Chapter 154 . About a Map...

Maps are a complicated thing to attempt...
One can easily find himself in a dreadful situation trying to represent the geographical landscape of a particular place.

On top of that, one would have to choose what type of map he will use as a template, make sure the scale is what it is suppose to be, and, jungle with the fact that, after all, it has to be easy to read, efficient, and agreeable...
One might want to do something else.

Nevertheless, it is extremely satisfying to work on such projects.
The multitude of challenges arising are in fact a blessing, and one can also move along and enjoy the different parts as they are supposed to be enjoyed!
In short, it's like giving yourself the pleasure that the viewer will have.
A world backward, so to speak...

And now, we're getting to my point:
I had to do another map for The Night of the Sasquatch, this time, I had to display The Sooke Potholes area.
Such a wonderful place!
Material to work on is quite pathetic but enough to start something.

What type of map was I going to do?
Let's have a look at the  few basic options:
The trip starts with the classic maps, detailed, useful and complex.
Here is an example:

Classic Map

That was not what i was going to do. Not that I don't enjoy those type of maps, I love maps in general, they make me travel from my seat, but this was simply not appropriate for the Potholes.
So, I moved on.


Second, we have the same type of map, but made with colours, for the purpose of defining certain area of the map.
Here's what I am talking about:

Coloured Classic Map

Here, there is interest to me. The colours, somehow, add something I am very fond of. But still, that wasn't what I was looking for...


Third, we are reaching the realm of the 3D maps.
This is extremely attractive, but bloody challenging to do. By this I mean that, this type of map might very well take way longer than one could expect at first.
Here's a simple version of one of type of maps:

3D Map

This, clearly, was not at all the way I was going to go, but, I keep that in mind for future references as, this is pretty cool too!


Fourth, and we are starting to get into the "yummy" stuff now.
We have now the illustrated type of maps.
Those, go straight to my heart, I carefully love them, they are a trip within the trip, so much details and "things" to look at.
Those type, I was tremendously interested by, but, those always require an insane amount of work illustration wise, and well, when you want to do a little illustration, you might not want to spend a week working at it.
Nevertheless, here is a fantastic example:

Illustrated Map 1

Gorgeous.

Here is another one completely different, but still within the category of "illustrated maps":

Illustrated Map 2

Fantastic! it really is a trip within the trip.
One can spend a fair amount of time contemplating this map, truly traveling within the map!

I decided that I was going to take some attributes of this type of map, but avoid going into endless type of details.


Last, there is the Heroic Fantasy type of map, or what some call The Treasure Island kind of map.
Here are two examples:
The infamous famous perfect card of The Middle Earth:

Middle Earth Map from Tolkien's Lord of the Rings

And some mysterious island:

Treasure Island Map

This style, again, goes straight to my heart. This most probably came from my love of Tolkien in my younger years, and what I felt following the characters throughout those maps.
I was with them...

It was decided that I will get inspired by the illustrations maps and the Heroic Fantasy ones.
To start, this is what I had, a map from GoogleMaps:

Sooke Potholes Google Map

From there, and after more work, I got there;

Sooke Potholes Map 1 - Illustration

This took a while to do...
And, it is as accurate as I could be.
Next step was to add texture and such for the final product.
Here it is:

Sooke Potholes Map 2 - Textured Map

Just so you know, the illustration was made with Adobe Illustrator, while the texturing was worked with Adobe Photoshop.

And last, here is the final product, placed within the pages of the book from The Night of the Sasquatch:

Sooke Potholes Map 3 - Final Product

And since, I kept on writing and I already started a new illustration.
Truth is, I haven't been that productive in about 1.5 year, and, it feels really really good to be creating again. Especially, that it flows!
Just like the love I have for my darling!

Have a great day Folks,
Behave and enjoy the gorgeous sun!

Sincerely,

Serge
3rd March 2015