Mogna World Map

[Opera]

Hello there!

I've been making a map for my constructed world for some time already. Took me some time but I finally decided to post my WIP here. It's not that beautiful compared to most maps I see here. It's very simple and it's thought to be so. I'm gonna use it for all kinds of purpose so I favored effeciency over style... and also because I've got not so much art skill

Beware, the picture is a big one. Actually it may deserve me since you'll be able to easily spot bad lines and stuff.



It's a WIP in that I'm going to redo most islands; I have to finish the northern hemisphere (mostly island arcs and a small continent); I also have to add some mountains (Ckis for instance); and I have to add lakes and rivers.

So... any thoughts?

[Ghostman]

Your world has the appearance of a supercontinent just recently (in geologic terms) split; all the big continents seem to be bunched very close together, with Ckís having split off a bit earlier than the rest.

While it's simple I think it's also pretty nice looking. One should not underestimate the aesthetic potential in minimalism

[Opera]

Your world has the appearance of a supercontinent just recently (in geologic terms) split; all the big continents seem to be bunched very close together, with Ckís having split off a bit earlier than the rest.

Ahah, most people I've shown this map to said me that. Some parts just split off yes. Zunqu is actually splitting in half (as you can see by the rift valleys in the middle), while Plija and Rofalan split away from Zunqu some time ago; they're linked now due to an area of very active volcanism. The southern Vybera plate is actually splitting itself in half. I'm not sure it's attested but it should be possible for plates to do that.

However, the big mountain ranges in Plija, Rofalan and Vybera are rather new and mark plate boundaries. You can see remnants of mountains on the coasts of the three continents which are typically less high due to age.

Also note that I'm missing some height overlays on the Zunqu-Rofalan islands, where there are old mountains but also plateaux in the west due to volcanism (like the one on the NW of Zunqu).

Then Ckis; it's in fact in a collision course towards Vybera. It's on the far SE of one of the biggest plate of Mogna and lacks any height overlay.

While it's simple I think it's also pretty nice looking. One should not underestimate the aesthetic potential in minimalism

Thanks!

I'm in the process of trying to make climates (I'm missing a few data like I said above but I wanted to get away from drawing islands for a bit ) and it's complicated... Especially tedious with such a big-sized map.

[Opera]

So, it's been a while -- big bump!

I resumed working on this map, which I left in the state above and didn't touch much since I posted it, by trying to see if I could shift the colors a bit to make it less "bright". My new take has a deeper blue for the ocean (maybe useful to make shallow water around the isles and continents) and no more colored coastline. I also tried with a 'cream' base color for the landmasses but it looks kinda weird to me, especially with the mountains. Any opinion or advice on this end would be welcome!

(if the attachment fails, here's a link)

[Gidde]

I think the blue still looks very vivid -- try a slightly desaturated color, it might reduce that "brightness" feeling. The cream on the land still looks white to me, actually, you may want to actually saturate that one a bit more.

As an aside, you may consider using jpg for your uploads rather than png. The jpg lossiness tends not to matter too much as long as you keep the quality setting rather high (above 80% if you're using gimp, or above 10 if you're using Photoshop). The png takes a really long time to load; jpgs load faster and you may get more feedback if folks don't have to wait as long for your map to load

[Opera]

The cream seeming white is maybe due to me not putting it in that picture I had removed it because it didn't please me. As for the blue, I'm going to try a few things as I'm really not sure how I want it to look. I may try some texturing tutorials, see if any fits. What I fear though is that trying to prettify the map will reduce its simplicity -- which is there both because I'm not very good at graphics and because I need the map to be pretty 'functional' rather than superb looking as I will use it as a base map for many things. Any advice on that? (ie, on keeping the map simple but not too barebone-y)

Also, thanks for the jpg tip. For some reason I always use png... Next one will be jpg

[Gidde]

Try using a gradient from a pale blue to a medium blue -- just don't make it vertical or horizontal. Any diagonal will do. That will give it some depth while keeping it about as simple as you can get

[jbgibson]

I give you Pun Points for posting a Mogna Carta. Also recognition for filing a tectonic flight plan. Repped. Oh, and the landforms are coming along nicely too.

Retaining enough simplicity to use as base for multiple types of maps? I just keep as many layers as my application can handle without bogging.

[Opera]

So, I made a little progress. Specifically, I didn't progress in terms of landmasses but I tried to prettify the map somewhat, starting with a small region of it and using ravells' non-destructive tutorial. Current state attached.

I'm not too happy with how the mountains & the desert turned out. I'm having trouble getting a result I like for them, for whatever reason.

I like the sea and the forest though. Also, overall the tutorial is great (if not as step-by-step-y as I'd like ) and pretty much reminds me of HTML & CSS.

[Opera]

I made some progress. I only switched the style of the map for something using ravells' non-destructive tutorial. It's actually prettier now and easier for me to edit. Can't ask for much more, right?

Still have some issues like the water texture being horrendous when trying to view all the map at once. I'm not sure how I'll show differences of height in mountains either...
Thinking I may have to resort to doing different mapstyles depending on how they should be viewed: 100% (for regions), way less (atlas), etc.

Here's a link to the full map, 14400*7200 jpg, be patient and fullview
Here's another link to a regional map.

@jbgibson: ha, and I didn't even notice the pun! Thanks

@Gidde: I tried but I didn't get anywhere I liked. Instead went for the above

EDIT: Ah well, here I thought the previous post had been lost, here it shows up? Well, you've got my progress report twice, lucky you!