The Campaign Builder's Guild

Well I've been fantasy mapping on a semi-pro basis for about a year - campaign mapping for myself for years, however.

I actually own Profantasy Campaign Cartographer 3 and do use it on occasion, though Profantasy shipped me Dungeon Designer and City Designer for free - to better serve their client base with my Gamer Printshop business.) I purchased Dundjinni and was given Fractal Mapper by NBOS.

Despite the software above I prefer using Xara Xtreme for most of my mapping as it is a hybrid vector drawing application and light-duty image editor. I always use Xara to composite my maps from parts created in other applications, if I don't create them entirely using Xara.

About 50% of the time I prefer to hand-draw my maps, digitally scan them and finish them in Xara Xtreme.

Regarding Photoshop and GIMP, although I have used Photoshop for over 12 years, I am starting to switch over to GIMP even in my pro shop - the price is too good to pass up (free!)

Those that mention above that Photoshop and GIMP don't work for them since they are so NOT user friendly, though I agree somewhat - do what I did and go visit cartographersguild.com Pyrandon has an excellent mapping tutorial using Photoshop, and RobA has an even better tutorials using GIMP. I used RobA's tutorials to get my last GIMP map to meet my expectations.

And since I am a regular at cartographersguild and the CBG is a sister site in the Alliance, your best bet is to post a map using whatever you're comfortable with or if trying out GIMP/PS then post the map at CG and ask for help. You will be extremely surprised by the response and the sound tips. If you act on the advice, I can guarantee you'll have a satisfactory map in short order.

Many newbies to GIMP and other apps show up in CG, then within a month a created a masterpiece.

My 2 cents, anyway!

I tend to make my maps using Ms Paint, really quick sketch, which I then Port into Photoshop to finish working on them.  If not I will hand draw them, I am illustrator wipping up map in pencil is so much faster, then scan them into Photoshop.  I also use map maker that came with second edition character generator.  It really rocks

Here's my winning November and January challenge entries at Cartgraphers' Guild.

The top map is Superstition Valley (old west map) November Challenge Winner. This is a completely hand-drawn map, scanned and ported to Xara Xtreme for compositing and coloring. Note: each mountain, cactus, structure, warning symbol, compass rose (cow skull) are invidual map objects. I created a set with over a hundred individual drawings. The mountains consist of multiple pieces allowing a mapper using my hand-drawn objects to composite their own desert map and still be hand-drawn.

The next three maps are part of a multi-page handout, supposed to be an invitation by a merchant to a lavish party - A Thousand Welcomes (arabic motif). Except for the map on the third page which is hand-drawn, all other pages and graphics were generated in Xara Xtreme.

My December challenge entry, which came in second (no award) is available as a PDF download:
(linked from Campaign Design & Elements Forum...)  http://www.thecbg.org/e107_plugins/forum/forum_viewtopic.php?46862

I finally got around to updating my map of Urbis.

Warning, huge image!

[spoiler][/spoiler]

This map isn't quite as visually appealing as my old map. On the other hand, it was made entirely with Inkscape, which allows me to update it easily and frequently - which was a problem with the old version. I've also made the Inkscape data file available, which you can download here. This allows GMs to customize their own map of the setting...

It looks very nice.

Thanks. I eventually want to make a fancier version, but first I want to expand the setting and put some more detail into the various regions - wide stretches of the map are still fairly empty.

I think that the simplicity could even be called a good thing.

The style I ultimately want to aim for is something like this:

[spoiler][/spoiler]

Yeah, that would definitely be a good style for your world, Jurgen.  But great improvement already!  Your new map is very pleasant to look at, and easy to follow.  Do you ever go over to the Cartographers Guild?

Quote from: IshmaylYeah, that would definitely be a good style for your world, Jurgen.  But great improvement already!  Your new map is very pleasant to look at, and easy to follow.  Do you ever go over to the Cartographers Guild?

I did register there, but given that map making was only a minor part of my world-building efforts I didn't spend a lot of time there. But maybe I should go there again...

Quote from: Jürgen Hubert

Quote from: IshmaylYeah, that would definitely be a good style for your world, Jurgen.  But great improvement already!  Your new map is very pleasant to look at, and easy to follow.  Do you ever go over to the Cartographers Guild?

I did register there, but given that map making was only a minor part of my world-building efforts I didn't spend a lot of time there. But maybe I should go there again...

You should. They can be very helpful.