Tips
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==The Basics== | ==The Basics== | ||
Revision as of 03:26, 23 March 2007
(From Fantasymaps.com)
The Basics
Getting started:
The cartographer requires a few materials to maximize his/her working potential. Paper, obviously, is a must. Sometimes doodling a map on the wall of your Vertebrate Zoology class is fine, but to really create a good map, you need paper. For the rough draft I recommend lined, loose paper. This will suit you fine until you have the map totally laid out. For the middle drafts, I recommend regular, loose leaf, printing paper. This will give you a clear view of your rivers, shorelines, etc. And for the final, all important draft I recommend the semi-sturdy, thick paper that has the flexibility of construction paper and that does not allow ink to seep through it.
Pencils and pens are the prime drawing tools of a map maker, but I find hi-lighters, colored pencils, and even crayons useful for indicating separate things on the rough and middle drafts. A regular, 2 hardness pencil is fine for making your first draft, and erases very well. A good pen is a definite must. Any final draft that you do must be in a good, well defined black ink. Regular BICTM pens leave a greasy ink, and I prefer micro-point ball-point pens for my maps.
People make mistakes. Cartographers definitely are people. In this light, you will need a very good eraser. I prefer the large gum erasers that rub off very easily and leave almost nothing stuck to the paper. Likewise, they leave the paper in place. Other erasers have a tendency to leave pink streaks on the paper, or they tear a swath of paper away where they erase. I like my paper intact, so I refrain from using the eraser on the end of my pencil on my middle and final drafts.
You are going to need a well lit, flat area to work. A desk is a good place (go figure), and the kitchen island is a nice place to spread your maps around. Just make sure that you pick them up when you leave, or you might return to find a splotch of spaghetti sauce smeared over the Halian Mountains. Do not work in direct sunlight, for the paper you are working on will reflect so brightly as to strain your eyes.
The research:
Look around. There are many fine maps in many fine books in many not so great book stores. If you like someone's style, memorize the way they form their mountains, trees, rivers, and whatnot. Remember that imitation is the highest form of respect, and is not something to hide from. You will find that after a few tries at your first maps, you detect a sort of style all your own. Work with it, it will help you learn. Try to draw someone else's maps in your own way, and see how it turns out. I recommend the maps by J.R.R. Tolkien (the original ones, by either he or his son Christopher). If you look around, you will undoubtedly find something by Shelly Shapiro. These, being fairly rudimentary maps (no offense, but it's true), are easily improved on. Read through these sections of this page for notes on certain styles: Rivers, Forests, Mountains, Hills, Valleys, and Fells, Swamps, Miscellaneous Landmarks: Have fun with it.
Things to think about
You should by now have a fair idea as to the requirements for any fantasy map. Now go and draw one. Seem a little terse? It needs to be. You, with all of your promise, need to practice. Like anything, this undertaking needs a lot of experience to become proficient at it. Draw a large map, and then "zoom" in on the seperate sections of it. Decide whether you need to perfect your mountain form or your river path. If you do, fill an entire sheet of paper with your practice forms. Do it until it seems like second nature.
Trial and error
Now that you can draw the forms, you need to decide how time affects your land. Which mountains are older? Have they been worn down or built up by the wind and rain? Which rivers seem to be the main ones? Are they big enough? Do your forests occurr in a natural pattern? If not, why don't they? Ask yourself these and other questions like these to see if your map makes sense with itself. Keep in mind that your world most likely isn't perfectly flat, and that rivers will run into the low places. Use common sense, and your map should come out coherent and believable.
You might have to redraw your map many times, as you are confronted with new revelations as to its content. If you are not sure that something will fit in with the rest of the map, draw it in anyway. So what if you have to redo the entire thing? It will fill up time before you die.
The making of a world
By now, you are probably deciding where certain things should go in the political or racial scheme. Countries are forming in your land, as are the kings and queens that govern them. Go with your ideas. The best part about writing a world is the development. You can spend hours with a good map, deciding who runs what and why. If your friends and family start thinking you a bit strange, smile and bear it like a badge of honor. It's good to be different. How many people can brag about truly being able to drift off into their own world? Not as many as there should be.
Place Names
Place names can make or break a map. Here I will discuss the nuances of naming your map and it's locations, and why you should not use too many 's in your names. I hate 's!
Why I hate 's
They are annoying. They stop the flow of reading. They chop up names like so much raw meat. They are apostrophes, and I cannot abide them in a fantasy language. Try reading the next sentence fluently. Cor ara noalmen veri thonrah machbuem. If you read much, you should be able to discern it. Now try to read this one. C'or ar'a no'al'men veri thon'rah mach'buem. Less fluently, right? Now just for fun, try to read this sentence all the way through, cleanly and without stopping. "How are you, Jane?" asked Pete qrnek'tregp'lay. You just can't do it. Foreign, unfamiliar words stop someone up like a literary stumbling block. Try to avoid this sort of naming within your map.
Name style
There it is again! Style. It applies to naming your map as well as drawing it. Here we will discuss the different parts of names, and how they affect your map. Here is a list of the most common styles:
* Cliché - avoid names like "Skull Mountain" at all costs * Gutteral - Dwarves, Orcs, Trolls, etc. all talk in a gutteral form of speech. * Noble - Elven. What else can I say? * Archaic - Good for medieval fantasy * Original - The best type. Make up your own language and let the good times roll! * Alien - Languages that are so far away from human sounding as to be unpronounceable. Avoid these if you want a map people will remember. * Cultural - Jamaican sounding words go with the Jamaican culture. You will never hear a dragon say "Ya mon!" .
Now to discuss each of the above in more detail:
Cliché- Do you want your audience to take you seriously? If so, do not use names like "The Black Pit of Despair." They will get you some serious scorn. Any time a barbarian muscle-man with an anorexic half-elf mistress defeats the skull demon with the Sword of Death, I have to laugh out loud. This kind of writing is cheap and terrible, and in lieu of that, you should keep your names realistic, too.
Gutteral- Gutteral names are that like "Orglub" or "Gloningor." They should be used sparingly, for they do get tedious. Cluster them in one or two places, if you want, to represent the location of a culture. Gutteral names use the uncommon letters b, g, d, z, and ng more commonly, to create a sound made deep in the throat.
Noble - Noble names make use of soft, voiceless sounds to produce easily read, pronounceable words. Usually the names mean something fair in a given "noble" language: leaf-dew or grass-swan. Use th, ch, s, a n, l, and r as your main letters to create noble names.
Archaic - Medieval names. Arthur and Vanion, Gawain and Pendragon are all well known examples of medieval names. Use sounds increasing or decreasing in tone to form original medieval sounding names. Ai, oi, (v)r and (v)l are good examples of rising and falling tones.
Original- Make up your own language. There are many web pages out there on this subject.
Alien- These languages are irrelevant to my fantasy maps, but I will discuss them a little. These languages, like Klingon, are hard to pronounce, due to the author's stereotypes of alien nature. But most likely aliens would have no oral similarity to us at all, and would therefore not speak to our understanding. You decide what you should do.
Cultural- These names can "link" your fantasy world with Earth. Have you ever wondered why the fantasy movie heroines always have a British accent? Puzzle around with this one - it's a lot of fun.
