What Style Looks Best in Grayscale?

JulianDracos · July 2020

I am going to print a book in B&W instead of color. I have made maps using the Inks style. It gives things a nice OSR feeling. However, I like the look of some of the color styles better. I was wondering if people had thoughts on which styles look best when converted to grayscale?

Loopysue · July 2020

The only way to tell is convert a few for yourself. You can do that by adding an RGB Matrix Process to the whole map and picking "grey" as the preset.

The main issue with converting colour maps is the overall lack of contrast.

JulianDracos · July 2020

So I add the RGB Matrix as an option in CC3+? Currently I just output the map as JPG or something and then open in GIMP. Then, I convert to grayscale. It is time consuming so I was hoping people had some opinions on this.

[Deleted User] · July 2020

You can use Effects for this - pick 'Whole Drawing' on the Sheets pop-down menu, the apply the RGB Matrix as Sue has said.
The first is part of a map i am working on in colour; the second is the same map in Grey using the method above. Time < 30 secs

Tanker55 · July 2020

I think that the simpler, the better, and if you don't like something simple that you like, then try to go for the style with the highest contrast.
I've encountered countless black&white maps that were unreadable due to the low contrast between colours in the original document, which turned into a mess of medium-to-dark grey once converted to B&W. From what I see, the map above looks pretty good, there's a clear difference not only between the streets, the buildings and the sea (or is it a river?), but between different buildings as well.

[Deleted User] · July 2020

River. Thanks for the compliments. Still took <30 secs, and I didn't choose the style for its greyscale abilities.

JulianDracos · July 2020

Thanks for the help. I found the option and was able to get it to work.

Posted By: Tanker55I think that the simpler, the better, and if you don't like something simple that you like, then try to go for the style with the highest contrast.
I've encountered countless black&white maps that were unreadable due to the low contrast between colours in the original document, which turned into a mess of medium-to-dark grey once converted to B&W. From what I see, the map above looks pretty good, there's a clear difference not only between the streets, the buildings and the sea (or is it a river?), but between different buildings as well.

I found this a helpful consideration when making the maps. I will look for high contrast color styles to play around with first.

JulianDracos · July 2020

This is to help people who might search the forums for this in the future. I ran across a series of blog posts where an existing template style was converted to grayscale. Oddly enough, this never came up when I searched previously.

https://rpgmaps.profantasy.com/creating-a-new-map-style-part-1-basic-considerations/
https://rpgmaps.profantasy.com/creating-a-new-map-style-part-2-fill-styles/
https://rpgmaps.profantasy.com/creating-a-new-style-part-3-adding-symbols/

Part 2 I found the most helpful for changing to grayscale, but the others are important if you do not know CC3 well enough to build your own map style.

Tanker55 · July 2020

<blockquote><cite>Posted By: JulianDracos</cite>Thanks for the help. I found the option and was able to get it to work.

I found this a helpful consideration when making the maps. I will look for high contrast color styles to play around with first.</blockquote>

Glad it helped you! When you'll be looking for styles, make sure that the contrast lies in the clarity of colors (as in, with a good graduation of the darkness/lightness of colors), and not in the array of colors used.
A map in shades of blue will be monochromous in color but will offer a nice gradient of grey once in black and white, while a map using radically different colors like green, red, brown and purple will turn into a soup of medium grey.

Graphic motives on surfaces (like the stone-like texture of the streets and the waves on the water on the map above) will be a huge plus, too.

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What Style Looks Best in Grayscale?

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