My first WIP

[Gregorus Prime]

Yet another update. I'm almost done with the terrain and I'd like some criticism on how it looks so far.

I'd still like to know if anyone has a good technique for making a volcano out of a mountain. I'd like to put one on the lower right island. I'm sure I'll need to make some adjustments to the bump map template and generate new maps on top of it, but as far as the lava goes I'm kind of at a loss. Should I make a pattern and apply it or stick with a radial gradient? Then there's the matter of smoke/ash after that. Anyone have some advice?

[Coyotemax]

Funny you should ask that, Ascension jsut posted a mini tutorial on just that topic

http://www.cartographersguild.com/showthread.php?t=2252

[Gregorus Prime]

What luck! This will keep me occupied for quite a bit. Then I need to put in some small rivers and after that, the easy part: labels, villages, and temples.

And of course figuring out the scale of the damn thing.

[Ascension]

It's an old tut for Photoshop and I need to redo it. You can get some ideas from it but the methods will produce something messed up probably.

[Gandwarf]

This is indeed looking a lot better. A volcano should be a great addition.

[Gregorus Prime]

They did produce unsatisfactory results, so I continued using the methods in RobA's tutorial to make a nice little lava crater after redoing the bump map for the mountain in question. Dodge and burn are great tools for doing just that, by the way. After that, some clipping, noise, gradient mapping, and two more layers of random noise, and I got lava I could live with.

Anyway, here's the result. I'm probably going to have to play around with threshholds, noise layers, etc. to get something I can use as the basis of a global bump map to use with the light and shadow filters to give it a shiny satellite photo look. (The Saerdastian Empire's mages have special clairvoyance spells or something. Shut up. )

After this, it's all symbols and text. Anyone know some good freeware clipart sets that would have some good Roman-looking compass roses in them?

[Coyotemax]

Oddly enough there's a few sets of brushes on here Somewhere in the Mapping elements section, I know I've downloaded 2 brush packs but they're on the other machine so i don't recall details.. and a quick scan through the mapping elements section eludes me.

But i DID find a great font that's full of compass roses.
http://www.dafont.com/pr-compass-rose.font?nb_ppp=50

[Gregorus Prime]

I HAVE THE POOOWEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEER

Check this out. I used the light effects filter on the land and generated my own water ripple effect through lots of noise, blurring, distortion, and good ol' down-home voodoo magic powers.

I am very happy with this as it is now. The two new layers add quite a bit to the map, I think. And I've got some new techniques to keep in mind when I move on to the other regions of the world. Those are a whole new set of problems, what with the icy areas and deserts and normal forests and such. Tell me what you guys think.

EDIT: Oh, and thank you to Coyotemax for the compass rose fonts. I'm sure they'll come in handy.

EDIT: Replaced posted version with adjusted one that includes shallow waters.

[Gandwarf]

The water has improved greatly. Could you redo the effect if you wanted? Sounds like you stumbled upon something

[Ashenvale]

Love your map! Very nice!

Did you consider bleeding some lighter color into the water area immediately adjacent to islands (letting it diffuse out to nothing as it moves away from the islands) to suggest shallows? (If you do, be sure to add some distortion to the shallows, like the Filter/Distort/Ocean Ripples, to give it some movement and texture.)