Category: Cartography

I didn’t make a big deal of it at the time as it was a holiday, but on Thanksgiving I released Chapter 9 of this book. I’m aware I skipped 6-8 to get there, and with good reason: my computer doesn’t always handle mapping well, especially the types of mapping I have to do for these last three chapters. They’re resource-intensive in terms of lighting effects, depth, and other elements that add height to the image as a whole so it’s easier to get a sense of scale and the type of work necessary to create those three types of fortification. I’m working on updating Chapter 10 (I wrote it while in college 17 years ago) and doing edits to 7 & 8 as I work out how to best tackle the remaining maps to finish those chapters.

I’ve been working on the map and have overcome some of the problems I was having with a few elements.  Currently, the map is nearly done topographically.  I have to finish a few elements and then add all the buildings.

Castle Builder Reforged, Chapter 6 is mostly written.  It has been for years.  For some of you who might be wondering why it never came out, that’s because the map needed for a hill fort or motte-and-bailey structure has been well beyond my mapping skills for a while.  I spent the last couple of years (while not actively working or seeking employment to pay bills) learning how to be a better cartographer and picking up a writing job or two.  Now, the general concept is easy, the problem is getting the map to look like it has depth to actively illustrate the concept and look decent enough.

To that end, I started with the basic shapes for an isolated hill fort in a remote mountain range.  Here’s the blocking.  As you can see, it looks pretty boring and doesn’t make a good impression for several reasons.  The biggest being that the lowest level looks exactly the same as the level the fortress is supposed to sit on.  Plus, the layering for elevation is missing.  The colors of the various terrain features mean nothing here.

Okay, so, working from that, there’s a bit of a problem in here that might not make any sense to you just from that one photo, but it’s this:  the elevation rises too quickly for what I was trying to go for as the shapes are on different layers and it isn’t clear which one is which.  Okay, so that led to the next fix, which helped further define the area depicted in the map.  This map looks a little better as it makes the area where the switchback road leading up to the palisade look more believable as residing on the same general elevation plane.

Unfortunately, this doesn’t solve other problems.  The next thing I did was work on fixing the mountains to give a stepped appearance.  It looks a little better than the previous one, but there’s still not much difference here and one of the reasons is because I didn’t turn on any of the effects that would let the shadows suggest the “height” of the terrain around the area.  If you look at the upper right side of the map, you can see that some of the elevation starting to show up, but it’s still not really popping off the page.

So, I turned on the effects and added a few features I thought would work out, like a 10′ square grid.  Yeah…..you can take a look at the results and see for yourself that this not only didn’t work, but it really makes the map quality suffer horribly at this scale.  Part of that is the glow effect that softens the appearance of the grid so it isn’t so dark as to obscure everything.  I know because I was appalled by how terrible it looked.  Even at the scale here, it almost takes on a plaid look, which detracts from the information your eye should be looking at.

A bit later on, I got the “floor” in place so it doesn’t look the same as the bailey and then I added the lighting effects while ditching the grid.  It’s still rough, but you can see the map really start to pop and get a feel for what’s on top of what and even a bit of how it should look when some of the other features are added in the future.  Okay, maybe it’s not as easy for you to see them as it is for me, but there’s a clear progression to this and it works on some level even if it isn’t one that makes a whole lot of sense to someone on the outside.

Next I added the road and a few more mountainous features to add more detail and make the map look less like a paper collage art project.  Problem was the map edges looked too perfect.  They weren’t jagged enough, and—in some cases—were way too smooth.  The map isn’t finished, but as you can see in this latest image, the majority of the details have been made fuzzier where they matter the most.  There will be further changes as I go, but for now, you can see how the map is progressing and it’ll be finished as time permits.  I know I could have skimped on a lot of details here, but I don’t feel comfortable offering a clearly inferior map than what I could and should do.

But, at the moment, Malmart awaits and I’ve got a bit of outlining and research to do so I can make that project read as good as the audience deserves.

Okay,  so there’s a few things I should probably tell you right up front: I suck at mapping.  I have terrible drawing skills in large part because of a learning disability.  But, with graph paper and a ruler, I can fake it in small doses, so I went with an old school style as much for the homage as it was easy to do.  I thought I’d done a great job and the color looked right, enough that I took a photo.

Yeah, that’s what it looks like.  Nowhere near as cool as it looked when I was staring at it.  It’s too dark, for one.  Two, the colors look washed out a bit and get lost in each other.  Bad move on my part.  Given that, I figured I’d scan the picture and things would be okay, right?  Oh, no.  Nothing doing.  Here’s an “F” for effort.

So, scanning should fix it and everything’s going to be okay, won’t it?  Well….  Have a look for yourself.  Yeah, it’s hard to see that.  Hell, I wish I could unsee it and I scanned it.  I figured it wouldn’t be too horrible and I could just fire up GIMP and fix the colors and make things look awesome.  I mean, it’s basically Photoshopping and if it works for people it should work for a stupid drawing.

Nope, nope, nope.

 

Oh, holy hell, what’s that monstrosity?  The ugly, it burns!  Everything is wrong in too many ways to count.  Someone scratch my eyeballs out for me!  This is a nightmare.  Not only are the colors terrible, but they’re severely damaged as well.

This is a picture I wouldn’t give my best gaming frenemy.  Sorry, it’s too cruel even for me, and if you’ve seen some of the things I’ve written for my own Planescape campaign, you’ll get that.

The ink pen I used was not only the wrong choice, it’s flaws make this look like a hideously mimeographed piece your teacher would give you for homework you could barely read and made you want to curl up and cry yourself into a coma.  You all remember that?  No?  Damn, must be a late 80s/early 90s thing.

Gel pens suck for this sort of thing.  That’s the lesson I learned here.  The color would have been okay….maybe, but the missing portions of lines that look like there were hollow walls, that’s all the ball mechanism.

Good thing I own a ton of pens in more than 100 colors.  I whittled it down to my fine point light blue UniBall Vision.  It not only worked, it looks true to the old school line style.

The takeaway from all of this: colors don’t work the way you think and just because it looks awesome with the naked eye, scanners will reveal how much your work sucks if you don’t use the right tools.