How to make a map with Gimp and Fractal Terrains Pro

[Uomaru]

Hi! This tutorial will show you how I make my maps by combining FT pro and Gimp.

1. Make a new world and set the settings like picture 1. I changed everything to metric units as I am more used to it then the default settings.
Change the Highest Peak and lowest depth to 9000 and –9000. Change roughness to 0.75 and Percent sea to desired amount (I’ll go mainstream so I set it to 70%). Change the land size to 1.99. This should generate decent looking land masses.
Now go to the Fractal Function folder and select Wilbur Ridged Multifractal in the Method box. Lastly go to the Editing folder and select what editing size you want to use.
I will stick with the large option (1024). Before you press execute check the prescale offset editing tools. You will use it later. When you are finished press ok.

2. The result did not turn out as I wanted. The whole world stretches out like a snake... Go back to the World Settings and change the World Seed until you have found a good looking world! If you need to se how big the continents are compared to earth search on the Internet after a picture of earth and save it. Then go to Image Overlays>Show Overlay Window and press the add button. Press Import color Image and select the picture of earth, set the opacity to 50% and press ok.

3. I’ve found a world that I am ready to move on with. From now on follow this tutorial
http://www.ridgenet.net/~jslayton/CGTutorial/index.html
to make the world look better and a little more “realistic”. Follow the tutorial and stop after that you’ve finished the rivers.

4. Now we are going to modify the rainfall and temperature values so we can have some variety in the climate. You can do it in many different ways, but I will just rise the rainfall and temperature. Tools>Global Rise>Temperature. Set it to 15
Tools>Global Rise>Rainfall. Set it to 25
You can also tweak the rainfall/temperature as you want with the Tools>Paint>Rise>Rainfall/Temperature as you want. Do some research on climate and the conditions that different climates needs.

5. Choose what projection you want and what piece of the world we want to map. I will use the Orthographic projection over the north hemisphere (La:90).
Then add two (less or more) grids according to the picture.