a more precise list of what is needed ?

I still not really know what is really needed.

lets try to make some categories:

vegetation:
- fungi (the classical ones from the monster manual too ?)
- algae
- lichen

most of them luminescent (purple or green, right ?)

animals:
blind stuff in the water (this is a information about the map scalling)
lizards and spiders (both wild and domesticated)
what else ?

people:

houses:

other stuffs:


Mark, I know you are lurking here. Feel free to fill in the holes
:-)

I never lurk ... that's Chris, remember <grin>
I watch and interact.

people:
Drow, Duergar Dwarves, Kobolds, ...

houses:
- in stalactites and stalagmites
- build into rockface
- fences (webbing, glowing metal, spikey stone, etc)

other stuffs:
- lots of effects like cracks, holes, light, shadow, height differences, etc.
- rocks and boulders
- water, rock, marble floors (plus designs)
- runes
- ...

Mark wrote:

I never lurk ... that's Chris, remember <grin>
I watch and interact.

people:
Drow, Duergar Dwarves, Kobolds, ...

3d artist'job

Quote :

houses:
- in stalactites and stalagmites
- build into rockface
- fences (webbing, glowing metal, spikey stone, etc)

do you want fully drawn houses or materials to make house (doors, windows, roof, and so on) ?

Quote :

other stuffs:
- lots of effects like cracks, holes, light, shadow, height differences, etc.
- rocks and boulders
- water, rock, marble floors (plus designs)
- runes
- ...

there are plenty of rocks and boulders. do you really need more ?
[/quote]

For houses, people tend to want both ... complete buildings and pieces.

We need rocks and boulders that match the textures we use for the floors. And I think we don't have enough covers that consist of multiple rocks (small ones). Also not enough rock-slides that can be put down as one piece, instead of placing a lot of single rocks.
We can use existing rocks, but why not add some new ones to an art-pack too. They will be part of the Underdark theme. We also have a lot of rock floors already, but we want more of those too

ok, then.
first of all stuff needed , imho, the bases texture.

then, the stalagmites/stalagtites made with those texture (except if you use a swadow object instead)

Mark ? any texture ? I really need them :-)

Sorry, been busy making material for the Generic Map project.
Will make some textures today ...

I made stony sandy texture tiles. Here is a sample with the tiling. Anybody interested in using this for the Underdark project?

imho it still too rough. The caves are made of soften stones... I would prefer something like

ah ... good sample Fred.

I should be able to create something like that. These kinds of floors will be very difficult to create a DJ floor of though. They will be large tiles used as Cover, Treasure, Trap, etc.

Tony: love the floor ... I'd like to use that for a river bed

may be not sharp enough

Mark wrote:

Tony: love the floor ... I'd like to use that for a river bed

Who is Tony?

Oops ... sorry Daryl ... I mistook your post for one of Tony's (Darkness).
Welcome aboard the Underdark Project.

Fred wrote:

imho it still too rough. The caves are made of soften stones... I would prefer something like

I can come up with something softer. I imagined that piece as a specialized texture anyway to be placed in secondary areas or butted up agains the walls in less-traveled areas.

This is neat watching this in progress!
I'm just starting to geather a clue about how much work goes into a map before I add my two cents. It's a pretty staggering amount.

I still think I have the fun part.

Yes you do Mysie ... although creating the art is also a fun thing (as long as it doesn't take 4 hours to create one single flower <grrr> ). I still smile when I see one of my pieces in a map at DJ ... and since I did a lot of creating and keplifying, there are not many maps without at least one of my pieces ... very cool.

Soft rock? That should be doable. Something like this?



Just a quickie, so I didn't fiddle much with the colours and such.

By the way, are we supposed to ... do anything with the art? This seems a tad disorganized for something that supposed to be at first proof in less than a month... Or maybe I just didn't get the supersikrit message giving all the sordid details.

That's a great comment Zicon.

Yes there are things you can do with the art that will move this along faster.

#1 create groups of art pieces. - Not just one stalagtite, but 12 (cover)

#2 package them according to a cover nomenclature or floors/walls

stalarmite_brownrock01_ZIC-a
stalarmite_brownrock01_ZIC-b
stalarmite_brownrock01_ZIC-c
etc.

#3 test the art pieces against the user textures we have available for floors and walls. Wonderful pieces still have to meld in order to be usable.

#4 get finished pieces to me as soon as you have them named and tested, I can see if they will fit in what I have, if I can adjust what I have, and give feedback and aditional requests.

So far I have two test stalagtites from Mark, some stone textures from Mark, and that's it.

I also had e-mailed out a wish list, but didn't see it posted here so I'll dig it up and make sure it gets out here.


Once I have all the art I need it usually only takes me a week or less to put a large map together. The timescale here is really getting all those pieces.

Right-o. "Send finished art to Micah" was really the magic sentence I was looking for. But testing ... testing is good, but test against what, exactly? "the user textures we have available" -- what, who, where? Where is this vital information hidden?

Another good question to which I don't have the best answer. Mark made a bunch of rock textures that I have, and Tony has made some great wild pieces that I unfortunately can't use for this project. We really need some sort of an art repository here that we can post stuff to. In the meantime we'll have to gang up on Mark, since he's been the most prolific in the textures department.

Aye, yes and amen to a repository. At the very least, members of a project needs to have access to the art created for the project by other members. And preferrably central access to a list where you can see the specifics of what other members are doing. For example; should I polish that rock texture more, or has that need already been filled? I have a neat-looking proto-fungus, should I finish that or should I rather be working on something else? Right now, I have no clue whatsoever what I should be doing, except "something underdark-related".

This was the wish list I wrote up originally:





1) basic rock textures – the ones you’ve got are great – but for mid scale if we could get something very similar but with a smaller “grain” it would be great. (the red and green shales in the temple artpack are close to what I’m thinking)

2) flowstone cover – that link: http://www.planetware.com/picture/yellowstone-minerva-terrace-us-wyyel11.htm has several good pictures there – though I can get more and none of them are top down.

3) stalactite cover – the funny thing here is due to the fantasy setting I think we can create pieces that can be used in normal cavern maps as well as the mid-scale – since the ones in this map will be “giant sized” for building manses on.

4) fungus cover – I think we have some good shrooms – or were those Fluid? Hmm can’t remember – but more wouldn’t hurt as well as molds – which are easy enough that I might give them a go.

5) mid-scale housing – these are just roofs (small roofs at that) towers, squares, rectangles, a few weird looking pieces We’ll be stamping them over and over to create the city map.

6) mid-scale bridges and other major architectural statements.



I'm trying my best shot at #5 on that list - not sure it will hold up. I'm not the best for creating from scratch. I shoulda posted this as soon as the forum was put in place, sigh - gotta come by and check this more often.

Very cool texture Tone

Once Mysie has posted the wish-list, we can make notes on it to indicate what has been created and what still needs to be done. I suggest Mysie keeps the art pieces for now, but sending them to all the project members is nice too. I can of course also keep them, but Mysie needs them for her map(s) anyway. After the maps are done (and basically this projects is done), we can see what we can do to make the art into a real pack ... (another project that follows this one )

Any other suggestions?

This map at WotC of the Lloth's Demonweb really rings a bell with me: http://www.wizards.com/default.asp?x=dnd/mw/20060613a

I picture the Underdark as being very dark but with glowing stuff giving off light. Whether magical like from faerie fire or natural like the mushrooms in the other post. And the glow lights up the immediate area.

I really like the way they used these web strands to define the pathways. We usually think of webs as the final round sheet spread out between to objects, but individual strands can be really effective also.

And who's to say the the Underdark cities don't have some large spiders as inhabitant that leave strands like this around. Be interesting to see some spider nests on the outskirts of any living area.

Just some food for thought...

You are right Bil ... let's try to think outside of the box and create maps that are exciting to see and original in design ... well, we can at least try LOL