# Mapmaking Discussion & Philosophy (WIP/Critique) > Town/City Mapping >  Breakwater - a city in the Mountain Realms

## tilt

I'm currently mapping my "world" map - the Mountain Realms (link in signature). One of the important cities there is Breakwater - the only harbour city and also where my players (D&D) resides. I've drawn the city by hand some time ago - but are now working to convert it to digital format via Illustrator and Photoshop. But as I'm currently changing the world map - the city will also meet some changes, like having a great river run by it and having some alterations to the fortifications to take into account the growing of the city over time. 
The map posted below is to show how the city started before the comming changes. I hope you like it and feel free to comment  :Smile:

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## mearrin69

The hand-drawn map looks pretty sharp. Lots of buildings there  :Smile: 
M

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## Kaiser MacCleg

Very impressive.  :Smile:

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## Steel General

Will be interesting to see the 'digital' version.

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## tilt

thanks - yep, lots of buildings - took a good time, and some shaking of the hand to loosen the muscles, to finish it  *lol*

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## tilt

SG - still working on the groundwork - just placing the buildings - but I'll post the first draft as soon as I've added room for the river  :Smile:

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## ZleapingBear

Hay. nice hand map there. nice details.

I realy like the idea that you can see the changes that time had put the city trough. and i look forword to see your work  :Smile: 

*Rep for a super detail hand map there  :Smile:

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## tilt

Thanks ZB, I'm pretty much reworking a lot of it right now - but it'll be worth it  :Smile:

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## tilt

So, now I've added a river to my illustrator file - and two connecting roads to what is going to be the original fortification of the city.

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## Sigurd

I'm interested to see how you deal with all the buildings. I think one of the unspoken advantages of hand drawing is that the viewer casually accepts that the relatively random buildings are an approximation. When you start making everything distinct and digital like the variation drops and the viewer expects more accuracy.


Sigurd

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## tilt

very good point sigurd, and I believe your absolutly right. As soon as they see those crisp lines, they pull out the ruler. But any "bitching" and the NPC's suddenly aren't so coorporative anymore *lol* - gotta keep'em in line  :Wink:

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## Ilvarin

That is quite a large city. I'm sure I've missed it, but what software do you use? Did you place each building or use some sort of script or macro? I'm looking forward to seeing this develop, judging from your starting point and your other work, it should be fantastic.

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## tilt

Thanks Ilvarin, I've had it on hold for a while while working on other stuff, and have an upcomming exam soon, but I plan to start on it again next week  :Smile: 
After skecthing the city by hand I've pulled that map into Illustrator and with it as a background have drawn the road system. Next up are the houses. And yes, I'm doing it all by hand - every single one of them *lol*. After I have placed all the elements in Illustrator I'm going to export the map to Photoshop and add details like roofs, trees, paving and all that stuff - so there are a couple of months work ahead of me  :Smile: 
There are several tutorial in here on how to autoplace buildings if you're interested, but I prefer the control of placing them my self  :Smile:

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## Sigurd

"Drawing everything by hand."

I think I understand your alias then. They said of Don Quixote that he would '*tilt*' at windmills. 

I think you're up to the challenge and I'd love to see what it looks like when its done.


Sigurd

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## tilt

Thank you Sigurd, yep 'I guess I am a bit mad... or bitten by the mapping bug  :Wink:

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## Sapiento

Great project, tilt. With scatter brushes in Illustrator slightly different shapes are no problem at all, but I'm sure you know that.

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## alizarine

Mad about mapping, only ^.^ I was considering trying my hand at a handdrawn map, and you've just inspired me to finally sit down and give it a go! Good thing I've got Illustrator - I can follow along (sort of)!

- Alizarine

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## tilt

> Great project, tilt. With scatter brushes in Illustrator slightly different shapes are no problem at all, but I'm sure you know that.


Yep - but I won't let it hamper me *lol*




> Mad about mapping, only ^.^ I was considering trying my hand at a handdrawn map, and you've just inspired me to finally sit down and give it a go! Good thing I've got Illustrator - I can follow along (sort of)!


Thanks, always nice to know that you inspire others - I look forward to seing your town grow  :Smile:

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## tilt

So - just to show you that I haven't give up.. here is an update  :Smile:

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## Ghostwaryr

Hey tilt, great job so far. I have one minor point to make about the breakwater itself. As someone that has spent a great deal of his life around the ocean, and has family that are commercial fisherman, I know that most breakwaters have a overlapping entrance at an oblique to the ocean itself. Of coarse this applies mostly to an Ocean as Sea's normally don't have the absurd wave surges that Ocean's do, so if the city is located on a Sea go ahead and disregard my comments.

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## tilt

hi Ghost, thanks for your note - had to look up a few words  :Wink: 
So, today I learned that there is a structure called Breakwater ... it was just a name I made up  :Smile: 
and I've learned that oblique means an angle not 90 percent (did know the word in its font use though)

Concerning my Breakwater ... it _is_ at the ocean, but I haven't gotten around to map the harbour/docks/breakwaters yet, still busy with the land structures  :Smile:  - I'm planning to make some docks for fishing boats in the river close to the sea as the original harbour, then as the city grew they added a new harbour on the ocean side. When I get that far, feel free to correct me in my attempts to map those elements  :Wink:

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## ravells

I've just come across this map....go tilt! If you want some building shapes with variation I attach a bunch made using context free and Alfar's building script. Context free is a free download just use Alfar's script to generate more or play with the script to get different looking buildings. The buildings are all in vector (.svg).

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## tilt

thanks ravi - right now everything is just square, with a few "angeled" buildings - but as I get them all placed I'll exchange some of them with more interesting shapes  :Smile:

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## tilt

So I made a small test of "roofing" the city, here is what I got...

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## jtougas

> thanks - yep, lots of buildings - took a good time, and some shaking of the hand to loosen the muscles, to finish it  *lol*


I can relate to that..The capital city of my Kingdom Of Shendenflar was a HUGE hand drawn map with about 1000 buildings. I would love to convert it into digital format someday..your city looks great!!

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## tilt

thanks jtougas - haven't counted my buildings but I know I'm about halfway there, and then I'll have to add some fortifications and the harbour and all the little stuff. Long way to go  :Smile:

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## tilt

So - 3 years later I return to mapping and Breakwater. A map I've been planning in my head for, well, 3 years  :Smile: 

To make it harder on myself I've now scrapped everything and I'm starting from scratch  :Smile: 


really from scratch  :Smile: 
I'll be using photoshop for this and it will be a 20 x 28 cm map in 200 dpi.

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## tilt

So I'm trying to figure out how the style of the buildings and area shall be - first attempt.

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## - Max -

Il ike the "soft" feeling so far Tilt, looking forward to seeing how this will progress.

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## Kiba

This is pretty good progress for starting over! Can't wait to see the new map!

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## Carnifex

> So I'm trying to figure out how the style of the buildings and area shall be - first attempt.
> Attachment 73316


Is this made in Illustrator?

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## Azélor

> Is this made in Illustrator?


I don't think so: it's blurry and has some textures. Or maybe the shapes were made with Illustrator but modified with another software after.

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## tilt

Hi again...  Just stepped away from mapping for a year... opps...  but, no - its' not illustrator - although I had thought of making buildings there - I'm just better at working with photoshop - my go-to tool  :Smile: 

So, coming back I scrapped it all and started again from basic shapes. This time getting into the nature first since its dominating the map at this point anyway. So here's my new first map of the city of Breakwaters small first steps - the village called "our village".  :Smile:

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## tilt

Added more levels today and then rivers, first building them up - then painstakingly removing the trees that suddenly stood in it to their necks  :Wink:  ... also build a little more on the village.  :Smile:

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