Need help with Mountains

[BISHDP]

Hey all,
It's been a while since I last posted but I need some help. Last time I was on these forums, I was able to create some maps (see attached) with the advice from several pillars of the community and I was very happy with them. Then, tragedy struck and I lost my PC with all the files I had so painstakingly made. I was only able to recover the finished .JPGs I had posted on this forum.

This was fine for a while but I have now run into things I need to change about them and can't since they are just .JPGs and not GIMP files with all the layers intact. Sadly, I have set about redoing all the hard work I did several years back. I decided to take this "opportunity" to make my maps at a higher resolution so they will look less grainy when I cut them up into regional maps.

And here is where my problem lies. I have long used Arsheesh's Eriond tutorial (that is what I used to make the attached maps) but this time I CANNOT get the mountains to look anywhere near as good as the ones I did from years ago. I am at the "pulling the hair out" stage and could use a hand. Anyone on the boards good at adding semi-realistic mountains in a style matching the ones from my old maps? I have SO MUCH more work to do on these but can't get past this and it is getting really exasperating.

[mbartelsm]

Post a pic of your current WIP, maybe we can find the reason they are not looking like they did

[BISHDP]

Okay. Here are a couple. The first is the best I have been able to produce. It looks pretty good but VERY flat compared to the mountains from my old ones. The second is the B&W file.

[mbartelsm]

I think the reason is precisely because you are working on a higer resolution. Both Wilbur and the clouds filter are very resolution-dependant. I would suggest creating most of the geography on a lower res and then scaling it -- maybe scaling in Wilbur (Surface > Resample > Simple) after doing all the steps, but running a few passes of Precipiton-based erosion (should be Ctrl+E) before exporting; or scaling on Photoshop/GIMP after Wilbur. You may also want to play with the bump-map/lighting-effects filter to create stronger shadows.

[nwisth]

I've been working on a height map for Wilbur these last few days, and there is a LOT you can do in Photoshop (or GIMP I guess). The Levels tool is your friend! If you use Levels to change contrast, and make a few darker and lighter variations - making your map higher, lower, etc. Then you can use masks and various brushes (I like airbrush tools with scattered spatter) to merge them together into a coherent whole. You can bounce things back and forth between Wilbur and photoshop and see what works and what doesn't.

Remember to use the whole greyscale spectrum - use 100% black for sea level, and reserve 100% white for the very tiny tippy-tips of mountains. Now, your gresyscale map is on the bright side, with grey sea and large patches of white mountains - which will make them flat as pancakes.

-Niels

[Robulous]

My sympathies. I accidentally deleted the file for one of my best maps thinking it was a duplicate and actually was the only copy, so only have the JPG and older backups

[Greason Wolfe]

This tutorial may or may not also be helpful if you are working with Wilbur.

[BISHDP]

First off, thank you all for your responses. They have been very encouraging and helpful. Here is my latest attempt at building out the mountains. They look better, imo, but not quite were I want them.

[BISHDP]

What do you all think so far? Here are side by side comparisons of my old maps (on the left) vs my new maps (on the right)

Continent Maps


Regional Maps

[nwisth]

I love the forest texture on the Du'lar map. Very nice tiny highlights! The new maps look a lot more foreboding, with the darker color scheme.

-Niels