I don't want to sound like a sob but.. I cant map! I literally suck. I am on no joke... my 5-6th map and I haven't released one of them. I just get frustrated with what I have compared to other people. *cough* "Jbird the mapping god *cough*. I lay everything out before I map and still ends up being awful. I've looked at A TON of tutorials blackjackjohnny, mods repository you name it and it has something to do with cod5 radiant ive watched it. It just never turns out. If you look in the image below my terrain patches are atrocious and the layout is an abomination. I don't know how this stuff happens but it does.

Heres a map ive probably put 7-8 hours into
http://gyazo.com/667869680da5eb929bd78fab2b3fb3a1 (sorry for gyazo)

Where do you learn to map so well? take Jbirds xmas map for example, buildings are gorgeous nice world spawn settings lighting is excellent and everything wraps together nicely. Is that stuff trial and error? because ive read and watched a ton of stuff and its no where near that level.

Any tips?


Well that's the end of my rant, sorry if I sound like a little shit about it.
 

Hey man, I've been trying to map since March, still haven't realesed a map but getting close. All you need to do is keep trying and do differnt things and see what looks good. I've finally come up with something that looks half acceptable. The world spawn settings are mostly trial and error, but the rest of it is just relentless work. And that pic? That looks very nice, just detail it with some blend patches and decals. It's all worth it in the end good luck mapping.

Thanks man

When you are making for example hallway, try to think of what could go in there to make it look not empty and do it as much as you can. Eventually it should look good, if you just put your mind into it

TBH, if your releasing your first map, it doesn't have to be perfect, as long as you put visible effort into it and it isn't a box map. Now i'm not saying you should release it if it is really bad, but to me, your pic dosnt look all that bad. I can see that you put some effort into it and you put more than one room into it. Your terrain looks pretty nice except for those black lines. I know how hard it can be when your first starting out. Hell, i'm still finishing up my first map (started 6 months ago). It can be very frustrating to look at jbird, weezy, chromastone, and all the rest of the pros amazing maps but trust me, if you stick with it, you will probably be as good as, if not better than them eventually! You just gotta be patient, and have some perseverance! If this is something you really enjoy doing (like me) then you should stick with it. Maybe you finish your first map and decide it just isn't your cup of tea. Anyway sorry for the long-ass paragraph and good luck in all your future mapping

Playing the original maps could inspire you also , try coming up with a theme or a story for your map for you to work around. I read the title and on first map here are the tips i learnt

- Back up .map file a regularly , and your mods folder to back up all edited gsc
- Have a test map to test new things you add to avoid confusion ( works for me anyway)
- The limit for 2400 models comes quickly
- I hit a limit on walls as i had added a lot of broken wall prefabs and they were adding a lot of cells , so be careful of having too small parts
When making a map i would also recommend trying to get the models you use regularly to avoid the time coming scrolling through the ones you do not want. I completely modelled my map with the waw  models and ( after finally obtained ) i remodeled my entire map again to find they show up green in other pcs.

Mainly enjoy making the map that is why you are doing it , my main problem is i like making pable areas and setting up spawns and general map making , but i have lost tonnes of time getting extras and models etc. Now i will back up everything that works in the map to have a copy paste ( almost ) effect for any future maps.

Try looking for a partner / team to create a map together, ( i would also like to do something like that ) as i know different people have different skills nation of those will create good working and detailed maps.

jbird, weezy, chromastone, and all the rest of the pros amazing maps

I didnt think I was to good, I know ive gotten better but didnt think it was that good, maybe I cut myself down to much..... or play to many jbird maps

I didnt think I was to good, I know ive gotten better but didnt think it was that good, maybe I cut myself down to much..... or play to many jbird maps

Yeh, you don't deserve to be on that list Chroma, didn't you make Lorkeep?  And how many Jbird maps are there? Only 2 isn't there?

- The limit for 2400 models comes quickly

Sorry what?  ???

Doesn't really matter how long you work on a map imo, as long as you have fun making it. I've started mapping about 1.5 year ago and still havent released a single map. My first map was absolute crap, and nobody ever saw it i think. I was never released anyway. Right now i'm working on 2 maps for about a year, and doing a map for the xmas contest now. So working on a map for at least a few months is kinda normal i guess.
Like someone mentioned b4, try thinking of a theme / setting for the map so you got some sort of goal of how you want it to look and feel. A tip for terrain maybe, try making everything as a seperate object, and weld them together afterwards. So for example if you want a road, mountain and a river in your map, first make each one of them seperate and put them in their place. Once happy with each of those, weld up the rest of the terrain with new patches. That way you can really make use of the verts for blending / height etc..

Let the real live environment inspire you. For example: if you have a rather long outside concrete wall in your map and you just slap on one texture itll look boring. Walk around your hometown for a bit and im sure youll find an at least similar wall to yours. It most likely wont just look boring and all the same. There may be some moss growing on it near the tree next to it or some vines growing up it on the other side. Maybe theres an old rusty barrel in it somewhere to let the rain water flow out and theres already ruststains under it stuff like that.

Same goes for houses i doubt any house is just literally 4 walls and a roof. Theres always some kind of pillars holding the roof, stairs arent just square blocks they have a little bit of an overhang on them and so on.

I hope you got the point and maybe inspired aswell. Im sure youll manage to implement that stuff.
This can of course be applied to layouts and such.