[Upcoming Kickstarter] 25 Quick & Dirty Map Tutorials Guide

[Gamerprinter]

25 Quick & Dirty Map Tutorials Guide
With the intentions of funding by Kickstarter, I plan to create 25 Quick & Dirty Map Tutorials Guide, a 248 page, soft cover, full color interior printed book and PDF files, offering techniques I use to create RPG/board game map designs. Although the focus of the book is using many types of standard graphics applications from image editors like Photoshop, GIMP, and Paintshop Pro, to vector applications like Xara Photo & Graphics Designer, Illustrator, CorelDraw and Inkscape, and many similar applications - all the tutorials will actually be created in Xara Xtreme Pro 4 (though I plan to upgrade, so may use a newer version that that).

The tutorials are 9 to 15 step tutorials with 3 steps per page, or 3 to 5 pages per tutorial section, followed by a full page version of the final step map, plus 3 sample maps using the same technique as the previous tutorials. Some tutorials will be preceded by a text page offering an introduction, and further explanation to help in the creation of this particular technique.

The meatiest chapter, aside from the tutorials themselves will be Explanation of Terms. When a tutorial states "create a shape" different applications use different tools to accomplish this task. While in Xara and most vector applications this uses a Pen Tool, Photoshop and GIMP would use a Mask Tool to do the same. There will be a general explanation after each term or phrase, with a subsection for several specific applications including at least: Photoshop, GIMP, Xara Photo & Graphic Designer and Inkscape (though several more may be included) that offer more detailed tips and explanations on using those applications to duplicate the intended effect.

There will also be a page dedicated to Xara Photo & Graphics Designer itself, since this is the application that is actually used in the creation of all the tutorials, not to mention cover design and page layout.

There are plans for several books to be funded by the same Kickstarter, as stretch goals, including a 25 Advanced Quick & Dirty Map Tutorials Guide, Hand-Drawn Elements with Map Design Guide and more.

To learn more, please visit the Quick and Dirty Map Tutorials website, or the Google+ Community if you have a Google+ account (serving as the website's forum).

You can view my thread on these boards, on using Xara to create fantasy maps, which use the techniques that are being developed for this book publication.

When the Kickstarter goes live, I will post a link in this thread. I hope you join as a contributor, or at least help spread the word.