Staffing Maps!

[Uaithne 543]

I was reading @Naen's into thread and the discussion of maps.

 

Maps are great. I love maps!

 

But aside from hand-drawing one, I'm not sure how to make one. There is software you can buy, but that costs good money. A few sites have free mapping programs (I'll have to find the links when I'm not on my phone) which might help some, though they're heavily fantasy / world-sized maps.

 

Any suggestions for town maps and maps for modern day RPs? (Besides using a map of a real town, which I'm not comfortable with when it comes to roleplays with violence or things that could be construed as a RL threat.)

 

Do you use maps for your site? As a member, do you need maps? What are your favorites?

[Naen 2]

GIMP is a good tool for image editing that can do mapping, and it is a free opensource competitor to photoshop.
Inkscape is a vector graphics program, also free, and there are tutorials on doing map type stuff in it available.

Some people will load a real life map image into a program like the above, then begin editing it and altering until it becomes something very different. Would probably be how I would approach a modern day map.

 

I've done my best work by drawing maps by hand and then scanning them into the computer where I improve them digitally (darkening, shading, editing, etc). Here is an example of a village map I did and use as the backdrop for my site that shows buildings, etc. Fantastical but might give an idea. The trees were kind of my original style, I think. Time consuming but I like the effect. 

 

 

Edited November 28, 2017 by Naen

[CovertSphinx 710]

I always did mine in photoshop. But, ended up being more flavor than hardcore use so I doubt I'll put that sort of work in again anytime soon.

[Naen 2]

Also wanted to say @Uaithne

The Cartographer's Guild http://www.cartographersguild.com is a wonderful resource for map making and I think there would be people there who could really tackle the modern city question. 

[Sadrienne 242]

I would love maps for my site. I would probably go as far as mapping out each building if I could -- they're so clear in my mind it's very hard for me to imagine that anyone else sees them different. Which, they absolutely do.

 

But I've never had enough issues with character's breaking "my" perception of the world to really warrant maps, and it would probably just be just flavour if I ever did get maps. More work than it would really be worth, as much as I would love to see these places come to life outside of my brain.