Thanks guys :)

@Maidhc O Casain A Tree of Life is already there. I just haven't drawn it yet.

Hi, shortstack :)

Did you turn off your AV and install all the software by right clicking the installer and picking "Run as administrator"?

If yes, did you allow the app to open when it wanted to open at the end of each installation process?

Have you downloaded and installed the most recent update for CC3+? (This needs to be done at the end of the whole process - again, if you already did it before but then installed something else)

Or, you could just draw the map first (minus the dead giveaway scale items like trees and such), and then scale it down by eye. That way the map is 'finished already'. You just need to agree the scale with the client - who maybe should be the one to be left with the headache anyway?

Hi Aramisdante :)

Here's a confession. I have no idea why I made that last comment above when Remy and Chris had already solved the matter. At a guess I probably drafted it, abandoned it, then posted it by mistake a couple of days later. It feels completely out of place.

However, it's there now, and its prompted you to ask a question I can answer, so here we go :)

I don't generally use bookmarks, but I believe they only operate within CC3. Hyperlinks are certainly only within CC3.

I learned sheet effects by reading the brief description of what each of them does in the manual and then playing with the ones I understood (and then some of the ones I didn't understand) for many hours, days and weeks, until I figured out how to get whatever specific visual result I was after. I can't remember seeing any videos made specifically about sheet effects bar one, and that was attached to a blog about sheet effects called "Day and Night" by Remy Monsen.

There are quite a number of blog articles about sheet effects. You might want to have a read of some of Remy's articles if you have time:

Here are some of mine, though they tend to concentrate on coastal and oceanic effects.

Happy Christmas yourself! :)

That's a beautiful map. Thanks for sharing :)

Is it possible to mess with the shadows on the strips?

If it is, then does it look better with longer shadows to cast the back of the strips in more shade?

Also, I think some of the labels are escaping into the fresh air over the edges of the strips.

That's fair enough - about the towns fitting in a single hex. I would recommend using the smaller symbols though, so that they are clearer. For instance call a hamlet a village, a village a town, and a town a city. That way you never have to fit a whole actual city symbol in such a tiny hex. Squished up symbols look bad.

Have you looked at the Options tab in the Save as... dialog?

Here is what you get when you click it (my personal settings shown here for an automatic 3000 px on the long side export cropped automatically to the MAP BORDER)

These particular settings mean you only have to export a simple straightforward image file without fussing about picking any corners, as long as your MAP BORDER layer has the right boundary on it.

Several things here.

There was nothing on the WALLS sheet to stop the light going outside the cave, so I copied the floor to the WALLS sheet and gave the polygon a line width of 1ft to make it a wall rather than a floor.

The WALLS sheet had to be below the LIGHTS sheet, so that it was part of the lit scene and could stop the light coming out of the cave. I moved it up the list to make this true. Unfortunately, I don't know where your entrance is, so you will need to cut one out of the wall or redraw the wall.

The effects were set up ok, but the column was on the LIGHTS sheet, and not the SYMBOLS TALL sheet. That's why it wasn't casting any shadow.

I may have tweaked other things while I was messing around getting it to work, but I tried not to.

You now have a new problem I'm not sure how to cure. The lights are casting rays in the shadows. I think @Monsen might be able to help you with that one. Here is the FCW I produced from yours.

The door will flip direction depending on which side of the central line of the wall you approach it from. So if you approach the wall with the door from the left it will be one way around, and from the right it will be the other way around. Hover a door over a wall, moving from one side of it to the other and you will see the flip in action.