Ayesha World Map

[Charerg]

Well, my advice is to not get too stuck up with the plate tectonics if you're past that stage already. Sometimes it's good to take a bit of a break and revisit the tectonics at a later date. At the same time, I would advice keeping the elevation map fairly rough, both because it's quicker to do a rough map than a really detailed one, and because you may want to do some revisions to the elevations as well. Also, the lower level elevations don't have an effect on climate (at least not if we go with Azelor's tutorial, I guess the reality is a bit more complicated).

However, what you have so far looks really good! I have to say that I really look forward to the climate generation stage, as there aren't many posters/maps here that go through Azelor's tutorial. Well, admittedly it's a fairly complicated process just to generate the climates, but for climate enthusiasts like myself, it's also really interesting to see the process and the results!

[Pixie]

Hi there. I'm with Charerg on his advice. If you moved on to elevation and your progress is good, you shouldn't go back. Be careful that detailed elevation maps drain just as much energy as working out believable tectonics. You can get stuck - I have inumerous times!

Azelor is a great help around here when it comes to climate, he really invested his time into that school of magic Have a go at your planet with his tutorial, once you're ready, and post any doubts you have. Working out climates/biomes will also take some time.

[Tiluchi]

Well, my advice is to not get too stuck up with the plate tectonics if you're past that stage already. Sometimes it's good to take a bit of a break and revisit the tectonics at a later date. At the same time, I would advice keeping the elevation map fairly rough, both because it's quicker to do a rough map than a really detailed one, and because you may want to do some revisions to the elevations as well. Also, the lower level elevations don't have an effect on climate (at least not if we go with Azelor's tutorial, I guess the reality is a bit more complicated).

Charerg, I competely forgot to thank you for the work you did in sorting out the tectonics for me- it was really helpful in seeing the issues I was having. It inspired me to go back to GPlates and try to redo the model of plate movement that I had in order to have a better way of visualizing things. Probably won't change anything major, but I do want to have a model where the elevations I have right now make sense.

The elevations I'm making more complex than I probably need to as my preliminary goal is to create a physical world map, hopefully with shaded relief. Having detailed elevation will be really helpful at that stage, so I'm just saving myself more work in the future.

However, what you have so far looks really good! I have to say that I really look forward to the climate generation stage, as there aren't many posters/maps here that go through Azelor's tutorial. Well, admittedly it's a fairly complicated process just to generate the climates, but for climate enthusiasts like myself, it's also really interesting to see the process and the results!

I'm looking forward to it too, in a masochistic sort of way! I've looked over Azelor's tutorial and it's daunting, but I'm sort of a climate nerd as well, so it should be interesting. Plus, as I said, I'm wanting to make this a physical map rather than a political one, so the climate and the elevation are probably the two most important steps for that.

Hi there. I'm with Charerg on his advice. If you moved on to elevation and your progress is good, you shouldn't go back. Be careful that detailed elevation maps drain just as much energy as working out believable tectonics. You can get stuck - I have inumerous times!

Pixie, I went through your WIP thread for your world and nearly stopped working because I was so intimidated. I'm definitely not doing something as hard-core as yours, just so I don't throw my computer out a window. Não sei onde você tá achando a perseverança pra fazer uma obra de arte assim, mas eu tô seguro de que eu não posso!

[Tiluchi]

Just for a quick update, I've finished another layer of the elevation! I seem to be getting more detailed with every layer I do, but thankfully the coverage is decreasing every time, so it's still going faster than before...

[Caenwyr]

This is looking splendid, Tiluchi! Are you planning to shade it once you're done? In theory that's super easy with what you have here. You just need to:

• turn a copy of the terrain layers into a grey scale layer;
• move it above the rest;
• blur it (you might have to do this manually to prevent overblurring the peaks or underblurring the lowlands, which would result in stepped shading); and
• throw a bump lighting against it

As you can see, the blurring stage is where "super easy in theory" tends to become quite complicated in practice, but with a little patience you could turn this into a masterpie — Wait, let me correct myself here. It's already a masterpiece, even if you'd decide not to bump shade it. Like I said in my first line, this is looking splendid! I can't wait to see your next update.

[Tiluchi]

This is looking splendid, Tiluchi! Are you planning to shade it once you're done? In theory that's super easy with what you have here.

Hi Caenwyr, thanks again for the compliments, and for the suggestions on shading- I am planning to do something with shaded relief as an end result of this version of the world map. I've got a few methods I'm thinking of- hand-drawing the shading, using Wilbur, or the bump lighting method you detailed (thanks for that! I was vaguely aware that technique was possible, but I wasn't quite sure of the steps). If I do the bump lighting, I think I'll have to do a few more layers of elevation, just for it to get the detail that I want and not look too artificial. At the moment I'm leaning towards doing it by hand- I know it's an ambitious undertaking, and I fully expect this map to take up the next few months of my life. But I managed to figure out a halfway-decent technique back in the day when I was using paper and colored pencils, so now that I've graduated to more advanced tools hopefully I can figure it out again. Though I may just regret that decision one day soon...

[Tiluchi]

Finally finished my elevation map! The last few layers were much easier than the ones in the middle, just because they cover so much less land. This is still somewhat rougher than I'd like it to be, and I think I'll definitely add more details before moving on to an actual artistic sort of map. But I think it's sufficient to move onto Azelor's climate tutorial this coming week. Something I look forward to with a small amount of trepidation!

[kacey]

This looks awesome Tiluchi. I've always wanted to do something like this, but just don't have the patients to work out all the details.

[Caenwyr]

looking magnificent, Tiluchi! Is that area NW of the huge mountain range going to be a massive lake?

About the shading: if you're going to do it by hand, consider throwing a quick-n-dirty bump shading against it anyway, stepped relief artefacts and all. You won't be using any of it for your final product, but it might give you a good idea of where certain shadows will fall, especially in the more confusing bits of your map.

[Pixie]

Great work! You have certainly invested a good amount of time on this and the result is fitting.
The best praise I can give on this is that you have respected a lot of tectonic events (not only the obvious himalaya type mountains). You've got active rifts, recent suture zones, ocean/continent subduction creating volcanic chains, etc.
Some spots are better than others and there's one I'll note on the negative side. The sea between the two large landmasses has a very odd shape. They seem overly far apart to justify the landbridge in the northern end. But, please, don't change it for me.

Indeed, this map is more than enough to work out climates using Azelor's guide. Move on.. we're all becoming interested about this world of yours.