[Abandoned] - Cairo

by **Industrial Helix** on Sat Apr 16, 2011 9:49 pm

Right, didn't mean to sound upset or angry or anything. But it's true. Moswt people only ever comment when there is a fresh update, if at all.

As for the bonuses... yeah, let's even them out at 3 each.

by **MarshalNey** on Sun Apr 17, 2011 12:44 am

Whoops, didn't answer your question but yes I like the decision you made for the Egyptian Army. I think I'll send this to the others to see what they think, I'm satisfied.

-- Marshal Ney

by **MarshalNey** on Sun Apr 24, 2011 11:19 pm

Tack has no objections, and ian seems okay with it. Therefore a stamp is warranted. Now where did I put it...

Aha! Congratulations, Helix, may this be another successful tiny map in the tradition of Doodle and Cyprus.

-- Marshal Ney

by **Victor Sullivan** on Sun Apr 24, 2011 11:26 pm

Bam! IH is hot tonight, amiright? 'Grats on stamp number two!...but what about the two map policy? This is his third in this Workshop.

by **Industrial Helix** on Mon Apr 25, 2011 10:46 am

Sullivan... always trying to rain on my parade... I'm moving Cuba to the bin anyway so i can sort out what I'm going to do with the graphics.

by **Victor Sullivan** on Mon Apr 25, 2011 3:44 pm

Industrial Helix wrote:Sullivan... always trying to rain on my parade... I'm moving Cuba to the bin anyway so i can sort out what I'm going to do with the graphics.

I'm sorry, Helix...

So for this map, what is your plan? I think you could experiment with different fonts, as I'm not convinced this is the most appropriate one out there. Also, I think you could do something with the picture stylistically, like make them not quite so...just pasted on there.

by **Industrial Helix** on Tue May 10, 2011 12:52 pm

Ok, I've been getting a lot of feedback off the boards and been deciding what to do.

One suggestion was to take an outline approach to the map... its rough, but here's an idea of where its going... Does this make the map any clearer?

Click image to enlarge.

The other approach, I believe I should credit Natty_Dread, increases the opacity of the government buildings and Security forces to better distinguish them from the nonplayable parts of the map.

Click image to enlarge.

Personally, I think the second option is better. I think the current layout of the map works, assuming some more adjustments, and I kind of don't like this outline aestetically and functionally.

Thoughts?

by **isaiah40** on Tue May 10, 2011 2:14 pm

Now that I see it this way, the previous version is clear IMO. I'll think on this some more though.

by **natty dread** on Tue May 10, 2011 4:13 pm

I believe you posted the same image twice...

Anyway, the black borders could work if they were slightly thinner.

I'll wait until I see the version with the higher-opacity government buildings, but in this one you posted they're still too hard to see... You could try bright white borders for them, maybe?

by **Industrial Helix** on Thu May 12, 2011 10:07 am

Ah crap... so I did. I updated the original post, here it is again.

Click image to enlarge.

by **natty dread** on Thu May 12, 2011 11:44 am

I'm sorry, but I still think it'd be better if you would change the black and white areas to some other colour. The yellow and red areas provide such a good contrast with the black and white background, that it sort of makes the Army/Gov areas blend in with the background even more.

by **Industrial Helix** on Thu May 12, 2011 9:11 pm

natty_dread wrote:I'm sorry, but I still think it'd be better if you would change the black and white areas to some other colour. The yellow and red areas provide such a good contrast with the black and white background, that it sort of makes the Army/Gov areas blend in with the background even more.

Anyone want to second this?

by **Victor Sullivan** on Fri May 13, 2011 2:54 pm

Industrial Helix wrote:
natty_dread wrote:I'm sorry, but I still think it'd be better if you would change the black and white areas to some other colour. The yellow and red areas provide such a good contrast with the black and white background, that it sort of makes the Army/Gov areas blend in with the background even more.

Anyone want to second this?

Meh. I like the limited color scheme with the Egyptian colors. I support Helix on this one.

-Sully

by **natty dread** on Fri May 13, 2011 3:20 pm

Well, something should be done to make the playable area distinct from the background. Currently, the yellow and red areas are well visible, but the army/gov areas sort of drown in - the outlines don't really help, as they are the same colour as the buildings on the background.

The problem as I see it, is that you have no clear contrast between the playable area and background. To give them a contrast, there should be a significant difference in one aspect between them. Either in lightness, saturation, sharpness... For example, in order to have a good lightness contrast, you should either have a dark background + light playable area, or the other way around, but currently you have mixed - some areas are darker/as dark as the background, some are lighter. The same with saturation... some areas are more saturated than the background (red,yellow) and some are the same (army/gov areas).

See the problem? There's no clear contrast between them, there's no single aspect acting as a dividing line, and that's what causing the problem.

If you're dead set on using those colors for the bonus areas, I have some other ideas...
- make the background blurrier, out of focus, while making the playable areas very sharp. I don't know if this would work, as the details of the city would be lost.
- make the background darker, and make all the bonus areas lighter than the background, but keep otherwise same colours you have now.
- make the background coloured, for example, dark blue.

Just throwing out ideas, but something should be done, because currently, the playable area just doesn't stand out as it should, IMHO.

by **Industrial Helix** on Mon May 16, 2011 10:43 am

I tried colors and it wasn't working... they just clashed with the existing colors and kind of made everything icky. Originally, I was thinking like a night vision green, but it worked out less great in practice than theory.

by **natty dread** on Mon May 16, 2011 12:19 pm

One more thing: I can see Google watermark (actually, several) on your background image. That is not good... If I remember right Google doesn't allow free commercial use of their satellite images.

by **AndyDufresne** on Tue May 17, 2011 10:36 am

Industrial Helix wrote:I tried colors and it wasn't working... they just clashed with the existing colors and kind of made everything icky. Originally, I was thinking like a night vision green, but it worked out less great in practice than theory.

Why not try using a pattern, like a cross-hatch or something to differentiate?

--Andy

by **RedBaron0** on Thu Jun 16, 2011 1:25 pm

What's the status here guys? Looking for a new background map??

by **Industrial Helix** on Fri Jun 17, 2011 8:03 am

Yeah... I think so. I'm not sure how to approach it, what a bad oversight.

I was thinking about it as a regular style flat map... but i dunno. i feel like that would lose the realism of the map, which i want to keep quite badly.

by **natty dread** on Fri Jun 17, 2011 8:39 am

You could try asking Google for permission to use their images... never hurts to ask. Or you could try finding a free public domain satellite image, but that might be harder to come by...

by **AndyDufresne** on Fri Jun 17, 2011 10:47 am

natty_dread wrote:You could try asking Google for permission to use their images... never hurts to ask. Or you could try finding a free public domain satellite image, but that might be harder to come by...

Directory of Free Satellite Imagery on the web: http://www.ppgis.net/imagery.htm

Maybe you could find something there?

--Andy

by **DiM** on Sat Jun 18, 2011 6:40 pm

Industrial Helix wrote:Yeah... I think so. I'm not sure how to approach it, what a bad oversight.

I was thinking about it as a regular style flat map... but i dunno. i feel like that would lose the realism of the map, which i want to keep quite badly.

i'm not a big fan of satellite images used as CC maps because:
1. they look bad
2. they limit the artistic expression of the map maker

on top of that i believe a satellite image does not fit this map theme. i mean look at the territories that you have. all the weird shapes and connections leave a LOT of unused space that doesn't look too good. also the photos on the right while true to the theme don't actually help in any way. in fact they draw more attention than the actual map does.

what i'd do is create separate cartoonish territories with connections between them.
for example talaat harb square has a statue of talaat harb (duh!) so draw that statue and that's it.
or the security forces base could be represented by a few guys with plastic shields and batons sitting side by side.
perhaps something like this: http://www.fungraphix.com/aaTexasMap.png but in a more serious approach.

with this approach you have much more freedom placing the territories and of course you can keep the original connections but improve on their visibility/legibility and at the same time you're free to add your own artistic touch and make the map truly unique.

by **isaiah40** on Wed Jul 06, 2011 3:29 pm

[Moved]

It would appear that development of this map has stalled. If the mapmaker wants to continue with the map, then one of the Foundry Moderators will be able to help put the thread back into the Foundry system, after an update has been made. ;-)

by **thenobodies80** on Tue Feb 07, 2012 5:20 pm

The six months of vacation has expired, for this reason this topic is now labeled as [Abandoned]. If the original mapmaker wants to continue this map project it's fine but an update must provided. From this moment anyone else is free to take this project without the original mapmaker permission, but it has to be started from the scratch.