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Thread: WIP- unnamed fantasy world

  1. #21

    Default Update: Tectoncis, landmass, islands.

    Hey everyone. Here is an update based on all the great information and advice you guys posted, and blatant plagiarism of good ideas.
    First I redid the plate tectonics plagiarizing Akubra's idea, ok took inspiration for it was inspiring. From my perspective the tectonics work and I'm hoping with the positioning of the boundaries the relative rotation of the plates is visible. There is only two things I don't like about how I ave the tectonics set up and those are. 1. I have the divergent boundaries on the eastern hemisphere forming a giant circle. I would prefer to have this broken up and thought of making the southern convergent boundary a divergent one instead but then the boundary looked like a wave function and I didn't like that either. 2. The south western continent I wasn't sure if such a divergent boundary is possible, and it begs the question about what happens when a plate is squished between two parallel divergent boundaries. I may change this don't know yet.

    From there I adjusted the position and shaping of my landmasses. This took a while because I cut out each landmass and pasted it to it's own layer. After that I brought the pieces together into one giant landmass and readjusted the basic shape so they fit together. Then I mapped out a general path and initial rotation. Finally I brought the continent to their current position made the coastlines more realistic (I hope, I tried to take into account past influencing factors along with the tectonic boundaries in the area, so long smooth coastlines along divergent boundaries or where little tectonic interaction plays it's part.) and adjusted the convergent boundaries to fit the new coastlines and hopefully demonstrate rotation.

    I've noticed that fitting my continents together and breaking them back up helped me understand the plate tectonics better and helped with the landmass shape. If/when I make other world map in the future I think I am going to simply start with a single super continent and then break it up into different tectonic plates and map past movement to the positions I want it. It's handy because it also shows you where old mountain ranges are and old land formations and islands that wouldn't necessarily exist through the tectonic or landforms first method.

    Lastly I added islands. There are a few areas that I am going to redo, mostly the eastern portion of the northwestern continent the islands are too dense, too big or both. There is one area (sadly I forgot to label) east of the northwestern continent that I need to fix so it doesn't look like a circle of islands, it looks weird. I've redone this area a bunch of times yet it always looks circular. I'm thinking of leaving maybe one or two. There are still a few areas that need islands, these are going to be the older islands of past tectonic convergent boundaries that may not exist at present. Mostly these old islands are along the western coasts of the two western continents, and along the south eastern coast. In some areas I will probably split them to either side of the divergent boundary.

    Red: divergent boundaries.
    Blue: subduction boundaries.
    Purple: convergent boundaries.
    Green: Transform boundaries.
    Click image for larger version. 

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    One thing. In the northeastern section I have three narrow plates stacked against each other. My reasoning is due to past position of the plates and the super-continent a divergent fault snaked it's way partially into a single plate in that area creating three different plates. More recently the divergent boundary is shifted north and the resulting pressure from the western to northern divergent boundary has caused fracturing due to stress and and plate movement. Think it works?
    Last edited by ascanius; 05-31-2014 at 05:29 AM.

  2. #22
    Guild Member Akubra's Avatar
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    Great work ascanius. Some rep coming your way soon!

    My thoughts:
    • It's interesting to see the way you have spread out the fault lines on the map, creating a rich variation of huge plates, tiny ones and some in between. I like it a lot.
    • I see what you mean about the giant circle of diverging boundaries. Looking at it as an outsider, it doesn't really startle me. As the crust is thinner along that boundary you could even have a ring of fire - mostly under water, granted, but a few volcanoes could pop up above the waterline on that perimeter. On the other hand, if you don't like it, then by all means follow your thoughts.
    • I found out that assigning a relative velocity to each plate helped me a lot in determining the way the plates interact and what type of boundaries they have.
    • As far as I understand it, in a subduction zone islands are formed on the plate that stays on top. It seems that your islands are on the wrong side of the faults as you have drawn them. I try to remember it by imagining the triangles as mountains, and the side of the triangles/mountains is the highest.
    • I also see that some fault lines stop and don't connect to other fault lines. Some examples: the diverging fault in the north of the southwestern continent, another diverging fault in the north of the northwestern continent, and both a converging and diverging fault in the northeast of the eastern continent. Any idea where they're going, or haven't you made up your mind up yet?


    Anyway, hope this helps.

    Cheers - Akubra
    Last edited by Akubra; 05-31-2014 at 08:39 AM.

  3. #23

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    Quote Originally Posted by Akubra View Post
    Great work ascanius. Some rep coming your way soon!

    My thoughts:
    • It's interesting to see the way you have spread out the fault lines on the map, creating a rich variation of huge plates, tiny ones and some in between. I like it a lot.
    • I see what you mean about the giant circle of diverging boundaries. Looking at it as an outsider, it doesn't really startle me. As the crust is thinner along that boundary you could even have a ring of fire - mostly under water, granted, but a few volcanoes could pop up above the waterline on that perimeter. On the other hand, if you don't like it, then by all means follow your thoughts.
    • I found out that assigning a relative velocity to each plate helped me a lot in determining the way the plates interact and what type of boundaries they have.
    • As far as I understand it, in a subduction zone islands are formed on the plate that stays on top. It seems that your islands are on the wrong side of the faults as you have drawn them. I try to remember it by imagining the triangles as mountains, and the side of the triangles/mountains is the highest.
    • I also see that some fault lines stop and don't connect to other fault lines. Some examples: the diverging fault in the north of the southwestern continent, another diverging fault in the north of the northwestern continent, and both a converging and diverging fault in the northeast of the eastern continent. Any idea where they're going, or haven't you made up your mind up yet?


    Anyway, hope this helps.

    Cheers - Akubra
    Thanks Akubra, I was hoping that this version would turn out better seeing as I put more thought into it.

    Lol, I though it was the other way around with the triangles, circles in my case, indicating which plate is sliding under while the part without the indications was the one on top. I'll have to remember the mountain as triangles. Though I'm not looking forward to changing this.

    As to the fault lines that don't connect in some spots like the north east I forgot. the spot in the south west I am debating on what to do with it.

    Ascanius.

  4. #24
    Guild Artisan Pixie's Avatar
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    Hi ascanius.

    Nice map and steady heading in the right direction, but there's one key thing about your text and map that makes me itch a little bit. (Now, as always, I am inclined towards accuracy and plausibility and you are free to ignore my ramblings and fantasize at will) . You seem to think of the continents as pieces of crust floating atop a sea of ocean floor, and that makes your placing of ocean ridges much less plausible and actually harder.

    Have a look at this map. Do you think a similar map could be drawn given your mid-ocean boundaries? Not that you need to do it, but I'm trying to show that the placing of the oceanic ridge in the east (instead of roughly centered) is difficult to explain.
    You could perhaps, instead of moving the boundary to the middle, create a second divergent zone in the west. And then, between the two, a deep ocean trench (which, for any purposes, would give a lovely set of very-far-away-volcanic-islands-at-temperate-conditions).

    There's a second region where this inconsistency happens - the northeastern ocean. I don't know if you ever heard/read about the Wilson Cycle, but if you doing your tectonics from a "Pangaea to present" point of view, it wouldn't be a bad idea to have a look at it.

  5. #25
    Guild Adept groovey's Avatar
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    I agree great work!

    The land masses look great, especially the western part of the map, they feel really organic to me. I also love the tectonic map, looks great too, quite appealing, and I think I'll "borrow" your idea of using circles instead of triangles to indicate subduction, because those triangles are a pain in the butt to place, one by one, and to edit, with the circles it'll be a breeze.

    So keep up the good work, it's turning out great.

    I think it's awesome that according to Akubra you get to have a ring of fire, I'm so jealous. I'm also very tempted to use his suggestions of adding relative velocity, while doing the boundaries I sometimes doubted which type of boundary would prevail, and I think the velocity would have helped, just as he said. Did you (ascanius) also have doubts with some boundaries? If so, how did you decide on the type of boundary?

    About the triangles, Pixie told me not long ago that they point INTO/under which plate subduction occurs, as ascanius thought, so the side without triangles actually gets "eaten" (into) by the side with the triangles, but maybe I understood wrong. EDIT: just realized, by looking at Akubra's tectonic map with islands, that we both actually agree after all, I mean, that we have the same understanding of what the triangles point into, but I guess I got confused with the explanations.

    And Pixie, nice observation about ocean ridges, now looking at mine, haven't I sinned just like ascanius? Mine isn't too centred on the north and south really.


    Sorry for making reference to my stuff or doubts. I wasn't very sure if I should make the questions here or in my own thread, but since they are related to ascanius map... I wasn't sure.

    Am I the only one incredibly impatient to see how all of our maps (what are we, 4 of us by now currently doing this type of work?) will look like finished, with terrain and texture and all?
    Last edited by groovey; 06-05-2014 at 02:44 AM.

  6. #26

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    Quote Originally Posted by Pixie View Post
    Hi ascanius.

    Nice map and steady heading in the right direction, but there's one key thing about your text and map that makes me itch a little bit. (Now, as always, I am inclined towards accuracy and plausibility and you are free to ignore my ramblings and fantasize at will) . You seem to think of the continents as pieces of crust floating atop a sea of ocean floor, and that makes your placing of ocean ridges much less plausible and actually harder.

    Have a look at this map. Do you think a similar map could be drawn given your mid-ocean boundaries? Not that you need to do it, but I'm trying to show that the placing of the oceanic ridge in the east (instead of roughly centered) is difficult to explain.
    You could perhaps, instead of moving the boundary to the middle, create a second divergent zone in the west. And then, between the two, a deep ocean trench (which, for any purposes, would give a lovely set of very-far-away-volcanic-islands-at-temperate-conditions).

    There's a second region where this inconsistency happens - the northeastern ocean. I don't know if you ever heard/read about the Wilson Cycle, but if you doing your tectonics from a "Pangaea to present" point of view, it wouldn't be a bad idea to have a look at it.
    Pixie I hate you. I'm kidding of course. I see your point though and looking at the Wilson cycle I see that very little of what I have is explainable, even after corrections. You have lead me down what I fear to be a dark path. Even to the point I'm trying to map everything on GPlates. Steep learning curve but, if and when I have the time an patience to learn how to map everything I hope it will be worth the effort. Thanks for the help though, I've made corrections need to see what you think. Anyway here a tutorial I found on using Gplates for world building Using gplates for Realistic Worldbuilding | Astrographer, I haven't looked it over yet but he seems to be able to get farther than I have so hopefully it is worth looking over.

    Edit: I looked over the tutorial and followed along it works well until I try to create a rotation file in a text editor. For what ever reason I am unable to create the adequate *.ROT file and get it to work. Maybe someone else will have better luck.
    Edit: Got it to work it's actually pretty cool.

    I actually tried to make an age map like the one you linked, I was going to post it with the corrections to see what you thought but I managed to crash the Gimp and lost the work. I never learn, save, save, backup.....

    Quote Originally Posted by groovey View Post
    I agree great work!

    The land masses look great, especially the western part of the map, they feel really organic to me. I also love the tectonic map, looks great too, quite appealing, and I think I'll "borrow" your idea of using circles instead of triangles to indicate subduction, because those triangles are a pain in the butt to place, one by one, and to edit, with the circles it'll be a breeze.

    So keep up the good work, it's turning out great.

    I think it's awesome that according to Akubra you get to have a ring of fire, I'm so jealous. I'm also very tempted to use his suggestions of adding relative velocity, while doing the boundaries I sometimes doubted which type of boundary would prevail, and I think the velocity would have helped, just as he said. Did you (ascanius) also have doubts with some boundaries? If so, how did you decide on the type of boundary?

    About the triangles, Pixie told me not long ago that they point INTO/under which plate subduction occurs, as ascanius thought, so the side without triangles actually gets "eaten" (into) by the side with the triangles, but maybe I understood wrong. EDIT: just realized, by looking at Akubra's tectonic map with islands, that we both actually agree after all, I mean, that we have the same understanding of what the triangles point into, but I guess I got confused with the explanations.

    And Pixie, nice observation about ocean ridges, now looking at mine, haven't I sinned just like ascanius? Mine isn't too centred on the north and south really.


    Sorry for making reference to my stuff or doubts. I wasn't very sure if I should make the questions here or in my own thread, but since they are related to ascanius map... I wasn't sure.

    Am I the only one incredibly impatient to see how all of our maps (what are we, 4 of us by now currently doing this type of work?) will look like finished, with terrain and texture and all?
    Thanks Groovey, I don't mind the references to your stuff, it helps point out things we do right and those we do wrong. Glad you liked the map.

    now to the corrections.

    Click image for larger version. 

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    A. I moved the divergent boundary west.
    B. I added a divergent boundary in the middle of the ocean I am not sure what I should do with the northern tip, I thought of bringin right up into that cleft, the arrow with the question, but I am unsure.
    C. I removed the jutting portion of the continent and lowered the divergent boundary.
    D. I'm not sure if I should lower this section or not.
    E. Should this plate be extended east more, or is it ok the way it is.

    Did I make any new mistakes? lol, only way to learn right!

    Well what do you guys think. And thanks for the input guys.

    Ascanius.
    Last edited by ascanius; 06-05-2014 at 12:50 PM.

  7. #27
    Guild Artisan Pixie's Avatar
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    I'll have to have a look at G Plates - looks like a great tool. As for the dark path - the force is strong down that way and I assure you there's light at the end There are great tectonically-aware maps popping up in the guild - groovey's, akubra's, yours.

    Now, as for your changes:
    - the divergent boundaries are better placed, but you have to consider the same reasoning when placing the subduction between the two oceanic plates that are converging. The one that is "sinking" should be disappearing, hence, should be narrower. Also, keep in mind that oldest oceanic crust goes under, younger stays atop.
    - it isn't necessary to continue that divergent line into the continent, you can consider that the continental plate moving southwards is "covering" that magma source - but you can continue it if you like, that sort-of-peninsula could pass for a breakaway "craton".
    - zone A still doesn't convince me.
    - for zone C (and overall, for the plate over the south pole) I really recommend that you make a stereographic projection of the zone and try groovey's technique of having a semi-transparent layer on top of it rotating. Plate movement close to the poles is hard to visualize.
    - mini-continent E should be as far from the divergent line as much as the large continent to the west, assuming that is a breakaway plate. On its east boundary, however, there's no reason to have such a wide front of oceanic crust. Either you make the east boundary close to the land mass or you keep it where it is and you add a big underwater continental area, with a mature island-arc at its limit.

    Overall, ascarius, great improvements, but I wonder how it will look if you use g plates. kudos for finding that gem!
    Last edited by Pixie; 06-05-2014 at 07:57 PM.

  8. #28
    Guild Artisan su_liam's Avatar
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    Hi. That was my awful blog.
    I'm glad to see you got that rot-file working. It took me a few errors to get it working myself.
    The most likely problem is that you need at least to lines for each plateid. One for the initial time and one for the final time.
    Positions are interpolated, but gplates can't extrapolate. Neat thing is that gplates will automagically create new lines when you move plates around.
    I tried to be pretty thorough(boring, longwinded, dull as slow-moving brown mud), but if I missed anything, questions could help.

  9. #29

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    Quote Originally Posted by Pixie View Post
    I'll have to have a look at G Plates - looks like a great tool. As for the dark path - the force is strong down that way and I assure you there's light at the end There are great tectonically-aware maps popping up in the guild - groovey's, akubra's, yours.

    Now, as for your changes:
    - the divergent boundaries are better placed, but you have to consider the same reasoning when placing the subduction between the two oceanic plates that are converging. The one that is "sinking" should be disappearing, hence, should be narrower. Also, keep in mind that oldest oceanic crust goes under, younger stays atop.
    - it isn't necessary to continue that divergent line into the continent, you can consider that the continental plate moving southwards is "covering" that magma source - but you can continue it if you like, that sort-of-peninsula could pass for a breakaway "craton".
    - zone A still doesn't convince me.
    - for zone C (and overall, for the plate over the south pole) I really recommend that you make a stereographic projection of the zone and try groovey's technique of having a semi-transparent layer on top of it rotating. Plate movement close to the poles is hard to visualize.
    - mini-continent E should be as far from the divergent line as much as the large continent to the west, assuming that is a breakaway plate. On its east boundary, however, there's no reason to have such a wide front of oceanic crust. Either you make the east boundary close to the land mass or you keep it where it is and you add a big underwater continental area, with a mature island-arc at its limit.

    Overall, ascarius, great improvements, but I wonder how it will look if you use g plates. kudos for finding that gem!
    Hey Pixie, Thanks for your help. Sadly I've been trying to figure out gplates..... and well I've got a whole new map. It's a really interesting program, don't know if you've checked it out yet but I say give it a try. Hopefully if I'm not too busy stop wasting time a get the above map on gplates and see how it works. I will say the Euler poles on gplates works really well, you can get a lot of different results by using a pole that I never would have thought of. Got some screenshots of what I've done in gplates so far. I've noticed that by doing a time progression you can figure out really well where islands are even those left over from previous plate interactions that are no longer there.

    150M yrs ago .
    Click image for larger version. 

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    169 M yrs ago showing a oceanic ridge(s) and corresponding plates.
    Click image for larger version. 

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    140 Ma yrs ago same area
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    Ok now I'm done playing back to work
    Quote Originally Posted by su_liam View Post
    Hi. That was my awful blog.
    I'm glad to see you got that rot-file working. It took me a few errors to get it working myself.
    The most likely problem is that you need at least to lines for each plateid. One for the initial time and one for the final time.
    Positions are interpolated, but gplates can't extrapolate. Neat thing is that gplates will automagically create new lines when you move plates around.
    I tried to be pretty thorough(boring, longwinded, dull as slow-moving brown mud), but if I missed anything, questions could help.
    My compliments on the tutorial, your blog helped a ton. The problem I was having with the rot files was a simple one. My text editor deemed rot extensions beneath it's lofty notice and was adamant about deciding which extension to use. In the end I used the humble notepad.

    Not sure if you know but in the latest version of gplates you can now create and modify the rot file in the program without having to use a text editor, very handy. Do you know if it matters if you save a feature as unkown or fault or coastline? So far it doesn't seem to change anything.

    Edit: No idea where that thumbnail came from.
    Last edited by ascanius; 06-08-2014 at 04:01 PM.

  10. #30
    Guild Adept groovey's Avatar
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    Wow, this stuff with GPlates is miles away from my comprehension, too complex for me to even try it, but it's blowing my mind a little, I can't believe a software that does this stuff exists, it's wonderful.

    Can't wait to see more of your experiments with it and how will all translate to your new map.

    About thumbnails, that happens to me when I load an image and then I delete it for whatever the reason. What I do is "Edit" the post and then "Go Advanced", then scroll down a bit to "Manage Attachments", click that button and it will lead you to a window where in the bottom it shows the images attached to the post. If you stop your cursor over the one you want to delete, in your case, the one attached below your post, you'll see on the right corner of the image an "x" appears, and clicking that deletes it.

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