Follow along with me as we go over the process of drawing a fantasy map.

Draw icons

When you're creating a set of icons it is important that you know what you want your icons to look like. Are you looking for medieval style icons, or a more modern or even futuristic style?

Tip: You can also use different sets of icons for different regions on your map. This is a good way to visualize a change in culture over long distances.

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Place your icons on your map

Placing your icons on your map may take some time. Make sure your icons aren't obstructed by any of the features on your map. They should always be easy to identify and read.

Tip: You can have your icons be obstructed by terrain features deliberately. For example, try to put a city of castle behind a mountain. This adds a sense of depth to your map.

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Create a hierarchy for you labels

Creating a hierarchy should always be done before you start putting the labels on your map. Not all labels have to be both different in style and size. You can have two different kind of labels that are the same style, but a different size. You can also use colour to show different kinds of labels

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Put your labels on your map

The next step is placing your labels on your map. Use the rules we discussed in the first lesson, and the hierarchy we determined in the last. Start placing the biggest labels first; these would be hard to put on your map later on when everything is already filled with labels.

Tip: work from crowded areas outwards. This will help you make all labels in these areas readable.

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Make your labels readable

Finally you've put all your labels on your map. You map notice that some of the labels are very hard to read or can't be read at all. Now it's time to do some tweaking on your labels to make them more readable. You can decide to add a small outer glow to the, or use a layer mask to hide the surrounding terrain features. Also play around with colour and transparency.

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Please share your project with me and others, I'd love to see what you'll come up with!

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John Colby

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