Ersïa

[Warlin]

Two things jump out at the eyes: for your southern continent, the reliefs are equidistant from the two shores, while one might expect more a distribution such as South America, on one edge or the other of the continent. In the middle part of the map, there is this big land mass which I might see coming up to the upper land, in this case the relief should be turned by 90°. But all this critics are without meaning if you have in mind another plate tectonic. I think It depends greatly from the viewer point.

[arsheesh]

Those mountain ranges look amazingly realistic Ilanthar, as do the land formations. Very nice work on this. Looking forward to seeing the finished piece.

Cheers,
-Arsheesh

[Ilanthar]

By Warlin
But all this critics are without meaning if you have in mind another plate tectonic. I think It depends greatly from the viewer point.

I don't have any plate tectonic in mind . Thanks for your view, I've changed things accordingly (and to my liking), and I think it's actually better. A lot of other small corrections...

Thanks a lot Arsheesh, that's the advantage of working from real data .

And except if you spotted a major catastrophy, I think the topography is done. Now, I'm gonna redo more precisely the coloring.

[SteffenBrand]

I'd drop the thickness on the outline nearly by half and I'd try a very dark blue. After all is done and you need more contrast, try to collapse everything on an additional layer, set on Overlay with 20-30% opacity with a high-pass filter on about 4px.

Other than that I think you are off on a good map here, I like the shapes a lot! =)
Best wishes, Steffen

[Ilanthar]

Thanks Steffen !

By SteffenBrand
I'd drop the thickness on the outline nearly by half and I'd try a very dark blue. After all is done and you need more contrast, try to collapse everything on an additional layer, set on Overlay with 20-30% opacity with a high-pass filter on about 4px.

I toned down the coastline and turned it dark blue. Better indeed. Sadly, I don't fully understand the rest of your advice : I suppose that a "high-pass filter" is a photoshop filter?

Some new test about the seas and land colors. Not much since I've reworked my conlang and named the 7 continents, the 6 oceans and the 116 countries...

[SteffenBrand]

The rest was Photoshop-specific stuff, indeed. To show you what I mean I just did it with 50% opacity, more than I would recommend and re-upped your map. I'd also - as stated above - drop the thickness of the outline.



Maybe you can include a small relief-effect combined with a soft shadow opposed to the lights direction to emphasize the coast a bit more to differentiate the land a bit more from the water. It has been done here, for example (cropped and blank):




Btw, labelling can be hell... my condolences. Did you came up with all names or do you had them already? Just out of interest.

Best wishes,
Steffen

[Ilanthar]

Hum, I tried your suggestions (I think). Is it better? I fear the land effect might be too strong an and the outline too pixellated... or that's just me?

By Steffen Brand
Btw, labelling can be hell... my condolences. Did you came up with all names or do you had them already? Just out of interest.

Hopefully, it's a world map (so, not so many mountains/rivers/details names...). I had to find the names and it was a long process since I had to develop my conlang dictionary in the same time. I think I've found the most part of the labels for this map, though.

[SteffenBrand]

Hey! I think it is way better! I only get the feeling of being too pixelated with the smalles islands, did you use outline settings on the outside or the middle? I think you used middle, you can try outside perhaps. =) Glad you have everything you need regarding labels. I recently bought 'The art of language invention', but haven't had the time to conlang along ^^

[Voolf]

This map looks so realistic, i love it Ilanthar.
Btw, is it made in PS ?

[Ilanthar]

@SteffenBrand : I don't have a middle outline option . It's both outside&inside, but at size x2 reduced to the final size to get something thinner. I played a bit with the new and the old version... and I hope it's better.
Concerning the conlang, I'm really glad of what I've done. Grammar, general rules and decisions are quite pleasant... the real problem is to build a dictionnary. Even if I have done a conlang which makes it easier (a lot of words are built from a a basis of "key words").

@Voolf : thanks! I'm not using PS. For this one, everything is made with my good old Paint Shop Pro 7.