As I announced on the mailing list earlier today, I'm almost at the stage where I can start to reveal the first part of my "secret project". Some of you may already have worked it out from my posts recently, and the hint I posted last night. But don't worry, there will be plenty of surprises left to discover along the way. And many more when I move on to revealing stage two.

In any case, I will be posting a new selection of hexes to this thread every day from today. You can also find them on my home page, www.thorf.co.uk, and I will keep you informed on the mailing list. Of course I hope to generate some discussions along the way too. Though build-up and suspense (advertising? hehe ) are a big part of why I'm doing things this way, equally important is feedback. I will be happy to hear any comments or criticisms of my work as I post it, and I am fully prepared to make adjustments.



Today's hexes were the forest sets. I originally started with two much simpler sets, and eventually upgraded to these. The deciduous hexes were actually based on two other hexes I have drawn. I liked the tree trunk I drew for the dead trees and the foliage I made for the good magic point so much that I combined them to make a new forest symbol.

The evergreens initially were extremely simplistic, but recently I found some very nice pine tree clip art in Illustrator's files, so I used that to update my hex to its current state.

I use Adobe Illustrator to make these, and for mapping in general. Should anyone else have the program, feel free to ask me for the original files. (They're a little too big for me to put on my website, unfortunately.)

If anyone is wondering what precisely I'm looking for feedback on, I'm interested in hearing what you think of:

• the design
• the colour scheme
• the sizes of hex components

And of course any other impressions you want to share.

Thanks and I hope you enjoy the next few weeks!

Hi Thorf,

The forested hexes look great, can't wait to see the rest.

May I request the Illustrator files? If so you can email them to me at:

gazza557 at hotmail.com (yes thats 557 not 555 )

Cheers,
Gary

Here's the next few, the basic set:



I will send the Illustrator file with the basic hex set to anyone who wants it in a few days' time. So please add your name to the list if you want them!

Ooh! Ooh! ME! Me! Send those Illustrator files to ME!!!

If at all possible, can you make them backwards compatible to version 9.x, and ZIP/SIT compress them (for smoother file transfer)?

I have thought of doing this myself for some time, but just have not been able to get to it yet.

Hope hotmail's filters let it through...

<added>
I use Illustrator professionally every day. I might be able to lend some small amount of assistance (depending on real life intrusions, of course) if you have need of it.
</added>

__________________
Obligatory non sequitur goes here.

Looks wonderful, Thorf!

Actually I could do with some help. I've been playing around with Illustrator for a few months now, but I'm nowhere near professional at using it... yet. Doing these maps is one of the ways I'm learning how to use the program; I've always been a strong advocate of learning by doing when it comes to computer programs.

Currently I'm using Adobe Illustrator 8.0. I actually got Illustrator CS last week but unfortunately they changed the way that patterns work, and it seems that my hexes will need some massive revisions before they can be manipulated in 10.0 or higher. They export fine, but you can't move them around.

My mapping strategy in Illustrator basically involves taking a large grid of grey-bordered hexes and pasting patterned hexes on various layers underneath it. Of course they lock in perfectly using the smart guides, and once the whole map is in place, it's easy to change any hex type by updating the pattern definitions.

The layers I use, from bottom to top, are: guide (the original scanned in map), map (for patterned hexes), coasts, roads/rivers/isles, hex grid, borders and labels.

The results are rather stunning, if I do say so myself. It's taking all my patience to resist just posting the whole lot right now.

In any case, any advice would be greatly appreciated. I'm going to send out the base hex file in a few days.

These look great! Thanks for sharing them...

Here are the next few.



This selection actually includes my least favourite two tiles, which are broken lands and volcano. Both were created over 5 years ago when I first got Illustrator, and I'm not happy with either. In fact I plan to redo both completely in the long term, but for now they will do as placeholders.

The colours used for the desert tiles took some thinking, because practically every map TSR made uses a different shade for its desert hexes. I originally chose a much pinker colour, but eventually settled on the warmer colour here.

Settlements and man-made constructions:



Extra symbols:



Terrain features:



Water, ice and... cacti (?!?):

Hmm... I am feeling a bit slow here. I have guessed that your secret project has something to do with mapping out (parts of) the Known World, but other than that...

I must say that I love the hexes. They are beautiful. I have been dreaming of owning a hex-mapping-system that you needn't be a college student in computer programming to operate but so far I haven't come across one. If this really works in Adobe (and I have no reason not to believe you ) I may have found the gold at the end of the rainbow!

Anyway, just wanted to say: beautiful artwork and I'll be tuning in to this thread regularly

;-) Jesper

I must say I think these are a beautiful job - and from what you say as to method - very nice work on how to cope with hex mapping in a non-hex program.

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"If it looks like a duck and quacks like a duck it might just be a crow."

Basically just think "big" and you shouldn't be too far off.

And thanks for the compliments on my hexes! I hope you'll like them even more when you see them plugged in to all the nice maps.

On that note, here are the last of them for now. Tomorrow I have a full day of work, but if I get a chance I'll post the whole Legend as one file. Then it'll be time to start posting a map each day.

The Elven set:



The Ethengar set:



And the hot-off-the-presses Atruaghin set:

Impressive Thorf!

Can't wait to see the "big picture"!

__________________
The Piazza - New home for "Old D&D Campaign Worlds".

Come join the 'Old Worlds Renaissance'!

Beautiful icons. I was actually just looking for a set of icons for a mapping program I'm writing (see my post in your newer thread). Can I steal these?

You said they were Illustrator files. Is that a vector graphics format? (This web site seems to suggest it is, since it's a form of PostScript: http://www.faqs.org/faqs/graphics/fi...ection-11.html) I was hoping to use SVG for the icons so that they could be smoothly zoomed. (There are lots of vector formats, but only SVG is supported by the Qt toolkit, which is what I'm using.) Can Illustrator export to SVG? Also, I know you can embed bitmaps in some forms of vector graphics, which misses the point - will the "clip art" you said you use scale smoothly, or is that a bitmap object embedded in the icon?

That one's not for me to answer, but I can help with the other questions.
It is indeed a vector graphics format (some would argue it is THE vector graphics format), and Illustrator CAN save the images as SVG.
Thorf did an excellent job with these files (speaking as a graphics professional), and as long as they are properly saved as SVG files they will scale properly.

When I have more time to review the files I will also be sending Thorf some tips which should help him with updating these files to Illustrator 9+.

Thanks for answering the questions for me, Katana One.

And I'm eagerly awaiting your advice on improving my map files to make them Illustrator 9+ compatible! Right now I have to adjust them in 8 and then load them into CS for exporting, which is just a little silly.

Sorry that it's taking so long to get back to you on your map files. The past few days have been fairly busy for me.

With Monday having been Valentine's Day, and then having a dinner and movie date Tuesday after work, I have had no spare time in the evenings so far this week.

Expect an email from me with some suggestions by the end of the week (maybe as early as this evening). In particular, I have suggestions for handling cliff/plateau contours, and for the hex-grid overlay.

If you can, please send me one of your finished map files - any one will do - so I can delve a bit deeper into your process.