The Secret of the Compass Rose

No, that isn’t the title of a new story, but now that I say that, it totally could be! Hermmm…

Okay, I need to stop getting distracted!

One could even say that I need to keep to one direction. Which brings us to the purpose of this post. Yes, the good ol’ compass rose.

If you’ve seen the maps of Iscaria–the world in which you will find the stories of The King’s Lantern–you’ll know that most of them feature at least one compass rose. And by most, I mean every map that isn’t a world or continental map. If it’s regional, it’s fair game! If you haven’t seen any such maps, however, you can get a glimpse of them in the featured image. Even from those few examples, it’s clear that said compass roses are bold and accompanied by windrose lines.

Some people ask why?

And I say why not? But even though that’s as good a reason as any, it isn’t the only reason.

It all started with a little experiment on my first map. I’m not sure where it came from, but I got the urge to draw a nice compass rose in a corner that had too much free space. I decided that normal compass roses were just too…well…normal. I wanted to make something a little fancier. With circles inside circles and lots of little chevrons. So, that’s what I did, and when it was done it felt a bit meh.

Naturally, I had to try again on the next map. I spent twice as long on that one and it turned out much nicer in my humble opinion. In fact, even though it was only my second, it’s still one of my favorites to this day, and it even ended up as a central element in the story. But you’ll have to stick around until ARC 6 to find out how exactly.

I enjoy drawing the second compass rose. I even found it to be deeply therapeutic. So I drew another. And another. And so on. And now I can’t draw a regional map without one!

The funny part is, each compass rose has a story of its own to tell. I don’t draw it that way. The story usually only springs off the page after the map is finished.

For example, the one in the bottom-right corner of the picture above ended up becoming the location of a vortex in the sky. And the one with the sword and shield ended up hinting at the relationship between the crown and the Duchies of the Kingdom of Thandia.

Initially, I thought they were just fun. Then I noticed how they added a sense of balance. Then I realized they were integral to the story on some level.

Crazy how that works!

Maybe I’ll do a breakdown of each compass rose some day. Until then, I have so many more maps to create for this story, so I’ll be drawing many more compass roses too!

Until next time, dear traveller.

Keep your sword sharp and your senses sharper.

Ganimor