WIP - continental map in GIMP

Here is my first map posting.

This is a continent in a world I am developing for role-playing (using Rolemaster as the system). I started with a pencil sketch showing the main population areas and a few key sites, some terrain and rivers, and not much else. The first picture is just this sketch scanned into the computer to use as a guide to my map.

The second picture is how far I got working on it this evening. I didn't quite get the coastline as jagged as I'd have liked, but it'll do. This process also produced some lakes, which I hadn't included in my sketch at all. I erased those in areas where they just did not belong and adjusted the rivers a bit to take the new lakes into account. I did the ocean and lakes as one layer, using a layer mask, while the rivers are another layer. So right now, I have four layers: the sketch, the continental outline, the ocean/lakes, and the rivers. Possibly overkill, but the sketch will eventually be deleted, having served its purpose.

Opinions?

Nice start. Good work with the rivers too, they look clean from here :)

this should be nice when it's done!

Yup looking good so far... there is a "Not So Random Coastlines" tutorial by RobA you may want to look at if you're not completely happy with your coastlines. Very easy to use and gives nice results.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Steel General

Yup looking good so far... there is a "Not So Random Coastlines" tutorial by RobA you may want to look at if you're not completely happy with your coastlines. Very easy to use and gives nice results.

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That's what I used. I think I should have used more blur for the continent, but then it almost killed the islands as it was -- I had to repaint the center of Rogue Island after my Gaussian Blur just to be sure it would survive. I'm not unhappy with the result, it just wasn't quite what I was trying for. I'm sure with experience, I'll be able to get much closer to what I expect.

Can anybody point me to brushes for swamp terrain?

It's tough to get a good coastline for larger maps using Gimp's regular noise filter. Try installing the Felimage Noise plugin (another tip from RobA) and playing with the size parameter.

With mountains, hills, and forest brushed in (thanks for the brushes, Wag). Found some more brush collections online and I'll look to see if I can find something for swamp.

Added swamps. Added capital and major cities. Differentiated between shallow and deep ocean.

Now I'm trying to decide what to use to mark major ruins.

other than the fact it looks a bit like you are mapping a "tall" human heart... none too shabby.

maybe if you have the rivers in another layer try smooth them out a little? in a close zoom they are "staggered" in a pixelated sort of way...

Yeah, the rivers were drawn with a mouse, so the quality is not what it could be. I redrew some of my attempts which were completely awful. But as they are on their own layer, I can go back and work on improving them later. Maybe completely redraw them if I find a method I like. Tomorrow I'll work on the rivers if I'm still stuck on the ruins.

I like it so far, one suggestion would be to vary/mix the mountain and hill symbols so you're not using the same ones all grouped together.