- Joined
- Feb 5, 2007
- Messages
- 446
I'm not sure if they've gone up yet (as I'm not used to uploading to Kayssplace), but all of my new-ish maps use interesting concepts. All of them have been done with a combination of lndromat and BWSurveyor.
One is a staircase made by using the fade-out effect in GIMP. Apprpriately, it is called Stairway. I have always wondered why nobody made whimsical, eccentric maps like this (though some of Kratzean's are somewhat whimsical and eccentric). It is pretty decent, except that it is still dusky, because I made it with the old version of lndromat.
Another, entitled The End, is just the largest map that I could seem to make with lndromat, a large, gently sloping circular dome, with a fantastic coastline.
One was my very first little project in lndromat, which looks kind of like a cookie, and is entitled Atlantis.
One is just a long, gentle slope to a sheer cliff, covered in rain systems. It is called "Maine," in reference of the rain and the cliff'd landscape.
The really interesting two, though, are one that is extracted from a photograph, Doris Humphrey, and another that I made only today, in about an hour and a half for map script, landscape, and all, with pencil, pen, Sharpie and paper.
For those that do not know, Doris Humphrey was an American dancer and choreographer. It is a nice photograph, though the highlights weren't as bright as they could have been, or the difference in colour would have been better. I just use, for photographs, the Land 5 texture set ("country") with snow at the top and grass at the bottom, so that the relative shades are correct, but I seem to have accidentally deleted most of these "picture lands." Nonetheless, this is a good example, and it is an easy way to make decent, artsy landscapes very quickly (say, five minutes), though the coastlines suck.
The last, though, is the best. This morning, I was again mourning the fact that I don't have a Tablet (which is a pressure-sensitive computer drawing accessory, which the Myst creators used in the Myst series to make their landscapes), when I realized that I have the next-best thing: A scanner. So, I sketched out a fairly random topographical map, then shaded it properly, then scanned it. I touched it up in GIMP, put it through lndromat, then Surveyor, then finally spent about an hour fixing up a rather lame script for it, total time one and a half hours. The coasts are nearly perfect, and the land is just as I imagined it, though a bit bumpier because I used textured paper (having no white plain paper at hand). This offers a tactile environment, easy line control and a quick, well-coasted landscape, and all you need is pens, paper, a scanner, and decent artistic talent (as in, able to shade; Actual talent isn't necessary.) However, not everybody has a scanner; But, for those that do, I highly recommend trying this.
My advice on using lndromat is as follows:
You can only use the center 256x256 block of pixels, not the whole 512x512, which is a pretty bad restriction, until you realize how immense 256x256 really is (i.e., Very Immense).
You need to be very sure that your coasts are dark. I try to make my highlights very bright, then burn the entire image twice at 75 power on GIMP, then blur the edges. This avoids the "coast glitch" in which you can literally see under a floating chunk of land, which looks shoddy and poorly made.
You need to use Surveyor to touch up the landscape; This is the best program for altering the textures of the land, and is good for fine-tuning little details that aren't immediately obvious in Surveyor.
The GIMP is basically a necessity for use with lndromat; It is powerful and easier to use than Photoshop.
Make sure that, when using the GIMP, you save your image as RAW image data, and manually insert .raw to the end. Also make sure that it is greyscale, and 512x512 pixels. When you lndromat it, if lndromat crashes, it is most likely because you have exceeded the center 256x256 pixel box. Try scaling your image down. When you finish with lndromat, make sure you tag your file .lnd, as the program doesn't do that automatically, either.
The best of luck, and I would like any advice on cultivation of these methods and styles, as well as stories of your own experience with these, if you should try to use them.
One is a staircase made by using the fade-out effect in GIMP. Apprpriately, it is called Stairway. I have always wondered why nobody made whimsical, eccentric maps like this (though some of Kratzean's are somewhat whimsical and eccentric). It is pretty decent, except that it is still dusky, because I made it with the old version of lndromat.
Another, entitled The End, is just the largest map that I could seem to make with lndromat, a large, gently sloping circular dome, with a fantastic coastline.
One was my very first little project in lndromat, which looks kind of like a cookie, and is entitled Atlantis.
One is just a long, gentle slope to a sheer cliff, covered in rain systems. It is called "Maine," in reference of the rain and the cliff'd landscape.
The really interesting two, though, are one that is extracted from a photograph, Doris Humphrey, and another that I made only today, in about an hour and a half for map script, landscape, and all, with pencil, pen, Sharpie and paper.
For those that do not know, Doris Humphrey was an American dancer and choreographer. It is a nice photograph, though the highlights weren't as bright as they could have been, or the difference in colour would have been better. I just use, for photographs, the Land 5 texture set ("country") with snow at the top and grass at the bottom, so that the relative shades are correct, but I seem to have accidentally deleted most of these "picture lands." Nonetheless, this is a good example, and it is an easy way to make decent, artsy landscapes very quickly (say, five minutes), though the coastlines suck.
The last, though, is the best. This morning, I was again mourning the fact that I don't have a Tablet (which is a pressure-sensitive computer drawing accessory, which the Myst creators used in the Myst series to make their landscapes), when I realized that I have the next-best thing: A scanner. So, I sketched out a fairly random topographical map, then shaded it properly, then scanned it. I touched it up in GIMP, put it through lndromat, then Surveyor, then finally spent about an hour fixing up a rather lame script for it, total time one and a half hours. The coasts are nearly perfect, and the land is just as I imagined it, though a bit bumpier because I used textured paper (having no white plain paper at hand). This offers a tactile environment, easy line control and a quick, well-coasted landscape, and all you need is pens, paper, a scanner, and decent artistic talent (as in, able to shade; Actual talent isn't necessary.) However, not everybody has a scanner; But, for those that do, I highly recommend trying this.
My advice on using lndromat is as follows:
You can only use the center 256x256 block of pixels, not the whole 512x512, which is a pretty bad restriction, until you realize how immense 256x256 really is (i.e., Very Immense).
You need to be very sure that your coasts are dark. I try to make my highlights very bright, then burn the entire image twice at 75 power on GIMP, then blur the edges. This avoids the "coast glitch" in which you can literally see under a floating chunk of land, which looks shoddy and poorly made.
You need to use Surveyor to touch up the landscape; This is the best program for altering the textures of the land, and is good for fine-tuning little details that aren't immediately obvious in Surveyor.
The GIMP is basically a necessity for use with lndromat; It is powerful and easier to use than Photoshop.
Make sure that, when using the GIMP, you save your image as RAW image data, and manually insert .raw to the end. Also make sure that it is greyscale, and 512x512 pixels. When you lndromat it, if lndromat crashes, it is most likely because you have exceeded the center 256x256 pixel box. Try scaling your image down. When you finish with lndromat, make sure you tag your file .lnd, as the program doesn't do that automatically, either.
The best of luck, and I would like any advice on cultivation of these methods and styles, as well as stories of your own experience with these, if you should try to use them.
I actually have some screenshots, but forgot to load them on my flash drive. The one without a map will have to be in Surveyor, though, because, as I've said, I don't have a map for it and don't want to make one.