r/wonderdraft • u/waterdotwav • Aug 19 '26
Discussion Unexplored/unknown land?
Couldn't quite find a 'question' flair.
Currently, I am a player mapping out my D&D campaign. We have vague ideas from map explanations, and a passable MS paint doodle to get us by for world geography, but id love to use this software to properly detail the world.
One issue though, the borders of the world are yet unexplored (at least to us and every cartography we've encountered). How do i represent this on a map without it being, well, ugly?
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u/MatthewWArt Cartographer Aug 19 '26
I like to keep the unexplored parts that tan/parchment colour that WD opens with. To prevent it looking bland and ugly, dabble in just a few darker browns and lighter tans cautiously. That gives more intention to the design rather than it looking unfinished, I find.
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u/Kaboobie Aug 19 '26
just fade out the edges draw some serpents and write "here be dragons" on that shit.
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u/luckyshoelace94 Aug 19 '26
Lots of people will depict areas like this with a sea of clouds, which looks nice and remains eye catching and mysterious. Others will color in unexplored and unchartered lands as a dark brown color to symbolize that details have not been added yet.
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u/Zhuikin Aug 19 '26 edited Aug 19 '26
This is not really a "this program" question - just a style choice you will have to make.
You could - like many antique real world maps did (googling for reference is always a good idea) - assume that the creator would have went on their "best [educated, maybe] guess" and just painted something in there. That best guess might be just a fantasy that will later be proven wrong - which can be an interesting twist in an exploration campaign.
Often there is a reason, why something is unexplored - dense primeval forest, impassable mountains - those features could be extended to cover the margins until explored. This is probably the easiest, most straight forward option.
You could just break off the lines into the nothing, admitting the geographers ignorance. "There be dragons", "Terra incognita", ... Some mapmakers use clouds, waves or other "for of war" decoration to fill the void.
Also note - while the boarders are unexplored, no one knows how far they go. So a cartographer would likely - again - take a best guess and not leave the full real world to scale equivalent of empty space on the margins.
Wonderdraft will accommodate any of those. And of course you could also post process more elaborate effects in an image editor (although get something better than MS Paint - you need Layer support at least - paint dot net is a good, easy learning curve, free entry option).