Hi Everyone :)

I've just started working on a new style called Forest Trail, which is due out in November as an issue in the Cartographer's Annual. I thought you might like to see the strange little world I work with when I'm just starting to work out the colour scheme and the textures. A mixture of serious business with the texture swatches, and play time doodles with borrowed symbols from other styles I've made.

It's loosely related to Creepy Crypts, but with a brighter more cheerful colour scheme, and should include ruin bits, and of course lots of tree parts.

I'm nearly there with the cemetery stuff now. I just need to do the wall and gates to go in that blank bit near the bottom.

Each of those bands is a pass made by the rendering engine.

You can use wider passes by typing the command EXPORTSETMPPP and hitting return. The command line will tell you the current Maximum Pixels Per Pass, which at default setting is 4000000 (4 million without commas).

Try typing 40000000 (40 million), hitting return, and trying your export again.

Well, there are actually several ways of getting the shadows to behave themselves properly. That was only one idea, which may or may not work for you. The other way is to create a new sheet called something like CLIFF TOPPING and use it to draw a shadow-casting plateau that covers the entire area of the higher ground a bit like this.

Here is the FCW for you so you can show and hide sheets and see what I did. It might be harder or easier to do it like this. I don't know. Only you can tell what issues might arise, as the creator of the map.

And here is the alternative I described before.

I haven't even tried to imitate those beautiful colours you created, but these are just 'how to' examples ;)

You're welcome :)

If its a plain, its a plain. Don't be afraid to map it as it is. There are plenty of symbol assets in this style to add points of interest across that vast plain. Spend some time looking through the symbols and picking out things you could add to a plain. Maybe paste them somewhere out of the way in the ocean or outside the map so you don't forget what they were or where they were. It's easy enough just to move them into position later, or to delete them if you change your mind.

Have you downloaded and installed the free monthly content for Mike Schley overland? This style is still growing. If you haven't, you will find the single download file listed under CC3+ on your downloads tab when you log into your account.