Playing with mountains

[Karro]

What has been working fairly well for me (at least, I like the result) is to use Ascension's technique for trees and kind of brush them on a layer over my base or mid range mountain layer.

However, I kind of reverse the order he shows in his tutorial. first I apply the layer styles to the trees and reduce the fill to zero, then I use the splatter brush to very carefully stroke them on. This gives kind of 'instant feedback' when applying them, rather than painting a bunch on, applying the styles and finding out you went way over board

thats what I did in these (crops from my larger map in my Intro thread)

Is that in Photoshop or GIMP? Either way, I need to go back and look up Ascension's technique!

Karro, you need to have the trees stop half way up the mountain side. There's a tree-line on mountains, above which they don't grow. So it's going to look strange if there's a forest right over the top of your mountain.

Yeah, I thought about that, but I also thought about the mountains in the Appalachians, and how they're mostly covered in trees... There, I've been to above 4,000 feet and had trees around me. So... how high to trees normally reach?

Anyway, I was going to try to go back and blank out the trees primarily around the ridgeline.

[jfrazierjr]

Is that in Photoshop or GIMP? Either way, I need to go back and look up Ascension's technique!



Yeah, I thought about that, but I also thought about the mountains in the Appalachians, and how they're mostly covered in trees... There, I've been to above 4,000 feet and had trees around me. So... how high to trees normally reach?

Anyway, I was going to try to go back and blank out the trees primarily around the ridgeline.

Though I am by no means an expert, I seem to recall hearing something around 5000-7000 feet is where most treelines top out on average

Of course, I could be remembering something totally different such as the approximate number of feet in a mile... My brain is a sponge for information, keeping it slotted in the right spot... that's a different story...

Joe

[Karro]

Though I am by no means an expert, I seem to recall hearing something around 5000-7000 feet is where most treelines top out on average

Of course, I could be remembering something totally different such as the approximate number of feet in a mile... My brain is a sponge for information, keeping it slotted in the right spot... that's a different story...

Joe

I feel your pain... I truly do. I think I have the exact same condition.

That's probably about right, though.

[torstan]

Yep, I thought about that too. It may be more that trees can't grow on the windswept mountain tops than there being a hard altitude limit. The tops of all the Scottish mountains I've climbed have been treeless and they are only 1000m or so. Also, the steeper the cliff, the less likely there will be trees on it, so the sharp ridges on those mountains are going to be relatively tree free no matter what.

[waldronate]

Tree line is one of those things that it determined by both altitude and altitude (or, if you prefer, by soil depth, temperature and water mobility). So there are places in the warmer latitudes where tree line is 12000+ feet and places where tree line is at sea level (these are arctic steppes). http://www.blackwell-synergy.com/doi...9.2003.01043.x has measurements in the middle of the document.

[Karro]

So much complexity...

Well, here's another go:



I just used a jittery brush to clear out the forest mask along the ridgeline. The hard part was going back and trying to add a bumpmap on the new edge of the forest....

[jfrazierjr]

So much complexity...

Well, here's another go:



I just used a jittery brush to clear out the forest mask along the ridgeline. The hard part was going back and trying to add a bumpmap on the new edge of the forest....

Yea, and now your mountain has a green tinge....

[Karro]

Yea, and now your mountain has a green tinge....

Yeah, I thought that, too... which was strange because I had masked out the ridge on the color layers, too.

So... I went backwards, hiding each of the forest layers in turn, watching the ridge where the forest surrounds it, just to make sure. In actuality, there was no change to the ridge... The green was there all along, even in the original mountains.

I figured it must look greener because of the surrounding forest, sort of an optical illusion.

Anyway, it's still not working for me, but this represents only about 15 minutes of additional effort over the previous attempts.

[Karro]

What has been working fairly well for me (at least, I like the result) is to use Ascension's technique for trees and kind of brush them on a layer over my base or mid range mountain layer.

I went back and looked at Ascension's tutorial on Photoshop Trees...

Really, I can't follow it. Not the tut's fault, but it very quickly starts making references to features I'm not sure GIMP has. Can GIMP, for instance, do size jitter? I would use such a thing if I had it... And that's a fairly basic one... most are more complicated than that and I can't figure out how to achieve the same effect in GIMP...

Guess I'm going to have to start playing on my own in GIMP...

[RobA]

I went back and looked at Ascension's tutorial on Photoshop Trees...

Really, I can't follow it. Not the tut's fault, but it very quickly starts making references to features I'm not sure GIMP has. Can GIMP, for instance, do size jitter? I would use such a thing if I had it... And that's a fairly basic one... most are more complicated than that and I can't figure out how to achieve the same effect in GIMP...

Guess I'm going to have to start playing on my own in GIMP...

Nope- no size jitter, no rotation jitter. Brush dynamics in GIMP are quite a bit behind photoshop (at least in some areas). Size jitter doesn't bother my that much, as you can tie size to tablet pressure, but no help if using a mouse.

It is pretty easy, however to create a custom brush that provides random size and rotation jitters...Just not as flexible.

-Rob A>