Question to mappers: Do you sketch your maps or make them up on the fly?

[roadworx]

while i do need to have some sort of general idea of what i'm gonna do before i get started, i typically do everything on the fly in the editor (with lots and lots of tinkering to get it to work the exact way that i want). however, i'm thinking about beginning to sketch parts of them out at work - or at least, prototypes of what i want - because of how much freetime i tend to have there

[enigma101]

I usually have a vague idea of what map I'm going to make before I do anything, but I usually sketch it out before I start working on it so I know what the general layout/design of the map is going to be.

[DynamiteKaitorn]

I'm VERY much scatter-brained so all of my maps are made up as I go.

[Lizardcommando]

I have tried sketching out my maps a few times in the past, but 99% of the time, I completely ditch whatever idea I come up with those sketches due to my mapping skills being really basic. Most times, I'll have a basic idea in my head or get influenced by something I see out in the real world and try to make something vaguely similar in a map editor.

[SleepyVelvet]

I do a mix and match of everything, though I find paper and pencil slightly more natural, and you're not always at an editor making that an option.

 

Sometimes I just open the editor and use that as the only canvas.  Sometimes I start drawing the idea of a map on paper first.  Sometimes I print out a half finished map with a loose layout and map on paper and then build the map in an iterative fashion (it helps to not have to stare at a screen sometimes too).  Sometimes I draw random doodles of varying levels of abstractness that can sometimes be turned into a doom level.  Another under-used method is to not draw a map, per se, but to use whatever scribblings as the basis for fancy abstract floor detailing (lunchlunch's Jaded.wad comes to mind).

 

Coincidentially, I have a pile of coffee stained papers under my desk with doodles.  Before it disintegrates like many before it: I'll share the only one of them that wasn't also covered with too much random office-work stuff top secret noisy work.  I think this one I actually had Doom in mind when doodling it out:

 

[Pezl]

I usually map somenthing I created in my mind or just do lines and it will turn into some thing. Personally I sketched few maps but most of them werent even transformed into doom builder, so I prefer not to sketch so.

[D0M0]

It really depends. If the map is some sort of magnum opus in the wad, then most of my brain power will contribute towards that map. So i would sketch the idea on paper and try and recreate it in doombuilder (the sketching is usually very rough)

 

As for the 90% of maps (not that i’ve made many), they are just done on the fly. I don’t really need a big idea in order to start working on a map majority of the time.