See what I did there? 'Filling in the blanks'?

While we all wait on the edges of our respective seats for the monumental Map-Making tutorial to be finished, there is at least one thing that needs to be addressed, that so far I have had to help explain to every single map designer submitting a map: Anti-aliasing (and/or image quality).

So, tired of explaining it every time, I'd like to be able to grumpily give the budding cartographer one simple link. To that end, let's put something together here for Yertle to stick in Help. It can start off like this, maybe:

<i>When uploading your image for use as a map background in fill mode, you will have to make sure that anti-aliasing is turned off in your graphics program.</i>

I've never used Photoshop. Can somebody contribute with a screenshot of what the button looks like in Photoshop. And if somebody can give me a place to post a picture, I can do one for paint dot net.

The other thing is image quality. Is the secret simply 'do not save as JPEG'?

I know you guys, like me, have answered and explained all this stuff a hundred times before. The goal here is, explain it one last time step-by-step so that we never have to explain it again.

Why do you keep trying to put in tags in your posts? It is you isn't it?

Fancy you should say this, asm. I spent some time chewing on my tutorial over the weekend, and decided that I'm going about it all wrong. One big piece is too much for me to chew, and likely for any budding designers to bother reading.

Instead, I'm working on a series of smaller, more focused pieces. This topic is the first in the Fireside Chats with Grandpa Cramchakle series.

Then I got distracted and made my Wargear version of Fallout instead. I promise I'll do it. Honest.

Yertle wrote: Why do you keep trying to put in tags in your posts? It is you isn't it?

Thanks for the super helpful feedback. I don't see why I shouldn't be able to. It works at least half the time.

Lol asm :D

That's what I'm afraid of too Cram. I think it would be very awesome to have a full blown super tutorial, but I do fear some would get overwhelmed and just say eh I'll do it my way. I guess some would read through it though and it would help, and makes it easy to point people to read through the big tutorial rather than retyping everything again and again.

Sometimes I do try and instigate you asm :).

<b>Wow that is weird asm, the tags work in Quick Reply, but if you type them in the Full Editor they don't, but then if you Edit the post they do.</b>

alright, so im not real familiar with anti-aliasing.

Im using paint.net at the moment, where can i find this option? do i need to turn this mode off before i create a certain aspect of my map? or can i just turn it off, save the map, and this will help with fill problems?

you also mentioned image quality, any ideas on what the best format is that is compatible with this site? thanks for the tips.

kidamnesiac

http://www.wargear.net/forum/showthread/317/Tutorial:_Anti-Aliasing

helpful?

kidamnesiac wrote: or can i just turn it off, save the map, and this will help with fill problems?

Sadly, no. You have to turn AA off while drawing. It's not a retroactive setting, it actually affects the way your drawing tools work.

Your other questions are answered in the linked post. Which should be stickied (YERTLE).

Thanks Cramchakle.

Stickied, just for you asm :)

I think the best plan though would be something like that in the Help (and all the other Map Design guide stuff), and one sticky pointing to that. Eventually, wouldn't that be best?

how about a new forum, just for tutorials. you could call it "Tutorials" or, "Fireside Chats with Grampa Cram". Your call.

asm wrote:

kidamnesiac wrote: or can i just turn it off, save the map, and this will help with fill problems?

Sadly, no. You have to turn AA off while drawing. It's not a retroactive setting, it actually affects the way your drawing tools work.

http://www.wargear.net/forum/showthread/319p1

Here is probably the fastest way to fix it.

just wanted to thank you guys again. all the tutorials recently posted look like just what i needed to know. Im in the midst of studying for finals, but as soon as I get some time I will get back to map designing. Hopefully I can get my first one fixed and move on to another in the near future.

just as a personal preference, if any of you have seen the board ive been working on, what do you prefer as far as having the entire territory fill in, or a circle within the territory. A few things that make me wonder

-I have some small islands in my board, which even if they fill correctly will maybe not be large enough to display the numbers within them.

-the color outline clearly represents continent territories for bonuses. If the entire territory fills in this may make it difficult to tell, no? perhaps a colored border for each territory indicating which continent they belong to is in order?

First, I saw you map briefly and I think that total fill will work. Just make sure that the colors you use to distinguish between bonuses are different than the color pallet you pick in Wargear. You can change the colors the players have to choose from.

For your islands, what I have done in the past is if they are a chain, connect them with a single pixil continuous line that will fill and all the islands will fill. Not the best but it works. Otherwise you can use an icon or circle for the islands if you want.

There are always ways around with fill mode especially with the system here on WG. Again, we're all willing to help you out any way we can. Good Luck on Finals and I will impart some wisdom I learned from my 9 years of college....

When in doubt on a multiple choice test just fill in the circles with the KISS logo and you'll be fine (AC/DC works also but makes the proff say hhhmmmmmm)

Yertle wrote: Stickied, just for you asm :)

I think the best plan though would be something like that in the Help (and all the other Map Design guide stuff), and one sticky pointing to that. Eventually, wouldn't that be best?

I like this idea as well as Reich's. I think this stuff should be in both places - the forums and the Help. The two graphics tutorials already done should be stuck right into Help as far as I'm concerned they look ready to me. I think the forums should have more than a link. A tutorial sub-forum sounds pretty nice, I think - maybe along with a sticky in the Mapmakers forum pointing to it?

asm wrote:

Yertle wrote: Stickied, just for you asm :)

I think the best plan though would be something like that in the Help (and all the other Map Design guide stuff), and one sticky pointing to that. Eventually, wouldn't that be best?

I like this idea as well as Reich's. I think this stuff should be in both places - the forums and the Help. The two graphics tutorials already done should be stuck right into Help as far as I'm concerned they look ready to me. I think the forums should have more than a link. A tutorial sub-forum sounds pretty nice, I think - maybe along with a sticky in the Mapmakers forum pointing to it?

Part of Reich's reasoning for suggesting a forum insteadof/inadditionto the help files is because the forums are interactive. If people need further clarification, then they can quickly and easily reference a point or ask a pointed question. The help files is nice, too, as it becomes slightly more official.

The two tutorials done right now are functional, but were really just a rush-job-test-balloon to get a feel for form and function. I'm not really happy with how they look. I'd prefer something more polished, i.e. doesn't look like it was done in MS Paint.