Untitled layer mask test

[Coyotemax]

I still haven't figured out how to get the ocean to work with me the way I want it to. I'm using an inverted copy of the land layer mask, but that has the advantage of keeping layer effects consistent when I draw the rivers onto it (I have the ocean placed above the land layers). I left off the smart object step this time, it seems to work fine without that for what I'm doing here, and things are still incredibly easy to modify, so I'm not worried anymore.


[edit] I take that back.. i have it working EXACTLY the way I want to to. Putting the ocean layer above everything else was the key. I then removed the mask on the base land layer, and now the land is editable just by painting on the mask from the ocean layer. if I want to cut into the land, it takes a bit more effort, but if the land is all placed as a smart object, it works just fine. if i need to edit mountain layers, though, I need to go into the smart object to do it is all.

Oh and incidentally, I found a way to un-group a smart object (more or less). When you edit the object and it loads itself as a new file, you just duplicate the layers, and when the requester pops up, tell it you want them to copy to the original file.

{one more edit} I have my answer regarding full layer vs only what you need. I have the original file, full layers of texture - 206 megs. I have the other one chopped down by selecting the masked area and expanding by about 50 pixes for safety margin in case of edits, and it weighs in at 101 megs. I imagine it would have a similar impact on the available ram when opening the file to work on.