How to Draw A Plateau

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Drawing a plateau on your fantasy map is a simple way to make the landscape of your world stand out from the flat terrain you see on most maps. In this tutorial, you will learn how to draw impressive cliffs that rise out of the landscape. Which can become key storytelling features in the world you're creating for your next book or role-playing campaign.

All of the brushes I will be using for this tutorial are available in Map Maker Essential Brushes pack for Procreate & Photoshop.

1: Defining the Shape

Sketch a simple line for the top of the cliffs. Don't worry about making it look perfect at this point, you are mainly just trying to figure out the overall shape. Since this cliff will be in an isometric perspective, make sure the flows more horizontally than vertically. Think about it as using a sweeping motion from left to right in order to achieve the right perspective.

3: Determining the Height

You can now draw some vertical lines down from each of the main points of the ridge that you have drawn. At this point you are determining the height of the cliff, so draw the lines down to where they would meet with the ground.

You can start imagining the plateau as a three dimensional object with some parts of the cliff being hidden by other cliffs coming in front of it. A good example of this is with the point at the top which is mostly obscured by the main part of the cliff coming in front.

In this example I have also included a slight bump out at roughly the same height of each line coming down. In the next step you will see why.

4: Adding the Initial Details

Now you can begin adding in some of the initial details on the cliffs. Add in some more vertical lines but make them more broken and subtle than the main lines you drew in the previous step. You will also want to draw some more broken lines at the base of the cliff where it would meet the ground.

You can also see that the bump out I added in the previous step I have turned into a sedimentary layer for more visual interest. If you choose to do this as well you want to be roughly the same thickness along the cliff.

5: Finishing Up the Details

Keep adding in vertical lines on the cliff face until you are happy with the overall look. It is easy to go a little to crazy with this though, so you may have to go back and a erase if an area starts looking too busy.

You can also add some subtle sloping lines down from the bottom of the cliffs. This helps to blend it more naturally into the terrain. You can also add more horizontal lines at the top of the cliffs to give more texture.

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6: Painting the Base Color

Now that all the line work is done, you can start painting in a base color on the cliff face. I went with a fairly sandy sepia tone in order to match the aged paper texture of the background.

You can also take your base color and hit a bit of it on the slopes at the base of the cliff. Make it darkest where the cliff contacts the ground and then blend it out from there. You can do this with a lower opacity brush or using a pressure sensitive stylus.

7: Adding Shadows

With a softer textured brush you can now begin adding some subtle shadows below the top of the cliff and along the vertical lines running down the cliff face. Adding shadows where things overlap is a simple way to give a sense of depth.

The brush I'm using for this step is called the Rock Climber filler, which I designed to have a bit of a stone texture built into it. This really speeds up the process in making the shading look more organic and natural.

CLICK HERE to learn more about the brushes I'm using in this tutorial

8: Deepening the Shadows

It is usually best to do the shadows in several stages, so now you can go back through with a smaller brush and a slightly darker tone. The smaller the brush the more detail you are able to convey, so determine where the deepest shadows should be along the ridges to continue to add depth and texture.

9: Adding Highlights

Now that you have added all your shadows, you can now add some subtle highlights. It is important to keep in mind that surface and texture of what you a painting. This more sandstone type of rock is not as reflective as water or even a harder type of rock like basalt. So you want to be pretty subtle with your highlights or else it will look unnatural.

Based on the shadows, the light is obviously coming from an upper left position, so it would be appropriate to place some highlights on the ground at the top of the cliff. But, you have to remember that light gets bounced around from all kinds of place, including the sky and even clouds. So you can also add some more subtle highlight on the cliff itself particularly where the rock juts out. In this case I have also added a little bit of a highlight along the base of that sedimentary layer to give the impression of a slight ledge.

Now that you have a better idea on how to draw cliffs, you can incorporate them in a variety of ways to your maps. You can add a city or some type of fortification on the top of the cliff. Or you can draw a waterfall spilling over the edge, with a river winding away at the base. Just have fun with it and you'll start to see all the options that open up for you.

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Thank you, and I look forward to seeing you map your story!

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