my 1st map - physical continent

[grarrr]

After i found Ascensions Tutorial for Atlas-Style last night I went crazy about trying and learning... Here's the result.

Dear Guildsmen,
I'm a new aspirant - some personal information will be introduced right after this here is done.


Finding your Community and all the helpful hands it offer's really made me happy. Especially Ascensions Tut opened
my eyes - working for almost 10 years with PS and DTP-Software made me kind of snowblind to the tricks and techniques
I needed - let's say - 18 years by now, to bring nothing less then a whole world to papyrus (all the pen and paper-work
was just the nursery =)

then here's my 1st try in regional/worldmapping right after A's Tut just to learn the handling - not related to any rpg/
fantasyworld - I wanted to make it pure physical/kind of satalite-view so i skipped the borders and other landmarks...

I also varied in colors, expand-ranges and the way of blending layers in and out to see what's possible - and to make
it more personal to me

this I like:
+ the fantastic way to roughen the coastlines
+ the possibilities of lightspots
+ my colors
+ that's all together are simple tricks - but their combination (I hadn't found myself) make the brilliance
Lot of Thanks to Ascension again and again...

this I don't like (so much about my 1st try)
- shelfline isn't such a beautiful rough cliff (i guess it's a matter of the expanded selection and some more trys with the bevel-contour)
- some mountainranges have strange steps (i blended some mountains via masks out - but it also looks to be used cool somewhere)
- some hillareas look more like valleys/sinks (must have s.th. to do with the set LightSpots - more to play and test)
- the polar region could use some/one big glacier/s (i might create another hugh flat mountainlayer and experiment with the bevel)




boah - i wrote quite a lot... and there is so much more: how does this technique work when i want to redraw my landmasses, mountains and
coasts already clear defined? how do i keep accuracy when changing the scale: Planet > Continent > Countries > Regions > Town > piazza?
and where goes the time?

so I hope this is an appropriate 1st Try an post.