Saturday, April 20, 2013

Mapping Garalzapan's Land

I've had several people lately ask me what program I use to make my maps, so I thought I'd address that further than saying that I use Publisher.  Also, I've felt that text and images hasn't gotten the idea of my recent hex generation system across, so I've decided to address that as well. 

I'm guessing people want to see something like this ... but I haven't high hopes that people will watch the whole thing.  If, however, you want to see me work, then, here you go:




It starts off a little blurry, but the video soon sharpens right up.

14 comments:

  1. ROFL.

    There I am, through the video, talking about how anal I am, and there's a note right there in the beginning that should have been removed ages ago, that I don't notice at all while working on this video. Isn't that the way?

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  2. I am just getting "this video is private". :(

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  3. Stupid defaults. Should be public now.

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  4. I'm at twenty three minutes, and I'm a little confused by some of the measurements. You say that the hex is two miles across, so the town occupies a three acre space. Two miles would be a lot larger than three acres, so I assume you must be talking about a different hex than the small subhexes, but I'm not sure which one. Or are we using different kinds of acres?

    There's probably an obvious solution I'm missing somehow, but right now I don't understand the dimensions of the map.

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  5. Okay, so I'm underestimating it at 3 acres. I mean to say 3,000 acres. I apologize for that.

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  6. Thanks for clearing that up for me. I finished the video and it looks like you have a pretty solid system. It's a bit more complicated than anything I'd want to attempt right now, but it's nice to see an example of world building done in a logical and realistic way. Thanks for making it.

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  7. That answered so many questions I had about your process I can't begin to explain. Being able to watch you actually go through the motions was instructional and I also learned a few tricks about Publisher I didn't know. Thank you for making this viseo and posting it.

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  8. Well, I asked for this but ... You again amaze me.

    Great video, very useful to put my mind on how all of this work. And just when I was wondering how to fill the little hexes between the big hexes, here comes your vid ...

    Damn, if only I could developp some fine hex generator with all this ...

    Many thanks, for your time and your thoughts ! And now, I'm off to work on all that ...

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  9. Your feedback is appreciated. I was beginning to think no one cared. I also saw this page, which is also appreciated.

    The capture program was FREE. It's called Debut.

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  10. Hello again, gentle host !

    First, I must say, I care. I care so much as to have took the heart of my monday evening to watch your video from start to end, something I don't do aven for films i'd like to watch.

    And boy, was it a good idea ... Yeah, you're crazy, the kind you can't differenciate from genius, as they say.

    But enough, on to my question ! So, wandering on your website, I ran into some mentions of "subscribing", and after the mandatory search, I learned about it.

    Is it still an ongoing thing ? Those 100 dollars (don't know how much it would be in euros) would let me get a big part of your work ? Maps, Publisher stuff, excel files and the like ? For 6 months ?

    If so, I have to take a close look at my gaming budget. I'm sure I could get far more use from even part of this that I could from 2 50$ books from my game dealer shelves.

    Well, if I can get on the 'trusted list', of course ^^.

    Just, pure curiosity ... How much of Earth is covered, with population, Infrastructure, terrain types, and / or similar elements ?

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  11. Still calculating.

    Let me get back to you on the subscription thing.

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  12. I found the video fascinating. I couldn't imagine putting this amount of work into a world and your effort is admirable. Why did you chose Publisher as a medium?

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  13. I got a job editing the layout and design for a small local magazine in 1994, and that was the program they used. I had worked with Quark in University, and the principles were fairly the same; Publisher is a more mickey mouse program than Quark was, but it is less finicky and doesn't demand you master a thousand hours before the page stops looking like a protracter barfed on it. After a year of working with Publisher, when I got a Pentium III in '98 I made sure Publisher was part of the package. I've used three different versions of Publisher since then.

    (The latest was a gift for me bought by an admirer of this blog)

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  14. That's amazing... and I do not even understand the half of what you say in the video* !

    *Don't mind, that's normal. I'm French.

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