Learnings:

....related to the mapping process not the end result:

Shamsp1:

+ Clear aesthetic style from the start.
+ Details that can be applied fairly universally.
+ Decent prefabs.


- Having to make a terrain mash
- Not planning interior layout / detailing
- Starting with overly simple 2-D layout.



Shamsp2:

+ Very clear, replicatable design style.
+ Lots of harmonious prefabs, very easy to populate / detail map
+ Planning a reasonably complex layout that needed little change.
+ Inspiring theme / textures easy to work with.
+ Easy general trim textures

- A few areas of getting trim to work at different heights.
- Not making pre-fabs func_detail / illusionary initially.


SM186_Sham:

+ Sticking to a fairly simple / small design.
+ Having a decent theme / hook to keep inspired.

- Using rotated corridors.
- Awkward window section in corridor cross.



Shamsp3:

+ Adding side areas afterwards, easy way to increase size / gameplay.
+ Starting as a speedmap so not getting too carried away with complexity.

- Having to make a terrain mash
- Faffy lift / switch combinations, didn't get working smoothly.



AD_DM2rmx_Sham:

+ Having a reasonably clear colour / texture theme from the start.
+ Having an easily functional layout.

- Basing a map exactly on an existing .map file
- Making prefab details that were difficult to fit together or fit into the map designs
- Having a fairly ugly main wall texture.


Xmasjam2_Sham:

+ Starting in plenty of time with lots of time to refine details.
+ Doing a lot of sketching to get back on track.

- Trying to fit in a really awkward layout in the space allocated.
- Not making complex prefabs fully func_detailed / illusioned first.
- Having intially over-ambitious / unvisualised ideas.



SM189_Sham:

+ Having a good gimmick for a speedmap.
+ Sticking to inspiring textures out of a large selection.

- Some tricky lighting.


AD_Shamsp4:

+ Having some neat design hooks to give me confidence / interest.
+ Decent "detail" / "gimmick" pre-fabs.
+ Fairly decent theme that was fairly inspiring to work with.

- Choosing a relentlessly difficult trim texture.
- Having large areas angled to 45' and filling with rotated stuff.
- Having to make a terrain mash
- Making some fairly difficult / obtuse pre-fab details (glass pipes, light cones)


So, common factors:

Good / easy:

Strong theme
Good layout early on
Lots of prefabs / applicable details
Easy to use textures

Bad / hard:

Struggling to fit a layout in to a certain area
Making loads of terrain mash
Hard to use / over-complex textures
Not finalising pre-fabs before use
Not planning details / layout

More mappenings.

Crikey. I've been laying down a lot of brushes and not a lot of paint layers. So here's a catch up:

Shamsp3: "Age Of The No Penis Mapper"

Standard ID map inspired by veteran Quake coder Baker talking massive amounts of horseshit in this thread - just read his first post and you'll see what I mean. I made this map in his honour and he's not been seen since.

 Thread

Download

Video (also includes SM187 runthrough):

AD_DM2rmx_sham: "Acidophilous"

AD (Arcane Dimensions Quake mod) remix of the classic ID deathmatch map "Claustrophobolous". Inspired by prolific Quake promoter, videographer and chat channel magnate Dumptruck who was musing on the lack of AD maps and that DM2 was his favourite ID DM map, shortly before suggesting I leave his chat channel for too much swearing. I completed the map anyway. Based exactly on the DM2 map source which was a giant pain in the arse to do.

 Thread

Download

Xmasjam2_sham: "Chapel Perilous"

AD map for the 2018 Xmas Jam which restricts maps to having a 1024^3 unit playable area (i.e. quite a small box by Quake standards). This was a giant pain in the arse to get the layout working with my intention of having a labyrinthine progression that would feel a lot bigger than the map restriction, but once that was done I really enjoyed polishing it up and it's definitely my equal favourite along with Shamsp2.

 

 Thread

Download

SM189_sham: "The Dig"

Doom-textured speedmap that was a lot of fun to make and was part of a necessary break and refreshment while struggling with AD_Shamsp4. I'm chuffed with this one and people liked the funky gimmick.

 Thread

Download

AD_Shamsp4: "Annihilith Of Abhorration"

AD map with an industrial horror theme and Zerstorer textures. It was supposed to be for the Halloween Jam but I had serious mappers block and it took ages to get going. Another pain in the arse with the angulation I chose (the layout is two deathmatch sketches mashed together), but once again good fun to tweak it, and get some riotuous gameplay on the go.

Thread

Download

That makes a total of 8 maps in 6 months. Not bad. I might take it easy for a bit, I certainly want to stick to much smaller, but more polished maps.

Mappenings Part 1

So I made a thing. The box turned into a box with b0rked terrain which turned into caves and canyons with b0rked terrain and a castle in the middle but was pretty cool for a first map overall:

Download and discussion:
http://www.celephais.net/board/view_thread.php?id=61604

Playthrough for non-Quakers

 

The minor exhuberation of doing that thing turned into attempting another thing, which worked a lot better and I'm rather chuffed with:

Download and discussion:
http://www.celephais.net/board/view_thread.php?id=61620

Playthrough for non-Quakers:

And finally for now, a smaller thing. I got an early whiff of a "Terracotta" themed speedmapping session, had a look at Quake's terracotta texture selection, realised there were a lot of terracotta-coloured base textures, and did my own thing, in just a couple of days. Fun to do something smaller and quicker!

Download and discussion for whole pack:
http://www.celephais.net/board/view_thread.php?id=61621

Dabblings.

Not quite sure what will happen but something might:

Sketching ideas from, errrr, 20 years ago??

 Thanks to dumptruck's tutorials , I made a box, and then another box.

  

A bit of fannying about...

 ....and I made a slightly better box. A fair amount going on here with skybox, fog, undulating and phonged rocks and ground terrain, coloured lighting, multiple lights in the pillars to get a glow and surround lighting, a proper spawn point out of a blocked off cave, etc.

 More sketching ideas....

Next plans include making some detail / structural prefabs to get a consistent theme, then see if I can block out a layout roughly similar to my original idea. And, errr, learn Trenchbroom at the same time...

OTOH, bitches....

Black Orc

Not actually black.....but the skin is darker than a normal orc, and the armour, well, it's not in an orc's nature to be subdued let alone camoflagued. I did find the excessive amount of red armour to be frustrating at first, but once I got the right paint choices I was happy with how it worked (basecoat 2 x Mephiston Red, wash Devlan Mud, blended highlight Mephiston Red, blended highlight Blood Red, very small blended edge highlight Tanned Flesh, edge highlight Dwarf Flesh, glaze Blood Red + lots of Lamian Medium).

Feeling festive!

Quick and easy paintjob, fun after the more complex Barbarian and Witchhunter. I originally was going to have the glow coming from within the robe and lighting his skull from below, but decided that would be too distracting. In contrast to the grand mis-tradition of source lighting where trend-chasing idiots paint the normal highlights too bright and the source lighting too dark and colourful so it looks like someone's thrown food colouring over the poor bugger, I made sure to keep the skull highlights muted (one step down from the hand bone highlights) and the eyes bright.

Barbarian and Witchhunter

I painted things! Two of the better (i.e. less hideously-over-designed-by-committee-themeless-cartoon-mashup-bollox) figures from Games Workshop in recent years, and the quality of the design came out when I was painting them. Of course there's always a concept, the initial concept for the Witchhunter was "purple and copper" and for the Barbarian it was "cold-ish". Then I decided to paint them in the same colours and it was an interesting challenge working out which colours would be suitable on which bits of two differently themed figures. I made some subtle differences, i.e. the Barbarian metals have rust and verdigris and blood, the Witchhunter ones have a very faint oily wash to evoke serviced machinery. I liked the jade as a spot colour and indeed the overall result :)