Quote Originally Posted by Lute View Post
Now there is an interesting idea.

Just adjust the opacity so I can see the "outline" of the continent and add what texture I want where I want it. Just paint it on.

I will play with that. Thank you.

BTW... speaking of opacity...

When I create a new channel for a land mask, what is the fill opacity supposed to be for that mask? It is defaulted to 50.

Shouldn't it be 100%?

I would HIGHLY suggest learning and using non-destructive techniques as much as possible. For example, if you have a Layer that is green and you want some texture applied to it and use the paint brush to apply the texture direction, that is a destructive technique. It makes more work if you want to later go and change the shade of green just slightly. since you then have to repaint the texture again and that's wasteful time spent. Instead, paint the texture onto it's own layer.

Likewise, instead of using the eraser on portions of a layer, use a layer mask to "erase" the sections you don't need by masking them. Again, if you want to go change the color later, you get have far less fiddling.

Also, when doing a bump map, I would suggest NEVER running a bump map on a standard layer with some color or texture already on it. Again, if you want to change the color after the fact, you have to redo the bump mapping process. Instead, for all your bump maps, create a layer with 50% grey, set it to overlay mode, and apply the bump map to that layer with whatever noise layer you want the textures from. This will then have the texture show through where the bumped parts are lighter or darker but anywhere on that layer which is still 50% grey will be 100% transparent.

As others have said, a layer mask is the right way to go here. If you will need to apply the layer mask to multiple layers to get the right effect, then create a selection first and transform that to a Channel and use said channel as the layer mask.