My homebrew CS map.

[Blackrat]

Well here is the map of Arandon Alliance, the eastern edge of my homebrew world. I posted it to another thread and thought I'd share it with the Art Gallery also. Created solely with MS Paint.

http://www.enworld.org/attachment.php?attachmentid=31915

 

[Angel Tarragon]

Holy Cow. Not bad for MS Paint. Where did you get the symbols for the map?

 

[Blackrat]

I used the symbols on Warcraft 3 loading screens as models but essentially created them myself.

 

[Angel Tarragon]

Any chance for a quick tutorial?

 

[Blackrat]

Um. Well. You print one of the loading screens, Open Paint, Zoom in max, Look how the symbol looks from the print and draw similar pixel by pixel. Can't really help much more than that. Not really too hard but took some time to get them look as I like.

 

[Pyrandon]

Hey, Blackrat: Nice map--especially for MS Paint! Have you ever thought of upgrading to either a pay software set (like Campaign Cartographer or Dundjinni) OR downloading a free graphics program (like Inkscape or the GIMP). Why do I ask? Well, as I looked at your map I kept thinking to myself, "Man, if he can do this in Paint, think what he could produce in another app!"

I like a lot of your names, too, especially Lake End and Rabbit Hills. It gives a lot of realism that such places named so mundanely would stand beside such exotically named locales.

Oh, and one question on the map: the river running by/through Stormhill appears to go from body of water to body of water (or, actually, one shore of the Celmanthor Ocean to another) If so, is this a magical occurrence of the campaign, for this is all but geographically impossible, I believe.

Thanks for sharing. Nice one!

 

[Blackrat]

Yeah I've tried some mapping programs. I think I once toyed with Campaign Cartographer, but I didn't like it. I made a delibarate decision to stick with Paint. I actually prefer it even over Photoshop.

I need to go through my material to find the reason for that river. I don't remember ofhand what the reason was but there was somesort of explanation for it. Something magical...

 

[Lalato]

For something in between Paint and Photoshop, I suggest Paint.NET. It's free and offers the simplicity of Paint with some better Photoshop style tools.

http://getpaint.net

Nice Job!
--sam

 

[Rhun]

Hey Blackrat, nice map! And FWIW, I used MS Paint to draw the campaign map for my world as well, so I know how difficult it can be to use. I love the symbols for the map...great touch.

 

[Blackrat]

For something in between Paint and Photoshop, I suggest Paint.NET. It's free and offers the simplicity of Paint with some better Photoshop style tools.

http://getpaint.net

Nice Job!
--sam

Thanks Lalato. I'll check that program out.

Hey Blackrat, nice map! And FWIW, I used MS Paint to draw the campaign map for my world as well, so I know how difficult it can be to use. I love the symbols for the map...great touch.

Thanks. Yeah. It's difficult and time consuming but I love the simplicity of Paint. And it was actually quite fun making those symbols pixel by pixel.