I'm just wondering how many people do this for the settings of their stories, and what they use to do it. I'm writing and illustrating a graphic novel in a fantasy setting, and I'm strongly considering mocking up some of the towns that the story takes place in using some sort of 3d program. There's more than a couple reasons I want to do this. For starters, it forces me to think about details of the settlement that I might otherwise avoid. It also means that I'll be consistent with the layout of the (rather large) town and surrounding landscape, and have a better sense of perspective to boot. I'm also toying with the idea of rendering 3D scenes for my backgrounds and then managing the rest my artwork on top of that... I've seen that done rather impressively.
However, I've got no idea what kind of program to manage something like this quickly and easily. The most likely course of action is that I'd use something like this as a rough guide for placement and perspective rather than have it as part of the finished artwork, so the fidelity isn't a huge issue so much as just getting the shapes in in a hurry. Does anyone know a good program for this sort of thing? I've looked before, but found nothing to my satisfaction.
However, I've got no idea what kind of program to manage something like this quickly and easily. The most likely course of action is that I'd use something like this as a rough guide for placement and perspective rather than have it as part of the finished artwork, so the fidelity isn't a huge issue so much as just getting the shapes in in a hurry. Does anyone know a good program for this sort of thing? I've looked before, but found nothing to my satisfaction.
