Landmass Creation in Photoshop (or possibly other programs)

[kittrellbj]

Continuing on, now I want some mountains in the middle of the island that conform, generally, to the shape of the rest of the island. So, with the magic wand, select the dark green forest. Contract it down (I used 24 pixels again). This time, I took a brush and filled in the selection that I wanted in the middle. (The paint bucket will fill everything selected).

So, I colored in a dark grey color to represent the base of the mountains. Then, I contracted the selection just a few pixels each time and filled with a lighter grey color each time to represent change in elevation as you get closer to the top.

When I got to the top, I decided to paint it orange, instantly turning it into a volcano. Then I took my dark green forest brush and touched up the mountain a little (rough and quick) to take a few of the strange edges off.

[kittrellbj]

That's basically it. With this technique, you can generate entire planets in less than an hour. Populating it, of course, will take more time, but getting the basic layout is quite fast and easy with this method.

Some optionals that may help:

- Add each new terrain feature as a new layer. This will allow post-editing of the map for different terrain types to make them uniform and allow you to quickly "pretty them up" with layer styles, filters, and textures.
- After you get the basic layout, hand-draw some features for variety, such as smaller outlying islands or rocky outcroppings. You can also use this technique in another layer for outlying islands to generate them, as well.

[Vascant]

Thanks, while the style may not be to my liking I did learn about the select -> contract. (Yes I am still very new to PS and learning all the time)