Illustration Tutorials and Advice Superthread

Can anyone give me some advice how to create some flags for a medieval fantasy world ? I wasnt able to find any good tutorials online. Sadly i do not own a drawing tablet but i have photoshop. The flags i tried to do so far look like really amateurish :/
 
Can anyone give me some advice how to create some flags for a medieval fantasy world ? I wasnt able to find any good tutorials online. Sadly i do not own a drawing tablet but i have photoshop. The flags i tried to do so far look like really amateurish :/

Your best friends are vector lines (pen tool) selection and masking. It also helps to have a good grasp of layout tools like setting up grids, cropping and good folder layout. In fact, if you are patient enough there isn't a design I have seen on this website yet that you could not recreate without a drawing tablet.

The best tutorials for making flags are going to be how to use Photoshop in general. Here are some ones that might be a good start:




The best way to get clean, crisp details is to make vector lines. Vectors calculate shapes based on a mathematical equation while rasters (the sort of stuff you would ordinarily make if you were 'drawing' in PS) assign values to pixels. Practically, this means that a vector line will always be crisp at any resolution while a raster will get blurry and messy if you zoom too much. You can make straight lines with rasters, but its a bitch. With vector tools you can crank out perfect straight lines, curves, shapes etc. left and right. Use vectors to draw, masking and selection to color and/or correct your designs, and fit it all inside a well-proportioned grid.

For actual flag designs, it really depends on what the actual design is. For basic stripes, grids, I dunno...flag of Japan, you can stick with basic tools. Photoshop lets you make stars, circles, squares etc. natively:


More complex designs can be made by applying these simple shapes repeatedly , drawing with the pen tool or copying existing artwork. I suggest using files with the .svg type (thats a vector type) if you can get them, or transparent .png (no background).

Last point. One of the easiest ways to make a flag design look more 'legit' is color. Historically colors were a bit more restrictive than our modern color-palettes. A good trick is to actually copy pictures of real period artwork and use the eyedropper tool to sample those colors directly. It will keep your palettes more realistic and in the end, a touch more visually appealing as they will blend together more nicely.
 
Last edited:
Your best friends are vector lines (pen tool) selection and masking. It also helps to have a good grasp of layout tools like setting up grids, cropping and good folder layout. In fact, if you are patient enough there isn't a design I have seen on this website yet that you could not recreate without a drawing tablet.

The best tutorials for making flags are going to be how to use Photoshop in general. Here are some ones that might be a good start:




The best way to get clean, crisp details is to make vector lines. Vectors calculate shapes based on a mathematical equation while rasters (the sort of stuff you would ordinarily make if you were 'drawing' in PS) assign values to pixels. Practically, this means that a vector line will always be crisp at any resolution while a raster will get blurry and messy if you zoom too much. You can make straight lines with rasters, but its a bitch. With vector tools you can crank out perfect straight lines, curves, shapes etc. left and right. Use vectors to draw, masking and selection to color and/or correct your designs, and fit it all inside a well-proportioned grid.
thank you very much for the fast and great reply
 
I use Pixlr, which is a free website. It's not great for complicated maps but it's perfectly compatible with Worlda. It's also pretty simple, just use the one pixel paint brush to draw borders. If you do plan to use this and need help just ask me. :)

would you still be able to provide an easy how to guide - I want to create very simple map - western Europe with sort of actual borders and maybe to be able to add 'nato' style army symbols

any suggestions for a newbie map maker gratefully appreciated - the main effort will be on the AH narrative rather than the maps :)
 
would you still be able to provide an easy how to guide - I want to create very simple map - western Europe with sort of actual borders and maybe to be able to add 'nato' style army symbols

any suggestions for a newbie map maker gratefully appreciated - the main effort will be on the AH narrative rather than the maps :)
Sure! I still use the old Pixlr Editor software, but if you’re using a WorldA map you’ll have to use a 1x1 square pixel for your borders and you can download already existing WorldA maps as layers to trace over for OTL and realistic borders.
 
How would you recommend showing nominal control on a Q-BAM? Just a border in the color of the country or a slightly lighter outline of the region inside it as well or something else entirely?
 
Hey y’all!
I’m just curious as to what software is available on iPads that is could use to make Wik—worthy maps in a variety of projections and whatnot. Bonus points for being user-friendly. I’ve already tried GIMP and a few others, found them too unwieldy and frustrating to use.

Thanks!
 
How are Puppet states now depicted in maps? take for example these puppet states during WW2: Manchukuo, Mengjiang, and Mongolian People's Republic, which is the correct way to depict them, the first, or second?

I personally prefer the first one because it makes it less confusing to discern different countries.
,
ManchukuoExamples.png
 
How are Puppet states now depicted in maps? take for example these puppet states during WW2: Manchukuo, Mengjiang, and Mongolian People's Republic, which is the correct way to depict them, the first, or second?

I personally prefer the first one because it makes it less confusing to discern different countries.
,View attachment 557611

The first version is better.
The second version is rather uncommon today.

Here is a tutorial from Crazy Boris, and his THICC 2.2 color scheme (one of the best color schemes used today)

thicc22tutorial.png
 
How are Puppet states now depicted in maps? take for example these puppet states during WW2: Manchukuo, Mengjiang, and Mongolian People's Republic, which is the correct way to depict them, the first, or second?

I personally prefer the first one because it makes it less confusing to discern different countries.
,View attachment 557611
Personally, I'd use 1. for less controlled puppets, and 2. for more heavily controlled puppets.
 
thanks - anyone got a good site to get 'nato style' symbols - you know these ones (picture from http://niehorster.org/000_admin/009_symbols.html) View attachment 557623
NATO Joint Military Symbology is listed in APP-6, now up to version D.
The source document is here: http://nso.nato.int/nso/zPublic/ap/PROM/APP-6 EDD V1 E.pdf
You can find large versions of the symbols here: https://spatialillusions.com/milsymbol/docs/milsymbol-APP6d.html
Version A (from a few years previously, but most of the symbols are identical or very similar), is available as a font here: http://www.mapsymbs.com/app-6a.html
 
Top