Creating a Paradise Travel Map - Part 4

This is the fourth in a series of posts describing my process in creating a Paradise Travel Map of the remote South Atlantic island, Tristan da Cunha. If you like, you can review the previous three posts to catch up.

After composing the text in Word describing the island, I carefully ruled and penciled in the text on the right side of the page. Then, using a Micron Pigma no.1 pen, I inked in the text. I had to work very carefully because, as you see,  the "font" size was very small. It takes concentration to maintain control of letter forms at that size.

For all my pencil work, I use the pencil version of the popular Pilot G2 pen, the G2 pencil. My wife found one somewhere a few years ago and bought it for me. Since I do all my writing with a G2 pen, I like drawing with the G2 pencil.

Next I began work on the first of the spot illustrations that will be carefully placed at strategic spots on the map. I wanted to find a picture of Tristao da Cunha, the Portugese explorer who discovered the island, and I did. I found only one image of him online. So I tucked it into the text on the banner, as you can see. It's faint because it's still in pencil. It will be so small that I will need to use a Micron Pigma 005 to ink it.

Then, I moved up to the top of the page. I wanted to include an illustration of da Cunha's ship as it approached the island. It took some research to find what I believe to be the correct ship. a Portugese Carrack ship from the 15th Century. I penciled and inked it on top, near the island. So I will reduce the title banner in Photoshop so it fits between the ship and the upper right corner panel.

I found an open space below the text banner, so I plan to fill it with a small map of the village, Edinburgh of the Seven Seas, referred to as "the Settlement" by local islanders. You can see it, still in pencil form. It could possibly be the only published map in existence of the Settlement itself. It's always included as part of a map of the island.

The next post may be the last one to describe all of the pencil and ink preparation work. I will pencil and ink all of the necessary spot artwork in whatever space is still available. Then it will be ready for Photoshop adjustments, then the color. I'm looking forward to applying the color.

Have you seen my other blog, The Trowbridge Chronicles?