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Thread: WIP - Fantasy World Aldraste

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    Wip WIP - Fantasy World Aldraste

    Hi there. I'm posting my first world map WIP here. I've been lurking for a very very long time. I've been working on a map for my headworld of Aldraste. Currently I'm working on the Post Lunar Fall version of the map, as that is the version that my story takes place. I've tried for years to come up with landmasses that I actually like, and now that I have a more detailed story for the map to go cohesively with, I can say that I'm pretty happy. I've started out in a mockup of an equirectangular projection (I tend to get hung up on projections but there comes a point where I just need to say it's good enough and move on) The left continent is where the story will focus on mainly, as that is the known world. The rest of it will probably be artistically shrouded in mist at some point, or less detailed in design. I think I will end up throwing this into some sort of azimuthal projection, more for aesthetics than anything else. Eventually I'll do some more large scale maps. I recently saw Gumboot's map of Terra Patria, and I think I want to end up doing some sort of topographical political map based loosely on that style. His map is gorgeous by the way.

    Anyway, some backstory on the map, as I know some of the landmass shapes are unnatural. The reason they're like this is because of an event called the Lunar Fall, which happened when an ancient human civilization tried to reach for too much power by grabbing energies from the moon. The way they did it caused massive instability in the moons energies and it shattered, with large chunks of the moon falling down to Aldraste. This caused the large craters in the continents. I may not be completely happy with how the right continent looks right now, and I'm sure it will change as I do this map, but for now it's okay and not nearly as important as the right continent. We'll see how this goes. I guess I'll get started on a height map.

    Click image for larger version. 

Name:	Aldraste Post Lunar Fall-3.png 
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    Guild Expert Domino44's Avatar
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    That is a very cool idea for a backstory and I like your landmasses a lot!

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    Love the backstory as well! I really like the shape of the landmasses as well, save the ones in the middle-ish section. The shapes are interesting, but don't flow into the others quite as well. Still lovely overall, and that is just more of a nitpick type of thing.

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    Thanks guys. Some of the middle ones could be drawn better, for sure. The bottom one has a special place in my heart though, since I was trying to go for a kind of ripple land effect and that would be the area in which the ripples kind of collided.

    Also, while playing with heightmap stuff in photoshop (sort of following arsheesh's Eriond tutorial) I was playing with some layer modes on the difference clouds and discovered a really cool way to do mountains. Took a sample from what I was doing and ran it through Wilbur to get some neat erosion and I think I like how it turned out quite a bit. The left is the original heightmap the right is the eroded version.

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ID:	59333Click image for larger version. 

Name:	heightmap sample erosion.png 
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    Finished a sort of height map, but I'm none too happy with it actually. I'm gonna have to figure out a different way to make a height map. It's rather frustrating. If only I could generate a height map within the bounds of my outline. That would make it so much easier.

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    Thanks, I'll definitely give that a try. Certainly hope it turns out well!

    EDIT: Oh, I suppose it's worth asking, but does it matter how you make the mountain masks? Or can they basically just be blobs in the general location where I'd like my mountains?

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    I think in the name of progress, I'll be doing a hand drawn style map for the world. Maybe someday I will end up commissioning for a relief map, but I seem to have lost the patience for it at the moment. I will post some more updates tomorrow.

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    Quote Originally Posted by Asdrubael View Post
    Thanks, I'll definitely give that a try. Certainly hope it turns out well!

    EDIT: Oh, I suppose it's worth asking, but does it matter how you make the mountain masks? Or can they basically just be blobs in the general location where I'd like my mountains?

    Blobs in the places where you'd generally like mountains. Make the edges noisy (not smooth) for best effect.

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    Quote Originally Posted by waldronate View Post
    Blobs in the places where you'd generally like mountains. Make the edges noisy (not smooth) for best effect.
    Alright. I'll definitely have to try that. I'm also giving the height map sculpting another attempt, to see how that works , otherwise off to generating mountains it goes.

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