GB & Ireland remake

My apologies, the circle example was using 15a, I have overwritten it to the correct one now.

Edit to account for The_Bishop suggestion. Same background I made earlier, slightly modified to better texture, with Vexer's colours untouched.

I think 15a is acceptable. I like the West Country bluish purple vs. the very purple on 15b. I don't think the pea-green on Ireland in 15c makes the brown Ulster look anymore orange. I've looked at it on three different monitors and it is burnt umber. Which to me is a reddish brown. If you're going to keep Ulster as orange than I really think you just need to tweak it a little more to lessen the brownish hue, which I think sticks out overall, and also looks unflattering on this map.

Still don't think the best solution has been achieved yet. Neither Ulster, Wales, nor the West Country look right stylistically to me, but it's still 1000% better than the current version.

I think you meant 15c (the first one)? When you mentioned your preference and acceptability, they have been placed in reverse order, the order I saved and uploaded them.

The green in 15a wrong. I'd try to just make the orange in 15c a little more orange.

The blue background is good. The background in 15d needs work.

You rediddled it right as I was posting aero ;P

Yes I meant the map that is now 15c.

Scoping the comparisons, 15c works well and I agree with Vexer a little more orange, and the background is good.

For now I agree with Vexer, go for 15c and see if you can up the orange.
The background idea of 15d and 14b is interesting, but it gives the map a very metallic feel. I don't think that's what you want for this map.

Right, we have direction!

The green adaptation for S.Ire (15a) was from a suggestion from Psymon, the (15d) example is for The_Bishop, the purple of West Country (15b) was from a suggestion by Psymon. The (15c) version was at the top because it was the colours made by Vexer and seemed the perfect colours to me. I was hoping that this would be the direction that would be chosen... see it with colour circles on it and it looks awesome! I worry about making N.Ire too orange because of circle colour clash.

We still have some division and if we can get agreement after altering just the orange on 15c, it will be just as I thought, Vexer's colours were perfect and just needed the background enriching and a different texture to show their true vibrancy.

I know Bishop doesn't like the new background on 15c, but are there any other objections to it, or do you have suggestions of the way you'd like it, remembering that I can not match something someone made an example of unless they can tell me which image/effect/colour controls they used?

I can tell you once again that I made this background from all the likes and dislikes of all previous backgrounds, examples & suggestions.

It is also obvious that although 15d looks good and appeals to me and The_Bishop, it does not appear to be the choice of direction or preference for the majority, so I don't think I should waste any more time showing versions of this.

The background is better than the previous one - that one was too deep blue. However, the colour is a bit dirty. Of course, sea colour is a bit dirty by itself, but it can be improved I think.

So, even though the previous blue colour was a prettier colour by itself, in the big picture the new sea contrasts better (better, but not perfect).

Then if 15d is rejected I vote for 15c with no colour changes on the land, and a lower saturation on the ocean background. In fact I didn't said I don't like the new background, it's amazing for me, just a little bit too much powered blue (really there's a bit of green now). I think it should be a bit less satured and a bit darker.

A bit more orange for N.Ireland and extra tone and texture for background. Labels better positioned.

Both are good really I am undecided.

But I prefer orange as it was before honestly.
As for the sea names, I prefer them to stay more visible otherwise you have such great empty areas.

I think that does it for the orange, I'd say it's on par with the other colors.

GB16 2015!!

I think the hue of the orange is better but just a tad oversaturated. I think the ocean texture is a bit much and effects the color too much. Also the ocean color seems a tad undersaturated now, but that might just be because of the texture.

The text is ok but I think it can be better. I actually liked how the text was in all caps in the old version. Part of my issue is the outer glow. Personally I prefer a light stroke + a light outer glow or drop shadow instead of just an outer glow. It makes the text sharper. I tried adding it to this font but it didn't look good. I also prefer text to not be bright white but to use a lighter version of the region's color so that it doesn't stand out as much. This might be a challenge, however, on this map because some of the labels are half on the land, half on the sea. See the text on the ancient realm map for an example of what I am talking about.

I like the orange, but something in between the 15c and 16 version might be even better.
I actually like the ocean a lot, especially the fact that it is a bit dull. Makes it not take too much attention, while keeping a nice colour.

Like the new colour of the text on the sea (sea names and author names), better this way.