and production. So after a lot of careful searching and reviewing, I settled on CC3+.

But while I have been a coder and network engineer, I have never actually used a CAD program or a Graphic Imaging program.

So my General Question: Best place to start? I do have the CC3 Essentials and CC+ manual, and I know there are video tutorials out there, but I learn best by working on a real project.

Which leads to my Specific Question: I have scanned in a hand-drawn map of "Il-Baħar ta 'Arawak" (my version of the Carribean). Following the guidance I found in this forum, I have tried to import this map so I can 'trace' over it with CC3+ tools. But when I try to import it using Draw>Insert File, I get a "Could not open file" error box.

I have saved my scanned image as PNG, BMP, and JPG, but they all give the same result!

Help! I do NOT want to have to freehand draw this into CC3+!

Thanks!

Monsen

I highly recommend you start with either the manual or the video tutorials. While you may find your own projects a good way to learn, there tend to crop up all of this myriad of questions of how do I do that, and then that, and then that, and so on. The manual is paced to learn the right things in the right order. I don't think "jumping from problem to problem" which is what tends to happen if you just dive right in is the best way to learn CC3+.

That error typically happens if your file is too large. Try to reduce the image size in an image editor before inserting it.

Josh.P.

Don't start with the project you bought CC3+ for. I can't stress this enough. Do some small maps. Learn the tools. Make the mistakes. Learn from them. Then start.

Lean on the resources that are available to you.

YouTube Videos - This is my channel and aims to help the new guys.
If you have Facebook there are currently 630 of us hiding in here chatting every day: https://www.facebook.com/groups/1830466227284189/

DigitalLogic

Hmmm. Okay. The two of you have persuaded me. I won't start by trying to build a big, complicated map.

Josh, I bookmarked your channel, and will start working through it.

Monsen, I will try reducing the size of the file.

Thanks to both of you!