First Map, wanting to Get some input [WIP]
I have begun fleshing out my fantasy world for a while now, and recently decided to map it out. I chose Campaign Cartographer, and really love this tool, It has begun to feel very natural to me. I have two maps I would like some comment on, both are a work in progress atm.
The first map is a world view. I have only done one land mass so far, that of Krava. I debated for a long while the use of contours, but was inspired by the eberron campaign manual's world map. It just has the major bodies of water and rivers. I think it makes it clear when named. I am unhappy with the font and effects though, it is the middle ages font from the February 2009 Annual.
Below is the actual Continental Map of Krava, up close. Same issue with fonts, they seem to be odd to me.
I welcome any comments
The first map is a world view. I have only done one land mass so far, that of Krava. I debated for a long while the use of contours, but was inspired by the eberron campaign manual's world map. It just has the major bodies of water and rivers. I think it makes it clear when named. I am unhappy with the font and effects though, it is the middle ages font from the February 2009 Annual.
Below is the actual Continental Map of Krava, up close. Same issue with fonts, they seem to be odd to me.
I welcome any comments
Comments
You do seem to have some river issues. Rivers generally start in the mountains and don't split along the way as water tends to take the way of least resistance. It looks like you have lots of splitting rivers, which would be unnatural. Just remember, this is your map and you can do anything you want with it.
As for the labeling: I kinda gave up labeling in CC3 itself. I always label in another program. The labeling I used to do in CC3 ended up a bit crude, maybe because the software doesn't do anti-aliasing. Someone correct me if I am wrong.
I found over the years that what really makes a world map is the quality of the coast line and here you have something very reallistic.
Just one detail on the first map : the island below the N of the Southern Ocean has not the same contour as the other outlines. Wrong sheet, perhaps ?
What's wrong with the labelling ? Looks fine to me even if I'm more used to curved text where characters rotate with the line. If it's a lack of anti-aliasing it doesn't really show at that scale. However, a small blur effect might correct uneven lines, or maybe a very light glow effect the same color as the text.
What color do you use for the text ? I've experienced troubles with pure black (color 0). Using color 240 instead will correct it.
@Joachim
Good observation, I have cleaned up the little island
@Gnomish Mustard
I use two glows, one for the outside, and one for the inside. I played around with the effects until I found something I liked. I know there are other effects I could have used, but I liked the look of these two. I also used a 50% transparency on the forests, deserts, and grassland, so as to soften the distinction between them.
Very nice effects.
I still have a bit of a problem with the way the rivers flow.
Doesn't look natural to me.
But like Gandwarf said. Its your world and your rivers.
Thanks for the feedback Henrie61. I thought I got rid of those splitting rivers
To the north there's still some weird stuff happening. The river near the Whispering Woods label doesn't seem to have an outlet to the sea? And near the Skyhaven Islands you seem to have a lot of rivers that start in the lake and end in the ocean. These could be considered straits of course, but they look like rivers at the moment.
(A lake would normally have only one outlet to sea as well).
Looking at the map again, you seem to have some lakes not connected to the ocean. A lake not having an outlet is quite rare, although it does happen in the real world.
Splitting rivers mostly only happen when there's humans involved (when they build canals or other connections for example, but those need constant upkeep). There's the river delta of course. Sometimes near the ocean a river does split. The most famous delta being the Nile delta I guess.
You can still see were you deleted some rivers though. There are now empty corridors in some forests :-)
For a nice example on how rivers flow look here.
http://www.euratlas.com/Atlasphys/hydrography.htm
Any thoughts on the political border map I put up a few posts back? I was thinking when the map is being shown, under it I can have a clean list of what each place is ,with more information. I can also add tooltip like popups as the person hovers over the numbers. I did not try to put the names on there, as I think it would make the map very cramped. I need to rework it with the new base map of Krava, but wanted to get some second opinions before committing to it. Although I may do the location texts in photoshop still, the numbers seem to be really nice.
And its just the first continent.
Looking forward to more maps of this world.
As for the political borders.
I really like the style (ever since I saw the annual).
Then, I did a map of Corica, #1 on the politcial map above:
I like that idea of putting villages and cities on a hill.
There's just an adjustment to be done with Denor. With the mountains behind it sort of looks floating in the air.
What about raising the range of the white glow effect, perhaps less strong... Just a suggestion...
Thanks! I love the default CC3 and SS1 bitmaps. I hated the SS1 trees, but loved the fantasy worlds contour trees.
@Kmunoz
I first did a "save as" with my Krava Continental map as Corica.fcw. Once that was saved , I deleted everything except the corica island. I then scaled it up to its current size, then fractalised the coastline, to make it look more detailed. I approximated the two islands around it, though, I could have done the same process. This is the exact same process I used for taking Krava on the world map, and making it into its own continental map. Even resized the lakes, and it was good to go.
If I was doing a specific area that is part of a larger landmass, I am thinking you could edit the landmass outside the window you want (use the draw land tool, then hit E for edit), delete everything outside the area you want, then scale and fractalise. At least thats how I think I would do it, I will find out here shortly, as I will be doing #14 - Kromgor tonight to test this exact process. I am still new to CC3, so I am trying to nail down the processes,this will be a good test