I do not know if this belongs here or somewhere else, so it won't hurt my feelings if you move this to another forum. I say that because this is not so much a tutorial but an explanation. I have attempted to make a tutorial, but that is something I might need practice at, and my software has changed, which screwed me up in a way. With that said...

Several have asked and PM'ed me on how I created the mountains in my East Tharduur map that won the challenge for January. The difficulty I am running into is that I created these mountains in PS Elements 4.0 and I recently upgraded to PS Elements 7.0 and have not been able to duplicate, to a reasonable degree, how to do it. They adjusted some of the features, namely the sharpness feature, and I believe that is the trouble I am having.

In a nutshell…

Basically using Handsome Rob's technique on bringing in Fractal Terrain files into Photoshop, I used a Filter>Texture>Grain on the mountain layer. Then a Filter>Blur>Motion Blur with a horizontal angle. I sharpened up those lines. Then a Filter>Distort>Liquify. I used a twist-right on those lines that would give the lines the bump that you might recognize. I believe I also used a Filter>Distort>Glass to give it a little more randomness. I remember sharpening at each stage of this process.

I believe that's it. I apologize for how bad this explanation is, but I played with those mountains over the course of several days and I never thought I would have to make a tutorial on them. The problem I am having going for PSE 4 to PSE 7 is the sharpness feature. I can't get those lines as sharp as I did in PSE 4. Hopefully somebody better than me can come along and help us out in this.

If anyone has any questions feel free to ask.