Café de Nuit

Jester: I think it's very nice... but the letters are bit too big IMO.

Gonzoron of the FoS wrote:

Jester of the FoS wrote:You mean around the text? Hrm, that might be true and trickier to fix. I'll have to think about how to handle that, if I even want to.

On your text layer, go to layer -> Layer style. Click on outer glow, choose black as your color, Technique: precise. Blend Mode: "Darken" fiddle with the size and other parameters. It's actually surprisingly easy to make it look nice.

It's actually Stroke in this case, not Outer Glow. I wanted crispness.

To copy all the layers at once requires flattening them into a single layer, so I have to adjust and reposition text on the master map before copying and saving. Which increases the time per map and increases the likelihood of accidentally saving an unwanted change to the master map.

Considering options and alternatives at the moment, I see if I can find a quick way.

Jester of the FoS wrote:

Gonzoron of the FoS wrote:

Jester of the FoS wrote:You mean around the text? Hrm, that might be true and trickier to fix. I'll have to think about how to handle that, if I even want to.

On your text layer, go to layer -> Layer style. Click on outer glow, choose black as your color, Technique: precise. Blend Mode: "Darken" fiddle with the size and other parameters. It's actually surprisingly easy to make it look nice.

It's actually Stroke in this case, not Outer Glow. I wanted crispness.

To copy all the layers at once requires flattening them into a single layer, so I have to adjust and reposition text on the master map before copying and saving. Which increases the time per map and increases the likelihood of accidentally saving an unwanted change to the master map.

Considering options and alternatives at the moment, I see if I can find a quick way.

Often, I find myself having to flatten an image of multiple layers to lessen the memory resource requirement for some other application, however, I always save the unflattened version as a separate file, so I can always go back and change something. I learned to do this long ago, and too often find myself going back to the pre-flattened file. This happens too often not to do this.

MichaelTumey wrote:

Jester of the FoS wrote:

Gonzoron of the FoS wrote:On your text layer, go to layer -> Layer style. Click on outer glow, choose black as your color, Technique: precise. Blend Mode: "Darken" fiddle with the size and other parameters. It's actually surprisingly easy to make it look nice.

It's actually Stroke in this case, not Outer Glow. I wanted crispness.

To copy all the layers at once requires flattening them into a single layer, so I have to adjust and reposition text on the master map before copying and saving. Which increases the time per map and increases the likelihood of accidentally saving an unwanted change to the master map.

Considering options and alternatives at the moment, I see if I can find a quick way.

Often, I find myself having to flatten an image of multiple layers to lessen the memory resource requirement for some other application, however, I always save the unflattened version as a separate file, so I can always go back and change something. I learned to do this long ago, and too often find myself going back to the pre-flattened file. This happens too often not to do this.

Yeah when i made signature's of 600x300(i think i said that in the right order... it's wider than lengthwise.) I would use multiple pictures, and blend them in with a fade to opaqueness, add in a black background just in case, added text to it as well. Needless to say I completely agree, you want at least have a copy of the one that has all the layers. I mostly never merge until the end of the project, even if it can be a pain working with multiple upon multiple layers. xD

Jester of the FoS wrote:To copy all the layers at once requires flattening them into a single layer,

IIRC, there's a way to group layers that allows you to copy multiple layers at once by copying the group... no?

Gonzoron of the FoS wrote:

Jester of the FoS wrote:To copy all the layers at once requires flattening them into a single layer,

IIRC, there's a way to group layers that allows you to copy multiple layers at once by copying the group... no?

I have things grouped already. There's a "merge and copy" option so I can copy and not affect the original (which I should probably make "read only").

I'll probably make a "zoom in" copy of the master and modify the crap out of that with smaller text (depending on the domain). Do that all first and then copy away.
Or instead of copying every layer at once, copying everything but the text and then just the text might work, and potentially be much quicker. Then I can just resize the singe text layer as a whole. But that will only work if the text is readable.

Yep groups is the way to go, you can stuff all the text into a group, copy the group and bobs your uncle. One copied you can also select multiple layers using shift-click or ctrl-click.

On the stroke one way of quickly amending multiple text layers is to set one text layer to the blending options you are happy with (stroke, outer glow or whatever) then right click the layer in the layer palette, choose copy layer style, then ctrl-click select all the other text layers, right click and choose paste layer style.

If you want to quickly flatten the document, simply create a new top layer than hit ctrl-alt-shift-e all at the same time to "stamp visible", basically this creates a merged image in the new top layer of everything that's visible. Its a nice way of flattening without removing any layers, because the rest are still there underneath and therefore editable.

Finally its a great map but I do agree with Goose Bone, the colours are a bit too bright, I would consider making each a little darker and more muted. You can do each individually of course or simply add an adjustment layer on top of everything. Simply go to your topmost layer and then hit the little symbol that looks like a ying-yang at the bottom of the layer palette and have a play with a hue/saturation layer or perhaps a levels or curves one. BGest thing about these is that by clicking on them in the layers palette you can readjust how they look so they are non-destructive. Also CS4 has some presets you get by bringing up the adjustments panel (window >adjustments) which if CS3 also has them is good place to get started.

Here's a couple options. Still beta-testing the design for individual domains.





Which looks better? How does the text look? Thoughts?

For me the second one is a much better option...

BTW - the handbook version isn't maded in a greenscale, but in a redscale - have you ever think about creating a version of the more map much similar (in colours) to the original (red) one..? I beg you, it will be cool:>

The second one certainly looks better. These maps are awesome!

Goose Bone wrote:BTW - the handbook version isn't maded in a greenscale, but in a redscale - have you ever think about creating a version of the more map much similar (in colours) to the original (red) one..? I beg you, it will be cool:>

You mean the 3.5 PHB grey-and-red map? Should be doable. I should do a black and white one anyway for those w/o colour printers.

Yesss, exactly this one

Red Core


Black and White

OMG, thank you so much, beautiful work If you will ever be in Poland - contact me, I've got a keg of beer for you here, master

I would say the 2nd one by far.
Although I still find the letters too large, the map is very nice.