Haunted Tree, Adept (Patreon)

This week I made the Haunted Tree (40x50), another larger-than-normal map! This one features the roots of a very big tree as well as an ominous tunnel inside/below. Spooky!

Your alternate version of this one is Enchanted- which I thought felt right for a giant tree. No way a tree gets to be this big without a bit of magic, right?

1. Map concept: big tree roots, spooky cave. That's all I had here- I figured I would improvise something for the rest of the map, if necessary, but I had a feeling that the roots + the usual forest environment would probably be plenty to make the map feel detailed. 

Side note: I thought the tree roots would be more interesting (or at least more spooky) if they looked a little like tentacles. Obviously trees don't usually look like this, but I think it looks dangerous, strangely enough. 

2. Want to guess why this map is late? Roots are a real bummer to draw, it's easy for them to feel misshapen or not read like the right shape. It took a pretty long time to get it all sketched in and detailed in such a way that each root felt like a tube shape and not just an odd lump. I could even have gone a bit harder on them too, maybe making the bigger roots' outlines a little more crunchy or adding little details to make it look like the grass was growing up the sides in places. But this was a long and boring process and it's been a long week

3. Fairly normal Haunted colors here, a little more contrast than usual and a touch more vibrancy because I felt like this one needed to pop. The magical fog coming from the cave really draws the eye though, huh? Spooky. 

So, I decided to not try to draw in the shadows from big tree's canopy. I tried it out in one of my first passes but it just made too much of the map excessively shadowy. Instead I handled it like I do the shadows cast from the small, dead trees- a little bit to express the tree trunk and then it fades off. I would wager that most people won't even think much about where the big tree's shadows are, and if they do notice then they won't care- therefore I've decided not to care much either.