The maps I did for requests and practice

[Psylence]

Ya know, I'm just starting out on it too, but I find (once you get the shape ya like and get the white down of your island/continent) I like to shrink the outline by a few pixels(depends on the size of the image), Smooth it by half, and then Refine Edge(at least that's what it's called in Photoshop) with a contrast set to 100%. Seems to clean up the lines a bit. In fact if you ever run into issues with an outer glow or a stroke because it's bleeding in funny ways, ctrl+click the layer icon and refine the edge with contrast at 100% - seems to do wonders cleaning up messy blurring/feathered areas.

[DZFaeley]

thanks for the tip! i had some trouble with that in one of my other trials that i didn't post up, and couldn't figure out how to fix it! and i'd control+click the layer that has the outer glow?

i REALLY like having "interesting coasts", with the crags and stuff that seems to come with real land. but finding the balance between "created looking roughness" and "too neat" is really hard. i was more accidentally successful in my first few, but now i'm getting more troubles. i'll probably look around and see if there are any tutorials on how to make them look realistic.