working on a map... and a how to for you to do one too

recently it has been getting colder and wetter outside and at school being stuck outside has become more and more depressing. luckily some of the schools computer rooms are open during lunch time (and I can eat there yea) so I got down to working on stuff for Oronegro.

I must state at this point I cannot show you the map it is saved at school and even though my father could use the school network to access my files (hence why I tell people not to save dodgy stuff onto their computers) he is working so I'll leave him alone for now.

what I can tell you is how to make one your self! first of all I only know how to get this to work on Windows7 my machine runs XP so I cannot get you all an easy to look at guide :-(

1. go to google maps and turn on the "terrain" setting
2. find an area of the world that you think has the right coastline, relief or river system. do not worry about orientation!!! try to avoid areas that are famous i.e whole continents. also try and select places with very few place names.
3. (this is where you need Windows 7) select the "snipping tool" and select the area of land you want, do not get the arrows and controls in the image
4. copy the image into Microsoft paint (the 2010 edition or newer) now to edit the place, first up rotate and flip the image until it is hard to recognise and is the desired orientation.
5. now lets get recolouring and renaming. first up there is no need to do this if your are happy already. so lets get rid of any unwanted place names. to do this use the pick colour tool to get the ground colour around the words. then use the brush or pencil tool to cover up the offending words. this can be done to any words or terrain items on the map, just remember to select the colour of the surround in terrain to blend in the edit. add green areas for forest, try and get the colours to shade just like the terrain so that you don't end up with a green mass.
6. now for some roads and railways. to do this we need some colours, black for railways and the normal colour for roads on the map (use select to get it) just draw on what you want and set up your little road networks. at this point you might want to add other systems like power lines and irrigation ditches but please expect me to explain this as I did not do it myself. all I can say is pick a different colour and get painting.
7. rivers and water. now forests may not be of priority in these maps, it is hard to add green without messing up the map, but rivers are important, use the normal google map blue and use the paint brush for this one, then you could use the pencil around the edges to blend it in a bit.
8. towns. simple really just add some roads, put in a pattern (grid is realistic) then use the pencil to look like shading, use a similar colour to the roads, I used the same. then use the Letter tool to write in a name, go for a small font, and a easy to read one, select white as a colour, type in the name and done.
9. blending the terrain. to do this use the pencil. select a colour half way between the two colours. then use it around the boarder between the colours, it should work though I have yet to try it on vegetation.
10. final steps are to see if you like it and to make sure that you included the FACTS of maps

• Frame
• Arrow pointing to north
• Color (not nessisary)
• Title
• Scale (if no scale write not so scale in a corner

Also A key would help people to interperate the map

so there you go have fun mapping and I hope to show you the map soon