caenissnow’s stuff

[Kelemelan]

Map maker as in software or as in person ?

Regarding the former, Fractal Mapper works all right for a limited investment. you can check a trial version over there: http://www.nbos.com/nox/download.php?id=144

It’s quite limited to fantasy though but I recon it shouldn’t be an issue. 🙂

[caenissnow]

Software…. I tried drawing it myself but honestly I think something I could edit would be lots easier. Campaign Cartographer is INSANE price wise so geez that’s out. I have Photoimpact, not Photoshop so I can’t find anything useful in so far as plugins for map building. I have Project Dogwaffle Howler for painting so I could do it by hand but eh.. That’s so much work. 😀 I just need to make a world map… So far only 4 countries are involved, but really these stories might end up being written for many years to come and I have references to the rest of the world throughout both books.

i’ll check out the trial one. And yeah my books are fantasy, just in a world after ours, so fantasy map stuff is cool.

[Kelemelan]

Yup, I get the idea. That’s why I suggested Fractal Mapper. It’s much more compact than Campaign Cartographer and as a consequence, way easier to learn and much cheaper. 🙂

[Fasoldgames]

I like the new avatar, nice hair, and you look a bit more serious :). Only, the glasses seem to float in midair?

I personally use Hexographer for maps (http://www.hexographer.com), its quite handy, only the maps are divided in hexagons, but you can switch off the visible dividing lines.

[caenissnow]

Yeah… They’re just a couple of rounded rectangles. 😀 And I flipped the ePic Char Gen girl so her hair is parted like mine. Silly but fun. 😛 It was just for my avatar here and on steam and you don’t really see them up close so I fudged a bit. 🙂

I’ve seen that hexographer before… I’ll check it out too. Good to know you can turn off the lines. I think that’s what put me off of it before. Since this map will be mainly to help me visualize it and to calculate distances it doesn’t have to be too pretty. Needs to be functional.

Thanks you guys. I’ll check out both. 🙂

[kalnaren]

For mapping I use Campaign Cartographer. It’s a little pricey (or a lot pricey with all of the addons) but it’s absolutely the best mapping software out there. I mostly use it to draw battlemaps though.

There’s an awesome online map generator… The name escapes me at the moment, i’ll post it when I’m not on my phone.

EDIT:

Or i could avoid doing work for a few more minutes

https://donjon.bin.sh/fantasy/world/

[Kelemelan]

[quote=”caenissnow” post=2836] Campaign Cartographer is INSANE price wise so geez that’s out. [/quote]

CC is damn expensive, indeed, plus it’s CAD architecture isn’t exactly super-intuitive.

That’s why I suggested Fractal Mapper, which is much more affordable and more akin to an image editing soft focused on maps. It works for simple, easy and yet complete maps. 🙂

So, yeah, all in all, CC is most prolly better, but it should be, it’s like 8 times more expensive. (all add-ons included for both of them) 😉

[kalnaren]

For me, being someone of zero artistic talent but fine with CAD, CC3 is aweaome.

Mostly i do stuff like this:

[Kelemelan]

I own both CC3+ and Fractal Mapper so I’ve got a pretty good idea of the end results (and how much work that can require, btw 😉 ). 🙂

But where the price is involved Fractal Mapper is cheaper no matter what. CC3’s total cost with add-ons is several hundreds GBP : . While you can have the full fractal mapper suite for like 50 USD, 30 or so for the basic soft, iirc

[caenissnow]

Yeah… they’re more than I can afford right now. CC I’ve coveted for years but is WAAAAAAY too pricy. To be perfectly honest i’m very poor and have to wait till i can scrounge up some money before I can buy anything.

I have used Donjon’s map thing in the past. Made this using it a while back:

I made several worlds and pieced them together and then ran them through multiple effects in Photoimpact… The problem is, it’s the whole world and not useful for the country I need. I have to get in there and put in details.

So sad when you can see the whole world in your head and can’t get it out. 😀 I so wish for a thought printer. 😀 Would be amazing.

[Fasoldgames]

[quote=”kalnaren” post=2842]For me, being someone of zero artistic talent but fine with CAD, CC3 is aweaome.

Mostly i do stuff like this:

Looks very nice. I can see how that would help with roleplaying, to flesh out an inn, or wayside fort, and give the players something visual.

@caennissnow: I like your world map too, especially the border, it looks like one of these ancient papyrus scrolls, that you can roll out.

[caenissnow]

Thanks, Fasoldgames. 🙂

Yeah kalnaren, that looks great. 🙂

What i need is like showing where the various towns are so I can figure out distances and travel times. The huge map I made is just too small for what I really need scale-wise. I’m still thinking about it. 😛 I’m probably making this a far bigger deal than what it should be. As long as it makes sense in the books I guess I shouldn’t worry about it. 😛 It just would be nice to make sense getting so many groups to the same place at the same time in the story. That happens a lot in there for battles and such. Have to time all these different parties leaving so they all arrive on schedule. With one town being 6 days travel by foot away and another only hours away… lots of timing issues and messengers to work out. 😛

[Kelemelan]

Now there’s the old dirt cheap option which is still working.

I’ve drawn countless fantasy maps by hand while computers were just an expensive not so convenient stuff (yeah, fantasy, I used to GM fantasy, like everybody ;P ).

A pen and a paper are the most cost effective way to keep an eye on your world your character’s travels and so on without spending much money (for now). 🙂

I’ve been there, that’s how I designed my original maps afterall. ^_^

[caenissnow]

Well, actually that was the first thing I tried. And when the book was smaller and the world tinier, the terrible thing I drew worked, but as the world got bigger and the books far longer I figured out I need something massive. But honestly, i need to stick with one project at a time. If I’m doing art, I have to just do art. Music, just music. Etc. I get a bit obsessed. 😛 So right now I’m trying hard to focus solely on writing. I stopped long enough to do a couple of terrible paintings for the book, and ended up losing a lot of time messing with it. I think I posted this one here at the time:

But yeah…. I mean I could do it… but I’m kinda hoping for the easier way out to save time. 😀 I’ll think about it.

Attachments:

• urgulanddiamondafterHALFSIZE_2016-09-07.jpg

[Kelemelan]

Don’t do “art” (where the maps are involved that is), just draw simple maps to know that the land of X is there and the land Z is east of the land of X with the city of P 20 miles from the border.

You don’t need more than that for writing your book, the map is just for reference purpose since the reader won’t see it. If it’s an hindrance don’t do it. But quick and easy sounds like the operative words as long as they help. 🙂

Remember that R. E. Howard’s Hyborian world was designed out of a map as simple as that one: https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/5/5c/Maphyboria.jpg (and even this one is edited the original one was even simpler actually 😛 )

[Author]

Posts