Very nice. I have a book of maps for his world on a bookshelf here which I got when I was young (The Atlas of Middle-Earth - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Atlas_of_Middle-earth). I enjoyed reading that a lot, and it was nice to see that most parts of it are well thought through and internally consistent (there's one piece near Rivendell which is a bit of a mess between the Hobbit and LotR but we can let Tolkien have one minor issue).
You can literally still connect to this game from your terminal: telnet mume.org 4040 IIRC.
When I was a teenager, a buddy and me printed out giant copies of that map, laminated it, and put it on the wall in front of our computers while we hunted hobbits on our orc characters. Was pretty rad.
Friendly advice: this is wrong way to sell fantasy maps to nerds. The link shows some animation (which actually feels a bit annoying cause I can't focus on any particular detail), and lowres pics of maps itself (which can't prove the quality of work), and some useless text. Instead it'd be way better to show a few highres fragments.
Beautiful work, I love fantasy cartography. Someday I actually want to make some maps of my own, I was thinking of ASOIAF. A slightly off-topic question, are these types of maps legal to sell from copyright point of view? I understand that this is quite a niche product, so maybe I'm overthinking it, but do these count as derivative works ?
I had the same thought. Not bashing their work I am genuinely curios.
For this specific case I was suprised to see they have a dedicated website for such questions! So I guess it is quite common.... (They seem very serious about it since i couldn't even mark the text to copy it here! )
>Tolkien’s original drawings, paintings, maps, designs, scripts and other graphic works are protected by copyright and may not be copied. The Tolkien Estate takes action against parties who try to commercialise Tolkien’s works, including maps of Middle-earth, the One Ring Inscription and other images.
The key is that the original maps are copyrighted, and direct derivatives may fall under that, too - but the general information cannot be copyrighted (at least in the USA).
You could make a freeway map of Eriador, for example.
Don’t forget trademarks, even if your maps are drawn completely from scratch then I am sure whoever has the license for selling maps of A Song Of Ice And Fire (TM) will take issue with you presenting them as such, if your business becomes large enough for them to bother noticing you.
Very nice. I have a book of maps for his world on a bookshelf here which I got when I was young (The Atlas of Middle-Earth - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Atlas_of_Middle-earth). I enjoyed reading that a lot, and it was nice to see that most parts of it are well thought through and internally consistent (there's one piece near Rivendell which is a bit of a mess between the Hobbit and LotR but we can let Tolkien have one minor issue).
This book is amazing; the fact that she was able to work out most everything involving geology just from Tolkien's descriptions is wonderful.
Tangential, BUT, here is a grid map of ARDA from a (M)ulti (U)ser (D)ungeon text game from the 90s that you can still play: https://mume.yllemo.com/lib/exe/fetch.php?cache=&media=maps:...
You can literally still connect to this game from your terminal: telnet mume.org 4040 IIRC.
When I was a teenager, a buddy and me printed out giant copies of that map, laminated it, and put it on the wall in front of our computers while we hunted hobbits on our orc characters. Was pretty rad.
Funny, I found this last night: https://www.ardacraft.me/
Friendly advice: this is wrong way to sell fantasy maps to nerds. The link shows some animation (which actually feels a bit annoying cause I can't focus on any particular detail), and lowres pics of maps itself (which can't prove the quality of work), and some useless text. Instead it'd be way better to show a few highres fragments.
A bit unrelated, but one of the rarest pieces for Tolkien's collectors has been put for sale recently
https://www.tomwayling.co.uk/product-page/songs-for-the-phil...
Beautiful work, I love fantasy cartography. Someday I actually want to make some maps of my own, I was thinking of ASOIAF. A slightly off-topic question, are these types of maps legal to sell from copyright point of view? I understand that this is quite a niche product, so maybe I'm overthinking it, but do these count as derivative works ?
I had the same thought. Not bashing their work I am genuinely curios.
For this specific case I was suprised to see they have a dedicated website for such questions! So I guess it is quite common.... (They seem very serious about it since i couldn't even mark the text to copy it here! )
>Tolkien’s original drawings, paintings, maps, designs, scripts and other graphic works are protected by copyright and may not be copied. The Tolkien Estate takes action against parties who try to commercialise Tolkien’s works, including maps of Middle-earth, the One Ring Inscription and other images.
[0] https://www.tolkienestate.com/frequently-asked-questions-and...
The key is that the original maps are copyrighted, and direct derivatives may fall under that, too - but the general information cannot be copyrighted (at least in the USA).
You could make a freeway map of Eriador, for example.
And see all the "unofficial" books around Minecraft or Harry Potter (or lord of the rings): https://www.amazon.com/s?k=unofficial+lord+of+the+rings
And maps "in the style" of Tolkien but covering the real world or other properties are likely entirely fine.
Don’t forget trademarks, even if your maps are drawn completely from scratch then I am sure whoever has the license for selling maps of A Song Of Ice And Fire (TM) will take issue with you presenting them as such, if your business becomes large enough for them to bother noticing you.
odd, I'd rather have Tolkienistic maps of the Earth :)
good news, there are artists out there doing exactly this!
one example: https://lordofmaps.com/ (unaffiliated)
Cool!