Geidor

[Greason Wolfe]

Still following this one. For me, it is the climate/biome work you're doing ASP. That is, perhaps, my weakest area in map design and, more often than not, I just fly by the seat of my pants when it comes to weather. But the work you've done so far, in that area, is really opening my eyes. Of course, I'll be looking forward to what you do with the land masses as well. Think I already repped you, but there will be more coming when I get a chance.

GW

P.S. As it turned out, I hadn't repped you yet, so here it is, what little I can give you!

[altasilvapuer]

Thanks for the rep, Greason, but the people you should really be repping are Karro and Korba. It's to the two of them and some nigh-upon obsessive research via The Climate Cookbook, Wikipedia, and other such websites, that I owe my knowledge (such as it is) of climates and biomes. Fascinating stuff, really.

The really fun part is watching clouds while sitting in a library when you should be doing work, and looking for the various climatological/weather mechanisms in action, and beginning to understand some of it.

-asp

[Greason Wolfe]

Thanks for the rep, Greason, but the people you should really be repping are Karro and Korba. It's to the two of them and some nigh-upon obsessive research via The Climate Cookbook, Wikipedia, and other such websites, that I owe my knowledge (such as it is) of climates and biomes. Fascinating stuff, really.

The really fun part is watching clouds while sitting in a library when you should be doing work, and looking for the various climatological/weather mechanisms in action, and beginning to understand some of it.

-asp

Ahh, but the rep is for posting your trial and "error" efforts. I'm not great with climatology so seeing how others (who may not be particularly great with the same subject) work their way through such things is a big bonus and helps me refine my approach. I've a theory about these things . . . And this isn't to suggest that those more in the know are wrong or anything . . . but sometimes it is the answer to the simplest of questions that offers up the most fruit for learning. Of course, it helps to have those that are in the know in your corner! So hats off to Karro and Korba as well.

GW

[Karro]

Thanks for the rep, Greason, but the people you should really be repping are Karro and Korba. It's to the two of them and some nigh-upon obsessive research via The Climate Cookbook, Wikipedia...

Of course, it helps to have those that are in the know in your corner! So hats off to Karro and Korba as well.

Yeah, except, I'm not really any more in the know than anyone else. I'm a financial analyst, not a climatologist! Almost everything I know about climatology can be attributed to short spates of self-study in some friends' college climate textbooks, reading bits and pieces from the Climate Cookbook, and especially to reading Expeditious Retreat Press's Guide to Mapmaking, which I had once read, lost in a hard-drive crash, and was re-pointed to thanks to others on this forum. I don't think I was even the first on this forum to approach mapmaking this way, and I'm certainly not the best!

[Greason Wolfe]

Yeah, except, I'm not really any more in the know than anyone else. I'm a financial analyst, not a climatologist! Almost everything I know about climatology can be attributed to short spates of self-study in some friends' college climate textbooks, reading bits and pieces from the Climate Cookbook, and especially to reading Expeditious Retreat Press's Guide to Mapmaking, which I had once read, lost in a hard-drive crash, and was re-pointed to thanks to others on this forum. I don't think I was even the first on this forum to approach mapmaking this way, and I'm certainly not the best!

Oooooh! Steve Jackson stuff. I used to have a whole load of work along the same lines and, like you, lost most of it in a hard drive/motherboard crash. Still got a little bit of it though, particularly a little blurb about planetary surface temperatures based on stellar temperatures and distances from the stellar surface.

Still, though, a bit more in the know than I am at the moment. This whole climatology thing will probably be my next big push, however, so it's still a good thing to see it being worked out by others.

GW

[altasilvapuer]

Well, what can I say? The virtual machete is one of the most fun tools to use. I don't often find new trails to blaze, so when I see the beginnings of others' tracks, I tend to almost compulsively explore the territory, as it were. Maps can be made of more than just locales, after all.

-asp

[altasilvapuer]

Apologies for the delay; it's finals week and I'm stealing a little sanity time for this update, because it's making me happy.

I've worked on and off on the map since my last update, and after a fitful false start or two, I think I'm getting closer. I'm currently laying down the textures for a pseudo-satellite shot. I'm not 100% happy with my textures, but I feel I've beaten a few of them into submission, and coaxed the rest.

In the spirit of my usual policy of posting early and often, though, here're some shots of one of the attempts with which I wasn't happy, and a WIP of the current one:

[DISCLAIMER Interlude: I've been working with this at roughly 19.1% zoom so far, heh, so I haven't seen how well the textures work up close. I should probably do that, but for now keep that in mind when giving critiques. I'd love mention of whether they're working at full-res, though, if anyone's up for it.]


Texture pass #1:

I was rather completely unhappy with the massive jumble of this attempt, so I decided to partially scrap it. Rather than completely killing it, though, I just reset each of the layer masks and worked from there.

Texture pass #2:

This is in-progress of the re-attempt after the previous image. There are still a lot of unfilled areas (see Southern Continent, especially), but I saved and uploaded it to show a friend several days ago, so I figured I'd show you all, too.

Texture pass #3:

This is the map in its current state. All of the art-work for the land is made up of multiple layers, with one texture per layer. I then put a black layer mask on each of them, and painted white at low opacity on the mask to reveal portions of each texture.
All of these layers are then placed into a folder which has a mask on it corresponding to the shape of the current landmass, so the textures don't leak into the water.

True to style, though, it's on upload that I've noticed most of my errors, heh. The most glaring I have seen, so far, is that this is season-neutral, just like my first temperature map. Both hemispheres seem to be experiencing some pseudo-summer/spring. With luck, though, it won't be too hard to make a seasonal variation, should I choose to do so. For now, I think this map is reasonably representative.

Next stage (surprisingly late, but I'm slightly putting it off, heh) is rivers! I've been giving thought to this, but I'm thinking about putting a layer under the current (textured) landmass, and then cutting pieces from the mask on the texture folder to reveal the river. And on the layer under the landmass, I'll put my river texture, if I decide to have it different from the oceans.

And I need to actually texture my oceans, heh. I haven't decided whether I'll do this before or after the rivers, but it all depends on what I decide to texture them with.
Any ideas?

-asp

[Greason Wolfe]

Glad to see you back to work on this one, asp. And, overall, I think it is still looking good. The colors, at least to me, are reasonable and give a fairly good idea of what the climates might be like. I'm curious, though, whether or not you would be able to add a bit of "crunchiness" or roughness to the mountain regions. It may just be my slowly failing eye sight, but they seemed a little flat to me, or maybe a little too smooth, not sure which. Alternatively, it might just need a bit of shadowing to give an impression of elevation.

As for the rivers thing. I'm not an expert on those just yet and may never be an expert. But as for the layer position, I'd think you might want them "on top" of your land textures as putting them below might turn them into gorges that could look a bit odd, particularly in the mountain areas. Then again, I could be completely off on that so will happily wait to see what you come up with.

All in all, still getting a thumbs up from me, and I'm looking forward to seeing what you do with your seasonal representations.

GW

[Steel General]

This is coming along nicely... might want to consider the transitions between your coasts and the ocean - are there going to be beaches, etc.

[altasilvapuer]

I'm also not happy with the mountains, at the moment. I did manage to give a little bit of illusion of depth, but not enough, and it's not crunchy enough, yet. I'll probably do some more playing around, and might poke around some of the related tutorials here, which I haven't viewed, yet.

I thought about beaches, but I've decided for the most part, I don't think they'd be too visible from this distance, would they? I will probably put a little bit, somehow, but not much.

-asp