# Mapping Resources > Tutorials/How-To >  [Award Winner] My atlas style in PS

## Ascension

I might be giving away the farm on this one, since I consider this to be my best style, but since I like to teach and make a tut for just about everything -- I present to you my atlas style.  It's not meant to be the end-all be-all but rather an introductory course...where you can take it and adapt and change things as you see fit.  I know my tuts tend to be lengthy and sometimes difficult so I'll do my best to help you out with any questions/problems you might have.

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## Gandwarf

The tutorial looks like it took a lot of work and I certainly love this style. A lot. I love the bright color, the sea and the ice to the north. And the golden font... darn, so much to learn  :Smile: 

Repped...

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## Nialas

I may be snowed or iced in tomorrow.  If so, I know what I'll be doing  :Very Happy: .  Thanks.

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## Steel General

I'll give this a whirl sometime soon - I'm sure its up to your usual quality.  :Smile:

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## Hoel

I looked it through and I am impressed. It looks really easy... How long have you spent perfecting your style?

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## Ascension

About 2 weeks shy of 2 years.  I've got some of my first psd files still on the hard drive somewhere and I've been thinking of converting them to jpg and posting them up so that everyone can snicker at my river violations  :Smile:

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## Hoel

That would be fun!

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## Nomadic

Very interesting tutorial. I can't seem to get it to work but that's because there are several areas I am confused on. Regardless though it has given me some neat ideas on how I can make my maps better.

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## hunab.cu

A really great tutorial!
You popped up with it right after I thought "It would be nice to get a good atlas tutorial"...  :Smile:  I'm gonna spend a lot of time to learn it and adapt to my techniques. 
Thank you very much for this one!

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## NeonKnight

Looks good!

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## Vandy

Hello, Ascension.

I have one main comment for you concerning your new tutorial --  THANKS A LOT!!  As If I don't have enough tutorials I wish to do, you go and post another one that I just MUST DO!!

 :Wink: 

Serioulsy, thought, thank you so very much for taking the time to write and post this excellent tutorial.  I most certainly will be using it to create Atlas style maps.

Great work!

* BOINK *

Regards,

Gary

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## woekan

Awesome tutorial. I learned alot from this. 

Here is my attempt.

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## Ascension

Spot on...see how easy it is to be a mediocre mapper  :Smile:

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## Vandy

Hi, Ascension.

I'm working through your tutorial (actually just got started) and I have a question already.  I'm currently using PhotoShop Elements.  In Step 4, I don't have an option for Hard Mix.  Is there a compatible choice (I've tried them all and I don't get the black and white "cow" picture like you show) or do I need the full-blown PhotoShop?

Thanks.

Regards,

Gary

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## Steel General

@Vandy - You may try something with 'Threshold' (if you have it), not sure if that will give you the same effect or not.

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## Nomadic

> @Vandy - You may try something with 'Threshold' (if you have it), not sure if that will give you the same effect or not.


It should, threshold is actually how I do my coastlines. Just fill with black then do clouds > difference clouds >threshold. Then tweak threshold  to get the shapes you like and piece them together like a puzzle (it helps to select the color you aren't using and delete it).

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## ravells

Fantastic, Ascension! Thanks for sharing the family jewels! 5 stars and repped!

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## Ascension

My pleasure Ravs, just hoping to help.

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## Ascension

Is anyone having a problem viewing the pics in the doc file in Open Office?  Sigurd tells me that the JPGs are OLEs...whatever those are  :Smile:

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## rkmase

Awesome tutorial - thanks for the detailed instructions. This will definitely be used.

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## indio

First post. w00t!!

This community looks great, and Ascension's tutorials are clearly a huge part of the reason why. So much generosity is both humbling and inspiring.

This atlas tutorial in particular is a wealth of excellent information, and just to my taste. I'm going to work my way through it this weekend and, if it succeeds, will post the results. Thanks for such a wonderful gift.

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## Steel General

> First post. w00t!!
> 
> This community looks great, and Ascension's tutorials are clearly a huge part of the reason why. So much generosity is both humbling and inspiring.
> 
> This atlas tutorial in particular is a wealth of excellent information, and just to my taste. I'm going to work my way through it this weekend and, if it succeeds, will post the results. Thanks for such a wonderful gift.



Welcome Aboard Indio!

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## Ascension

My pleasure, mate.  Welcome aboard.

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## dolenore

> Is there a compatible choice (I've tried them all and I don't get the black and white "cow" picture like you show) or do I need the full-blown PhotoShop?


Not sure if this will produce the exact same results, but if memory serves me you could:

copy the layer again
Image > Adjustments > Posterize (levels: 2)

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## StillCypher

I've just glanced over this tutorial, and I can tell it's one I'm going to *have* to try out! This style of yours really appeals to me. Wonderful work!

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## Ascension

Lemme know if you have any problems  :Smile:

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## Egfy

> I'm working through your tutorial (actually just got started) and I have a question already.  I'm currently using PhotoShop Elements.  In Step 4, I don't have an option for Hard Mix.  Is there a compatible choice (I've tried them all and I don't get the black and white "cow" picture like you show) or do I need the full-blown PhotoShop?


You need to use two layers instead of the Hard Mix, one 50% grey and set to Dodge and the other should be black and set to Burn.

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## Chadwick

Just joined up and saw this tutorial and your result looked amazing so I figured I'd give it a go as my first map ^^. The tutorial was extremely easy to follow however I had a bit of a problem that I can't figure out. My brush seems to have left quite a few marks throughout the map and I was wondering if you knew how to avoid this problem.

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## Ascension

Looks great!...other than those strokes  :Smile:   It looks like you have the brush properties set to something other than normal.  First click on the brush tool, then at the top you will see the word "Mode" in the box next to that, make sure it says Normal and not something like multiply or difference.  It could be that you did the airbrushing on it's own layer and never merged it down onto the clouds layer, thus you're getting some artifacts from that.  If that's not it lemme know and I'll see if I can replicate this effect (might take me a while since I'll be experimenting a lot to find the needle in the haystack).

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## Chadwick

It looks like that fixed it, I had it set to normal before but I had an airbrush button pressed. I just tried again with the airbrush button not on and it didn't leave the marks as far as I can tell with just doing up to the land step. ^^

Thanks a ton

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## Ascension

No prob, man.  Just here to help  :Smile:

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## Chadwick

I've gone through the tutorial a few more times and the brush strokes still seem to show up. They make their appearance after copying "Ocean" and making "Land". When I apply the lighting affect they become very prominent. I thought it would just be me clicking int he same spot a few times when trying to get my land mass how I want it but it seems even long held down brush strokes create the problem.

Any ideas?

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## Ascension

All right, got it.  After much experimenting I finally got it just like what you show.  What I did was to take a hard round brush tip, then scale it up to 300...when I then paint it leaves the rings.  What you need is the airbrush tip and not a hard round tip set to airbrush in the brush control panel.  Use the Airbrush Soft Round 300 tip (or 100 or whatever).  Just clicking on the airbrush button in the brush control panel does not give it an airbrush quality.

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## Chadwick

Ah it must have been the hard round that was doing it to me because I tried it with airbrush both on and off. Thanks a ton Ascension ^^ Really appreciate you taking the time to help me out.

--edit--

That was definitely it ^^ Just went through and did one that's much better I think. I also realized I had the lighting for the hills set up incorrectly and the color is much better this time around.

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## Ascension

Now yer cookin, looks great.  Glad I could actually find the problem and fix it and help someone out following my lead...I'd hate to lead someone down the wrong path.  Good luck, mate, and keep up the nice work.

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## Vandy

Hello, All.

Here is Ascension's wonderful tutorial repackaged as a PDF document.

Enjoy.

Regards,

Gary

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## Ascension

Thanks, V.  Glad you're doing this, it's very helpful.

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## Sirith

Hmm, I have a very hard time following the tutorial. I _seem_ to be doing fine, but when I get to the picture at step 22, it looks absolutely nothing like what Ascensions tutorial shows (see attachment). I figure it might already be going wrong at step 11, but I'm not sure. I like the tutorial, I just can't seem to get it right :/
Is there a crucial step or detail I might be missing?

(Also, ignore the weird island-shape, I'm just trying to figure out how it works  :Wink: )


EDIT: Alright I seem to have found my problem. When you start to add colour, I first selected the base layer, so all further layer styles were applied to that layer, instead of to the land layer.


EDIT 2: Another try. I'm not very fond of the outcome, there are some areas definitely needing improvement. However, I can see myself using some of these techniques on future maps, especially to throw in some texturing on my (normally) handdrawn and -painted maps.
Thank you for the tutorial, Ascension  :Smile:

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## Ascension

Sorry I couldn't get back to ya sooner there Sirith, I work at my biz every day, half days on weekends, so I am usually indisposed until the afternoons/evenings.  I'm glad you were able to mend it and if you have any further questions just ask  :Smile:

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## Kasonic

Hate to dig this up and bother you, but I'm screwing up somewhere around step 19 in your tutorial.

(First time poster, total PS newbie, I found this thread through another site; great tutorial and method!)

It says to apply the same lighting effects to the hill and land layer...well, when I do this, I get an image that's WAY darker than your example, or anyone else's.  The color is correct without the lighting render, but then the texture obviously wrong.

What's the newbie doing wrong?

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## Ascension

So far I don't see anything off except that red dot in the south ocean.  I'll have to double check my color hex codes to see if I messed that up (will do that when I get home tonight) but you can always just change them to suit ya cuz we all have different monitor settings.  So far so good really.

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## Kasonic

Yeah I didn't bother fixing the dot from a misclick, won't hurt in the end.  Thanks; looks like a simple Soft Light filter gets things more in line with what I'm seeing anyway.

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## tmvanatta

In following along in your tutorial, I'm stuck at step 8.  You mention to copy this layer but do you mean to duplicate it and name it base?  Then in step 9 are you supposed to apply the fill to the base layer and when you do, do you set the fill opacity to 100% and do you preserve transparency?  I also need clarification on step 10.  I select my brush and put it at 10% transparency.  But when I click on the ocean layer to edit it I can only see my strokes in the thumbnails on the layers panel.  This is because The solid black and white base layer is blocking everything out.

So what I have been doing is to set the base layer to an opacity level to where I can see what I am doing on the ocean layer. I use the 10% opacity brush on the ocean layer but how do you keep the brush marks from over lapping and building up their opacity?

Then I link the Base and Ocean layer then merge down the base layer.  But then the base layer is gone and I'm left with and ocean layer that has all these see thru brush marks on them.  Please help.  I have no idea what I am doing wrong.  I've attached a screen shot of what I'm left with after the merge down.

Also I have been using your file labeled Tutorial6 with Pics.doc




V/r

Eric

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## Ascension

You start with one layer called "background" and then render some clouds on it.  Duplicate this layer.  This will then be called "background copy".  Create a new layer, then hit the Edit button at the top of the screen.  A menu will pop up so scroll down to where it says "fill".  A window pops up and where it says "foreground color" change that to "50% gray".  Change the blend mode of this layer to "hard mix" and then rename it to "base".  Click back on the "background copy" layer and start painting with the brush.  Our low opacity painting will show as black and white changes on the "base" layer.  We then copy the "background copy" layer (called background copy 2) and merge the base layer to it.

It looks like you just forgot the 50% gray layer (with a hard mix blend mode) and that's messing things up for you.  Hopefully, we've got it straightened out now.

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## tmvanatta

Thank you so much for clearing that up.  I thought you meant the Hard mix mode in the pop-up for the fill.  I didn't know you still had to change the drop menu that is listed on the Layers menu as well.

Eric

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## pickaboo

> Hello, All.
> 
> Here is Ascension's wonderful tutorial repackaged as a PDF document.
> 
> Enjoy.
> 
> Regards,
> 
> Gary
> ...


I'm sorry but I think you have forgotten to include the phase where we're supposed to do the overlay for mountains from your pdf. I'll attach a pdf-print of the doc so you can see the difference.  :Smile:

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## Meloncat

Ascension, I wanted to give thanks for your amazing tutorial. It seems almost criminal to let even the layman like myself be capable of producing a map of this caliber. I can finally get started on my fiction, so I owe you immense thanks!

About the only problem I came into was with the whole erasing mountains part. I had it as specified (20% flow, 300 px brush), and when I tried to erase the mountains I ended up with rather obvious eraser circles. I think it's merely my own noviceness with Photoshop though, playing with the flow down to 10% and adjusting the opacity gave me what I feel like are better results. Do you know if there's any way we can better direct the 'spawning' of mountains in the preliminary stages, rather than rely on their random emergence? Might be more authentic to geographics that mountains go where they please, but I need to establish some mountain chains in my map, and I'm not sure that randomization will suffice. A more specific question is: At what stage could I begin to tweak how Mountains emerge, and what would I do to tweak them to be more/less plentiful, more in one area than another, ect.

I can clearly see why you won the award, and hope you're given all the more for your great efforts!

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## Ascension

The problem with your erasing is that you are using a hard round brush tip instead of the airbrush tip.  I haven't yet begun to start the process of planning where the mtns will end up, so that's why I suggest you use the freeform lasso tool (at the top of the screen set the feather to around 50 px), lasso a nice looking chunk and drag it into a chain somewhere or fill a hole.  Oh, and thanks  :Smile:

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## EnigmaParadox

I just wanted to thank you for this brilliant tutorial, Ascension.
Makes mapping for my campaigns a whole lot easier, not to mention that it taught me a couple things about photoshop that I won't very soon forget.

(Edit)
Sorry to bother you, but is there tool to locate a specific spot on the canvas? I'm on step 51, and very much being the photoshop novice, I can't seem to find a way to locate the magic "every 200px" spot short of counting them.

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## Ascension

Glad I could help  :Smile:

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## saundersc01

First time here and glad I stumbled upon this site and your tutorial...i had made a map before coming here here and it looked like my 7 year old did it...so thanks for that.

Only thing is though that when I do the border portion of the map and I try to select one country, it selects the whole landmass borders and all. I went back and redid the borders layer thinking that might be it, but it still does the same thing...any ideas?

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## Steel General

Are you using the 'magic wand' to do the selection?

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## saundersc01

> Are you using the 'magic wand' to do the selection?


I am indeed using the magic wand...I just don't understand what the deal is

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## Steel General

hmmm... not sure, you could try using one of the other selection tools instead and see if that works. I'm sure Ascension will drop a post in here before to long, he's really good about responding to questions regarding his tutorials.

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## Ascension

I'm pretty much indisposed tonight...watching my nieces, so I might not get into this until tomorrow.  I need to try to replicate the problem first then see what changes I made that made the problem and then tell ya what not to do.  

First, I need a screen shot of the whole screen so that I can see the layer setup as well as the map.  Second, my suspicions are that something is either wrong with the layer or the settings on the tool are different (ie: something like "contiguous" is checked).  I'll look into this sometime tonight after my nieces have gone home and will try to have an answer for ya before midnight (cst) but if I don't then I will have one for ya sometime tomorrow before dinner.

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## saundersc01

here it is...you didn't say to put everything in folders, but i assure you that they are still in the correct order. and thanks to all who have responded! also, i have included the version without the 'country' layers shown and i must say i happy with my first real attempt at a map. oh and i tried it with contiguous on and off...same effect. also it shows that the border layers have a blend option on them...they don't...it just says that because near the beginning, i applied an effect to the 'base' layer and then removed it...don't know how to make it not show the fx icon when there are no effects selected.

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## Ascension

OK from what I can tell your borders layer looks right...it should just be a single line to make a border.  First delete all of your country layers except for one.  Ctrl-click on the border layer (to load it as a selection) then click on your country layer and hit the delete key (to erase the border line) then deselect.  Your countries should now all be split up.  You can now use the magic wand tool to select a country, create a new layer, fill it with whatever color that you want, then deselect.  Then repeat the magic wand/create new layer/fill with color/deselect process for each country.  Hope this helps.  One thing to note is that the one country is still connected to the polar ice cap so you might want to put a border across the isthmus there.

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## saundersc01

hmm that still didn't work...now when you say borders should be one line, does that mean i should be bringing them around lakes and such instead of making them end once they hit a lake?

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## saundersc01

nevermind...i got it working...i just used a pencil to draw the border lines rather than a brush...cool stuff

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## barcaii

First time poster here. I have tried this tutorial few times now, and I really like it. I wonder  if you have come up with any ways to do volcanoes and forests of different kinds?

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## Ascension

At this scale forests are just dark green but I have a tut on volcanoes in the tutorials section.  Pasis' tut on them is also pretty good.

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## barcaii

Thanks, I must have missed it. then I found the search function. Life is easy with a search function. Wish me luck.

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## Ascension

Any ole shape will do the trick really.  Grab a pencil, draw a shape around your landmass, fill it with the same color, then apply the bevel.  I use the cloud layer to keep things random and not so hand-drawn and straight.  You could also do a new cloud layer and modify it with a very low opacity airbrush (10%) using white for the high spots and black for the low spots.

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## sarandosil

Oops you replied while I was reformulating the post, oh well. I've tried rendering a new cloud layer without much success; probably just bad handpainting on my end. My problem is that it just looks too smooth with a solid color layer, like so. I'm not totally sure if I have something wrong in the settings or if's a problem with the blending due to the lack of a cloud layer now that I think about it.

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## Ascension

Ok, so you want to break up that edge that looks too much like the coast and give it some randomness...right?  There are three ways to go about this that are very easy:
1.  Use a pencil with a scattered brush tip and paint in some randomness in certain places.  The scattered brush tip will give you lots of lil bumps along the edge but keep going over that same area and the blank spaces will fill in.
2.  Put your shelf layer (solid white) on top of a black layer, merge them, hit it with a spatter filter (under brush strokes), select-color range = blacks, hit delete then deselect, apply layer styles.
3.  Use the eraser (in pencil mode, not brush) and select a scattered brush tip and erase parts out to make it more random.

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## mean_dm

Hey, wanna say I was looking for a way to create maps and was getting frustrated until I found your tutorial, so thanks a ton.

I am having a bit of a problem though, I'm pretty new to Photoshop CS3, and I am stuck at step 29, I am having difficulty believing I am on the right track, so I decided to stop before I messed up beyond saving. My map so far =(

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## Ascension

What I can see is that you have a black layer covering up your grayscale clouds so just hide the black layer or delete it.  Seems fine otherwise.

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## sarandosil

I think it's funny that you named the file Argh, because I know I have several maps with some variation on that name.

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## mean_dm

Haha, well, the tut is fantastic, but photoshop can take some getting used to, but I've got the hang of it now. I kind of feel a tad bit dumb for running into some of the problems I ran into lol.

Thanks for the help Ascension, everything is looking A-ok now.

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## Ascension

No problem man, I've much tougher problems to solve.  Good luck and make sure that you give us a look at it when yer done.

EDIT:  due to my lack of proper terminology I have edited and re-uploaded the doc file in the first post.  Open Office has bugged some of my other things so if you download this and it doesn't open properly then let me know.

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## Vascant

> Open Office has bugged some of my other things so if you download this and it doesn't open properly then let me know.



Word 2007 cannot read this, claims a problem with the XML and content

Edit:  I can read the the first one downloaded a month ago though, just not this update

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## Ascension

I'm really beginning to hate Open Office.  Now my file is corrupted beyond my patience to repair.  Anyone with an old copy care to upload it here so that I can use that and then re-edit it?

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## Horzamonk

Here you go. Thanks again for this great tut.

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## Dalakmar

Hi all,

I'm trying to follow this excellent tutorial using Photoshop 7 and am becoming very frustrated - mostly with my lack of knowledge of Photoshop. So I was wondering, has anyone else out there with Photoshop 7, who knows what they are doing, followed this tutorial? Fancy giving an old geezer a hand by telling him the equivalent steps in Photoshop 7?

I shall struggle on for now because the maps look so good I just have to make one or two or . . .

Dal.

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## Ascension

The main thing that 7 does not have is the hard mix layer blending mode.  You'll have to do Image-adjustments-threshhold or Image-adjustments-brightness/contrast for the "base" layer at the beginning.

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## Dalakmar

Hi Ascension,

Thank-you for the taking the time to reply. As I said in my earlier post I'm not that HOT on photoshop, but your post has nudged me in the right direction. However, (you knew there was an however coming didn't you) I'm now stuck on this part:

Click back on the Ocean layer (on the layers palette). Grab a big airbrush and at the top of the screen reduce the flow to 10%. I start with the 300-pixel airbrush and work my way down as needed. Use black to define the ocean and white to define the land.

How can I do this. I'm on the Ocean's layer - which is beneath the Base layer, right? Either I'm missing something or I'm really stupid. I'd probably have to go with the second option - can you offer any advice.

Dal.

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## Ascension

The process will be a lil longer for you but here's what you need to do:
1.  Filter-render-clouds to start with.
2.  Duplicate this layer (will be named background copy).
3.  Create a new layer.
4.  Use the 300 soft round airbrush with 10% flow, use black and white, paint black to fill in some ocean and white to fill in some land.  You don't need a whole lot, just go over these places once or twice.
5.  When you have something that you like, hit ctrl+shift+E (this merges all visible layers and puts the final output on it's own layer while leaving the rest of the layers below intact).
6.  Image-adjustments-brightness/contrast=set the contrast up to 100.
7.  If you see places where you want to make some further adjustments, then delete the top layer and go back to the painting layer.  When happy repeat steps 5 and 6.
8.  When you finally get to something that you can live with, rename the contrast adjusted layer to "base" and rename the "background copy" layer to "ocean".
9.  Proceed with the rest of the tut.

EDIT:  I re-attached the re-edited version (in post #1) and I hope this one works.

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## Dalakmar

Thanks Ascension,

Your'e a STAR! BUT . . . I'm still unable to follow your instructions - my BAD I can assure you. Here is what I've done so far and where I'm getting stuck. If you feel like helping me again it would be greatly appreciated. Hell, I might even name a continent after you!

1. I set up the document – 2000 x 2000 pixels at 300 PPI, RGB mode, 8bit. I make sure the colors are black and white then select Filter > Render > Clouds. Fine.

2. Copy this layer and rename it “Ocean”. Again, fine.

3.Rather than create a new layer then Edit > Fill = 50% gray and set the layer’s mode to hard mix and renaming this layer “Base” - which I cannot do in Photoshop 7 - I copy the layer again and go to Image > Adjustments > Posterize (levels: 2). When I have done this I end up with an image that looks like your Base Layer. I now have 3 layers: Background, Ocean and Base.

4. I now try to follow your next instruction: Click back on the “Ocean” layer (on the layers palette). Grab a big airbrush and at the top of the screen reduce the flow to 10%. I start with the 300-pixel airbrush and work my way down as needed. Use black to define the ocean and white to define the land. However, this has no effect on the actual apperance of the map. The only way I can do that is to use a normal brush on the Base layer. If I do make the changes on the Base layer then I end up with something resembling a continent as shown in your tutorial.

5. I can then follow your instructions all the way to: Adding Colour to the Land. Photoshop 7 doesn't have anything like your describing. Is there a work around for this that you know of?

6. Hmm. Me thinks it might be easier to purchase a copy a newer version of Photoshop.

Thanks again for all your help.

Dal.

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## Ascension

You're using the wrong brush tip...I had someone else recently with this problem and it took us us hours to figure out the problem on AIM.  What he was doing was using the 1-pixel brush tip, then setting the size at 300, and hitting the airbrush icon.  This does not work so make sure that you are using the Airbrush soft round 300.  It is a default brush tip, so scroll down the list.

As far as adding color to the land, it is a layer style of Gradient overlay...it's there, just click that lil funky cursive F at the bottom of the layer stack.  The gradient is not a default so you have to make it by hand, that's why I put the color values in the tut.  If gradient ends up too dark for you then add in a layer style of Color overlay of white and set it's blend mode to soft light or overlay.

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## Tyr

Step 21 is where I seem to get really lost. No colours add at all. How do you even get into selecting colours with hex codes? I just have to use the standard sliders all the time.
Think I should try and figure out less complex photoshop stuff before this.

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## Ascension

Ok, this is pretty easy but if you've very little experience with Photoshop then I'll go through the Color Picker.  The pic shows the screen and I'll go through what the various letters mean.

HSB stands for Hue, Saturation, and Brightness.  This is one way to pick a color.

RGB stands for Red, Green,  and Blue.  This is another way to pick colors and is the one I use.

Lab stands for Lightness, color a, and color b.  This one is difficult for me to work with so I never use it.  It's supposed to mimic human vision by mixing two colors and then adjusting the lightness of the mix.

CMYK stands for Cyan, Magenta, Yellow, and blacK.  This is another way to pick colors, mostly use in print media.

#000000 stands for the hex code value...a number that has been assigned to the various billions of colors...00000 being black, FFFFFF is white, FF0000 is red, etc etc.

In my tuts I give you the RGB numbers, so just type those in next to the respective letter.  I also give the hex code and you can just copy/paste that in.

If you cannot add any color whatsoever then you might be in grayscale mode so at the top of the screen click on Image-Mode and make sure that you are in RGB mode.

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## Dalakmar

Hi Ascension,

Just wanted to say thanks for all your support. I'll have to wait until the weekend again before I can give it another stab though.

Again . . . many thanks.

Dal.

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## Mror

Hi everyone! Congratulations for the guide its helping me a lot but im having some troubles. I dont know nothing about PS and i cant speak english very good, so im going to write what i`ve made step by step... sorry about this. 

1. I create the document with your specifications. 
2. I aply the clouds. (Background)
3. I duplicate that layer. (Ocean)
4. I create a new layer and fill 50% gray. The layer turns to gray, aply Hard Mix (the cow effect) and i rename it Base.
5. In the ocean layer, with the apropiate brush i draw the land.
6. Copy the ocean layer. (Ocean copy). I link the ocean copy and the base layers and i combine them.
7. I go to color range, set fuzziness to 200 (ive ticked the selection circle). I delete it, deselect and hide the base.
8. I copy the ocean layer (Rename Hills). In hills i put render, difference clouds. i hit CTRL+ F. Copy this and rename it mountains.
9. Hide mountains, add noise to hills. Aply the lighting effects both hill and mountains layers.
10. Hide hills, i copy the ocean layer (Land). I hit ctrl+f to repeat the efects. 
11. I have the six layers in order, but its still plane! I add the colours just like in the tutorial, but its plane. no elevations.

Its like the seven step pic, but with colour. Its suposed to add colour after you get the elevations right?

Later im going to update an image, it doesent load right now.
Thanks a lot for your time!

----------


## Ascension

I'd like to see a screenshot.  On the keyboard press and hold the Shift key and also press the Print Screen key.  This will copy everything on your monitor into temporary memory.  In Photoshop, hit File-New and then hit the Okay button...don't make any changes.  Hit Edit-Paste and voila, there's your monitor image.  Lastly, hit ctrl+e to merge down and then save as a jpg file and upload it here.  There are some file size restrictions here (under 4.7 megabytes and roughly 5000 x 5000 pixels).  Since this is a screenshot you should be just fine.

My first thought is maybe you're in grayscale mode and my other thought is that you didn't use the red channel while doing the lighting effects.

----------


## Mror

Here is the image:



Here is what i ask you about the 50% gray:
I know there are mistakes in this one, its just to show you the settings.



Mmm, im pretty sure that ive used the Red scale... but im goin to repeat all the process again and check out any mistake with your help.

Thanks again

Edit:

Layers:

Montañas- Mountains
Colinas- Hills
Tierra- Land
Oceano- Ocean
Fondo- Background

Just in case.

----------


## Ascension

Ok, this is an easy fix...well, easy for me since I don't have to redo the work  :Smile:   The problem here is that your ocean layer is solid black and white.  It should look like the background layer (grayscale clouds) with some light airbrush painting of black in the oceans and white in the land.  I have attached a screenshot showing my layer stack so that you can see the difference between mine and yours.  Your gray layer looks fine.

----------


## Mror

GREAT! it works jaja... thanks a lot.

Err, how i move the layer the 200 pixels for the longitud lines?
Im searching in the layer menu, but i cant figure it out.

----------


## Ascension

There are two ways, one is easy but time-consuming and the other is faster but more technical.  
1.  Click on the Move tool (looks like a pointer).  Then on the keyboard, hit the -> key (right arrow) 200 times.
2.  Click on the Zoom tool (magnifying glass), zoom in all the way to 1600%, click on the Move tool, in your image, click, hold and drag it over 200 pixels (you will need to have the ruler visible...View > Units & Rulers, set it to pixels).

----------


## DethinBlack

Alright, So. I just went through your tutorial. It was a little difficult to understand, but I think that was due to my own Nitwittery. The problem I had was layers. I lost which layers were which, but no biggy really, I mainly figured it out. I do seem to be having a horrible time with the mountains. Everything else looks really good, but I have HUGE snow caps at the top of each of my mountain. Any Idea why?

----------


## Steel General

I haven't used Ascensions tutorials in quite awhile, but it may have something to do with the Lighting Effects Filter settings you used.

Ascension can give you a better answer next time he logs on.

----------


## RobA

> 1.  Click on the Move tool (looks like a pointer).  Then on the keyboard, hit the -> key (right arrow) 200 times.



Not that I pretend to know anything about photoshop, but doesn't shift-cursor keys move 10 pixels?  That would only be 20 times then  :Wink: 

-Rob A>

----------


## Ascension

Rob - I did not know that, cool  :Smile:   There ya go, learn something new everyday.
DB - SG is probably right about it being lighting effects.  I'd have to see a screenshot of the settings that you used for the lighting effects filter.  I can't be sure but I also detect something wrong with the blend mode of the color overlay and the layer itself.  The blend mode of the color overlay should be soft light and the blend mode of the layer itself should be hard light.  If that isn't the problem then it probably is lighting effects.

----------


## DethinBlack

Yeah, I posted that, and started another one, and found what it was that I was screwing up on. Misunderstood some of the layers... Meh, The mountains look correct now. I will see about posting attempt two when I get done. 

One thing I should mention I guess, Is that I usually go through the tutorial a few times, to gain the skill of it. The last one didn't have a very realistic mountain structure, and the next one probably wont either. After I feel comfortable with the techniques, I work on something... Usable? I think that's the right word. 

I dont know how everyone else does it, but that is my way of doing things  :Very Happy:

----------


## Ascension

That's what I tell everyone as well...do it a few times and get the hang of it.  When you get to where you have things memorized halfway you can then start changing and experimenting.  Be sure to post up the "final" version that you're doing  :Smile:

----------


## DethinBlack

Oh, I definitely will. I figure that you would like to see the results of those that have learned from your tutorial. Plus, I like praise, It makes me feel all warm and fuzzy  :Very Happy: 

Oh, And, Your tutorial is awesome!

----------


## DethinBlack

Well, Its not completely finished, and I don't have the time to work on it more right now. Just got finished with the second adjust layer... which I might adjust more but hey... It actually took me much less time to do it this time, but I didn't save, and the friggen thing crashed... and Ive been in and out. Gots to remember the saving! 

anyway, Ive made much more sense of it now, and I am about to move to the big hills, and the crunchy layers. when I get the time ill come back, but work! gots to go to bed  :Frown:  Anyway, tell me what you think  :Smile:  

Also, Again. Awesome Tut. I love it, and some of the techniques will be going into a design I have in mind.  :Very Happy:

----------


## Ascension

That's a great layout...island and continents are fairly close together, lots of possibilities in the mountains...good stuff good stuff.  I could see myself having fun naming stuff there.

----------


## Coyotemax

When I was working on my latest map, I wanted to get more mountains a lot smaller and more detailed than the standard cloud rendering size.  What i ended up doing was creating a second file at 8000x8000, rendered the clouds on that, and shrunk to 2000x2000.  Then after removing the black, I tossed  solid colour layer below that so I make out the clouds easier.  After that I just used the lasso tool to nab clouds out of this file to paste into the main one on the mountains layer.  I also used this image to generate the hills layer.

maybe that'll give out some more ideas  :Smile:

----------


## Mror

Great tut!

Here is the final result of this atempt:



Now im goin to try your other tutorial, the antique map... both looks good.

----------


## Ascension

Aside from the river violations (going over mountains, splitting as they go downstream instead of join, connecting two oceans, lakes having multiple outflows) it looks perfect.

----------


## Rythal

damn nice tut... makes me wish I had PS

Say, I wonder if I could do something similar in corel... worth a try. :Idea:

----------


## Gandwarf

If you can make something similar, be sure to post a tutorial  :Smile:

----------


## Steel General

I posted a .PDF version of the latest .doc file in the very first post.

----------


## Vascant

Lost a bit on Step 21 as well.  Here is a screen shot.  I am fairly sure I deleted something when not understanding the instructtions

Tyr:  Double click on the gradient bar and it will bring up the editor and allow you to do the instructions in the step

----------


## Ascension

Those layer styles go on the Land layer.  First off, ctrl+click on the Base layer to load the selection.  Right click on the Base layer, on the layer stack, and choose "clear layer style".  Poke out the eye on the Base layer to hide it.  Click on the Land layer.  Select - Inverse.  Hit the delete key and then deselect.  Then apply the layer styles to the Land layer.

----------


## Vascant

> Those layer styles go on the Land layer.  First off, ctrl+click on the Base layer to load the selection.  Right click on the Base layer, on the layer stack, and choose "clear layer style".  Poke out the eye on the Base layer to hide it.  Click on the Land layer.  Select - Inverse.  Hit the delete key and then deselect.  Then apply the layer styles to the Land layer.


I had a feeling that was the answer but given I am not an expert with PS by any means I have tried to follow the instructions as written the first time around, making notes as I go for things to improve upon the next run.

Thanks for the reply  (off to step 21 again)

----------


## Vascant

Okay, time to find out if I screwed up even before this point.

The "Base" Layer, should this be just a sheet of white which covers the land mass areas?

I ask this because of Step 23
As I read it, it seems the idea is to effect only the ocean areas of the mountain layer, correct?  Or the entire layer?

Then it switches the base layer and that is when I got lost and wondered if my base layer is incorrect.

Side note:  When doing these tutorials perhaps showing the entire photoshop screen shot and not just the image would be very helpful perhaps.  Just a suggestion.  Seeing the layer pal might answer a few questions and such.  However as long as you are willing to answer questions I am not giving up  :Smile:

----------


## Ascension

Step 23 has two parts; delete the blacks and dark grays, then delete the rest of the layer that is floating over the ocean.  This leaves the lighter grays that are on top of the land.

You're omitting something while reading so I'll recap it for you and be as descriptive as possible.

1.  You're on the Mountains layer.  Foreground color is black and background color is white.
2.  At the top of the screen click on the word "Select" then, in the scroll down menu, choose Color Range.  This will bring up a pop up window with the foreground color selected as default.  Set the Fuzziness slider at maximum, 200.  This selects the blacks and dark grays.
3.  On the keyboard hit the Delete key.
4.  On the keyboard hit Ctrl+D to deselect.
5.  This cuts the dark grays and blacks out of the whole layer, leaving the lighter colors.  Now we have to get rid of those lighter colors that are floating over the ocean.
6.  On the layer stack, ctrl+click on the Base layer to load it as a selection.
7.  At the top of the screen click on Select then choose Modify then choose Contract then set the number at 20.  This reduces the selection shape and brings it inside of the land outline.
8.  At the top of the screen click on Select then choose Feather then set the number at 20.  This "blurs" the selection edge 20 pixels.
9.  At the top of the screen click on Select then choose Inverse.  This selects the "ocean" area and not the "land" area but because we feathered the selection it will include some of the mountains on the "land" area.  We want this to erase mountains that run right up to the beach. 
10.  On the keyboard hit the Delete key then hit Ctrl+D to deselect.  Now the mountains that were floating over the ocean are gone as well as the ones that go right up to the beach.

----------


## Vascant

Now that makes sense, I also see what I was doing wrong and learned something all at the same time.  I wonder if that is considered multitasking.

I knew the goal of the step and realized I was not getting there, what I didn't know and learned was how to load a layer as a selection.  I am making notes on the PDF version, maybe this will help someone else when done.

----------


## Vascant

Everything working out well but have a question, if you notice how I have some of the mountain peak areas extremely white?  Did I do something wrong on one of the steps or am I missing something on how to correct.


I have to say, having a blast doing this and recommend to anyone learning.


Note: Figured out attachments here  :Smile:

----------


## Ascension

It looks to me like the lighting effects settings were bumped up too high on either intensity or ambience thus creating more whiteness.  Set the intensity at 25 or lower and the ambience at 10 or lower and give that a try.  Or just throw up a screenshot of your lighting effects settings and I'll know exactly what to tweak.

----------


## Krases

Is this tutorial possible in GIMP 2?  I just tried it and I don't think the programs are similar enough.  

Oh well.  I should buy photoshop anyway.

----------


## Notsonoble

It's possible, but rough... I used many pieces from this one and RobA's regional map tutorial to make a world map recently...

I can't promise lots of help, but this isn't the only Ascension tut I've tried to get to work in GIMP... so if you could post some details of your snags... I can try...

----------


## Vascant

> It looks to me like the lighting effects settings were bumped up too high on either intensity or ambience thus creating more whiteness.  Set the intensity at 25 or lower and the ambience at 10 or lower and give that a try.  Or just throw up a screenshot of your lighting effects settings and I'll know exactly what to tweak.


I followed the one in the tutorial which is different then the suggested, that was one of those moments when I wondered if perhaps this would be corrected down the line.  Now I know...  I am going to start over since it won't take much to do a new map with all the notes I have and see if I can't get this right. 

Thanks

----------


## Ascension

Krases - as far as I know, the lighting effects filter is the only thing that can't be duplicated in Gimp very well.  I use lighting effects for texturing mountains, hills and the land.  You could easily use Pasis' tutorial for mountains in that spot and it looks great.  You can texture land with a pattern overlay.  The point being that the tut is meant as a starting point and then you can jump off wherever you want and start experimenting on your own.  I would suggest doing RobA's tutorial first to learn your way around the Gimp techniques first and become familiar with them.  Then try mine and see what you think and make changes accordingly.

----------


## Notsonoble

> Krases - as far as I know, the lighting effects filter is the only thing that can't be duplicated in Gimp very well.  I use lighting effects for texturing mountains, hills and the land.  You could easily use Pasis' tutorial for mountains in that spot and it looks great.  You can texture land with a pattern overlay.  The point being that the tut is meant as a starting point and then you can jump off wherever you want and start experimenting on your own.  I would suggest doing RobA's tutorial first to learn your way around the Gimp techniques first and become familiar with them.  Then try mine and see what you think and make changes accordingly.



Without the layer effects scripts from here: http://registry.gimp.org/node/186 overlays, advanced shadowing and beveling and embossing are not accessible in GIMP, and even with the scripts some things don't behave quite right...

The lighting effects should actually be doable, but translating the settings from PS to GIMP is a bear, and I haven't figured it out yet (but I'm getting there)

But yes, RobA's tutorials would be a good place to start, and with the tuts, some scripts (the above and others many of which are in software discussion's scripting child board) you can still do quite a bit...

None of the things I've learned are really worth tutorials at this point, but I'm sorta getting to a point where I can answer questions about things...

Don't give up on GIMP just yet... unless you've really just got money to burn... If I had the cash I'd probably be looking at a copy of photoshop just for the sake of being able to compare the two programs out put at the same time, but that's only because I'm convinced GIMP is worth the effort. (And I wouldn't mind being able to figure some things out well enough to help coding things into GIMP 3...)

----------


## Vascant

I almost got away with a whole day of drawing and no problems... 

If you notice in the attached image, there are some odd discolored lines.  I know they comes from when I am making the land mass in step 8.  It seems to happen in areas when I am bring the air brush to small perhaps?  What I am trying to do is make all the coast lines look alike, as in no difference from the generated coast and the part where I paint.  Do you have this problem?  Is it something that I will be able to correct when I am at the artistic steps? 

Thanks

----------


## Ascension

If you have a lot of patience you can correct them in the Adjust layers by painting over them with a color.  Myself, I'd just scrap it and go back and redo step 8 and not put those stark lines in...if you're making the airbrush smaller the edges become crisper so you will have to lower the opacity even more.

That choice is up to you and I work much faster cuz I know this like my hand.  Keep going and do the Adjust layers and see if you can cover them up...Adjust 1 is a colored clouds layer and Adjust 2 is airbrushing colors in places where we want certain colors like swamps and extended deserts.

----------


## Vascant

Okay, been having a blast and learning a lot of things.  Rather then stopping every time I figure out something new or correct an error I decided to run through all the steps so I get a feel for the complete direction of things.  This was going great until Step 42 "The Shelf steps".  In fact it might as well be Steps 42,43 and 44 since it really becomes a mess there for me.

If I am reading correctly, the Ocean Copy should not have a Layer Style to clear since you just cleared it, so in effect the duplicate should not have one either?  Then you are creating a completely new layer or going back to the just created one?

If you could be so kind as to spell out these steps as you have done so in the past it would be greatly appreciated.  Thanks.

----------


## Ascension

In step 42, we are filling the ocean with black, except around the coasts, merge the layers, and delete the blacks.  So instead of black and white clouds all over, the white clouds are limited to being around the coast.  In step 43 and 44, we give it that shelf look with an outer bevel with a contour.  You know how to add a layer style of bevel and emboss, right?  Well that's step 43.  Step 44 defines a contour...if you look at the layer style window (pic1) then contour is right under bevel and emboss but just above texture.  Click on that and then click on the little window with the contour in it to bring up the contour editor (pic2).

----------


## Vascant

hmmm.  Maybe I am understanding 42 and just don't realize it.  I provided screen shots of the different changes in 42 with one simple question, did I understand?  

I guess my problem with this was after reading the step, I kind of expected something else..  (learning, sometimes it is like putting your head through a wall)

Thanks

----------


## Vascant

Okay, doing step 43 something seems to be way off.  It is like I am working in the wrong area based on your descriptions above. (screen shot provided)

----------


## Krases

> It's possible, but rough... I used many pieces from this one and RobA's regional map tutorial to make a world map recently...
> 
> I can't promise lots of help, but this isn't the only Ascension tut I've tried to get to work in GIMP... so if you could post some details of your snags... I can try...





> Krases - as far as I know, the lighting effects filter is the only thing that can't be duplicated in Gimp very well.  I use lighting effects for texturing mountains, hills and the land.  You could easily use Pasis' tutorial for mountains in that spot and it looks great.  You can texture land with a pattern overlay.  The point being that the tut is meant as a starting point and then you can jump off wherever you want and start experimenting on your own.  I would suggest doing RobA's tutorial first to learn your way around the Gimp techniques first and become familiar with them.  Then try mine and see what you think and make changes accordingly.


I am in the market anyway for photoshop, so I might just wait until I buy it and try the tutorial again.  

To be honest I am a newb anyway.  I couldn't even get past step 2 because I didn't know how to make it 8-bit and the cloud rendering came out really weird.

It looks cool though so when I get photoshop it might be the first thing I try.

----------


## bryguy

Vascant, what were your settings for the bevel and emboss? It seems to me like it is set to inner bevel, instead of outer bevel.

Also, if I am correct your shelf should only be in the area of your landmasses (Including islands) which means that you might not have filled everything in the layer above the shelf layer with black, although it seems in your picture that you might have. Without seeing your file I can't know.

@Krases
The closest thing to Lighting Effects in GIMP is the Bump Map filter. May work best if you use the layer itself as the source for your bump map
As for the cloud rendering, you may want to up the sharpness in the cloud filter, and set it on random, with about 6 for x and y. This makes it more like how it is in photoshop.
One problem you would then have though is that GIMP does not have the same layer modes as photoshop. You can make your landmasses though by duplicating the clouds layer and renaming it to base, then go to Color: Brightness-Contrast, and up the contrast to 100, it does the same as the gray colored layer does in photoshop. You then will have to use the pencil tool to connect different parts of the white/black and fill those in. It may take a while.

Sorry, don't know about 8 bit, I think that must be modified when you choose New Image or whatever. 

@Ascension
When following this tutorial I get confused for the Lighting Effects for the Mountains/Hills/Waves. It seems like you have 5 light sources (One in each corner and one in the center) but you only show the radius for one of them. Each time I use it I end up with an almost completely different look (Still looks good though, I especially love how it looks on my deserts)

Oh, and when making the base layer, when you say Soft Brush do you mean the big soft one thats blurry, or the hard edged one?

----------


## Ascension

Yes a big soft airbrush tip.  As for the lighting, I only show the settings on one because the setting are the same for all five of them (similar radius as well).

----------


## bryguy

> Yes a big soft airbrush tip.


Really> Cause mine turned out with it looking as if I had the land layer on the Dissolve layer mode. Is that how it is supposed to look?

----------


## Ascension

You should get lots of little white 1 pixel dots around the coasts.  If you use hard edged tips then it will mess up when running the lighting effects and you will get something that almost looks beveled.  Keep the transitions soft by using an airbrush tip.  Later on in the tut we get rid of the dots...Select-modify-contract=1.

----------


## bryguy

> You should get lots of little white 1 pixel dots around the coasts.  If you use hard edged tips then it will mess up when running the lighting effects and you will get something that almost looks beveled.  Keep the transitions soft by using an airbrush tip.  Later on in the tut we get rid of the dots...Select-modify-contract=1.


Dang I guess I missed that step =\

lol OH well, thanks Ascension  :Smile:

----------


## Vascant

> Vascant, what were your settings for the bevel and emboss? It seems to me like it is set to inner bevel, instead of outer bevel.
> 
> Also, if I am correct your shelf should only be in the area of your landmasses (Including islands) which means that you might not have filled everything in the layer above the shelf layer with black, although it seems in your picture that you might have. Without seeing your file I can't know.


I attached the screen shot showing the FX of the shelf layer and the bevel is as should be.  I usually always follow what is in the tutorial first and understand why the settings are what they are before venturing into playing with settings.
(I am fairly new with Photoshop so using these steps to learn and explore the functionality.)


Sorry about the delay, real life finally found where I was hiding at and had to find a new hiding spot  :Wink:

----------


## Diamond

Just wanted to say thanks to Ascension for a truly awesome and easy to understand tutorial.  Thanks, dude!

----------


## Ascension

You've deleted the wrong area...the area directly under the landmasses.  You're supposed to delete the area away from the land, ie the deep sea.

----------


## Tom_Cardin

Thanks for the tutorial. I was wondering how everyone was generating the nice ocean contours and that answered it for me!

----------


## Ascension

You're welcome  :Smile:

----------


## Wizard72

Hello Ascension,

firstly, this is a great map and a great tutorial. Secondly, I'm running into some difficulties.

I'm using Photoshop Elements 7 (if that helps), and am a complete newbie to Photoshop in general. It took some figuring out, but I've been able to follow your tutorial until Step 21, where the gradients come in. I've made the gradient you use, but when I apply it to my map it comes out looking like this.

http://i596.photobucket.com/albums/t...entsResult.jpg

What did I do wrong?

----------


## Ascension

Well, first, the tut doesn't really translate well to Elements because it doesn't have the same features and functions.  Second, it looks ok to me.  Go a few more steps and then let's see.

----------


## Endarguul

Thanks for this great tut. I tried creating a map by following your instructions step by step and I added some layers for the ice-part in the north and the forests in the southern regions. I posted the map in the WIP section, here

----------


## Gidde

I'm working on translating this to the GIMP, and whereas I think I'm pretty close, I'd like to post up some step-by-step pics to request advice from everyone on some steps that aren't translating as well as others.

Should I post that up here, in its own tut thread, or in a WIP thread (and then post up the finished product here)? Don't want to bogart credit, but don't want to hijack this thread, either. So I'm in a quandary. Help?

----------


## Ascension

Put it here, sort of as a one-stop-shop collecting place.  When you finally get it done we'll put it in the first post of the thread.

----------


## Gidde

Ok, so here's the translation up to the mountains, which is the first place I'm having trouble getting it to look as similar as I'd like. The steps I'm following are in the pdf, and here are pics to this point following the PS tutorial (2nd pic) and the translation (1st pic). The zip contains gradient and palette files for gimp, as well.

Specifically, I don't like how "hard" the gimp mountains are compared to the original, but I'm not sure how to go about softening them; gimp's bump map works very differently from PS's bevel.

----------


## Coyotemax

To be honest, I like the gimp mountains the way they came out.  I think you're on to something there!

----------


## Ascension

That's lookin pretty good.

----------


## Gidde

Thanks, Coyote, and thanks twice to Ascension, first for solving my dilemma and then for the comment  :Smile: 

Forging ahead, here's the hills done. The pdf goes from the beginning up to this point; I made a few changes to the beginning.

The gimp translation post is first, the PS comparison pic is second.

----------


## Ramah

I think those mountains look great on the Gimp version.

I love Ascension's overall style created in these tuts but I've never been a real fan of the mountains in them, which most of the time to me look more like rolling clouds or a beautiful nebula than mountains, which is why I usually comment when people improve (in my eyes) upon the usual mountain results when they follow this tutorial.

I would imagine that at the distance your map is drawn the mountains would maybe not appear that craggy, dunno, I think they look cool though.  :Smile:

----------


## Amazon_warrior

I just had a go at this tut today, and it's been very educational and fun.  The results can be seen in this thread here.   :Very Happy: 

All that remains is to say thanks very much!  :Smile:

----------


## Gidde

Sorry for the delay in posting ... between the tablet temporarily going haywire and how darned hard the continental shelf was to translate, this part took a while.

No matter what I did, I couldn't get that shelf to look right (again, differences between ps-bevel and gimp-map). Any suggestions or ideas would be very welcome.

As always, we have a PS shot following Asc's tut to the letter (or trying to), a gimp shot showing the translation, and a pdf for the steps followed.

----------


## Steel General

Looks like you're making really good progress so far.

----------


## RobA

> No matter what I did, I couldn't get that shelf to look right (again, differences between ps-bevel and gimp-map). Any suggestions or ideas would be very welcome.


Consider trying either the layer-effects script (or plugin) for gimp, or my chisel/carve script http://www.gimptalk.com/forum/chisel...32849s125.html on a slightly noised-up continental shelf selection.

-Rob A>

----------


## Gidde

Thanks SG  :Smile: 

I think this is the final translation. I didn't go into the country naming, city placing, labelling, etc., since it's already explained very well and didn't really need translation (those steps are pretty transferable from PS to gimp).

If anyone has any crits/suggestions for improvement, I'll certainly update it as needed.

I'm not uploading a PS version this time, since at this point it can be compared with Ascension's, and his is better  :Wink:   I am uploading a Word version though, so that the real author can make edits if he wants to.

I hope this helps other gimp users as much as it helped me to make it. I learned a lot about both programs in the process. Thanks again for a great tutorial.

----------


## Gidde

Oops! Cross-post. I'll try that this afternoon and see if I can't get it looking better. Thanks Rob!

----------


## Notsonoble

Gidde, thanks for this conversion...Yours came out way better than my mix of it and RobA's regional map... and has me half tempted to redo my maps for Krenna _again_...

Repped... And yes your mountains do look better IMHO...

----------


## Gidde

Hey Rob, for some reason I'm getting an error when I try that link. Is it working for you?

----------


## Gandwarf

> Hey Rob, for some reason I'm getting an error when I try that link. Is it working for you?


The link doesn't seem to work at the moment. Judging by the error I think it's temporary.

----------


## smyrin

> The process will be a lil longer for you but here's what you need to do:
> 1.  Filter-render-clouds to start with.
> 2.  Duplicate this layer (will be named background copy).
> 3.  Create a new layer.
> 4.  Use the 300 soft round airbrush with 10% flow, use black and white, paint black to fill in some ocean and white to fill in some land.  You don't need a whole lot, just go over these places once or twice.
> 5.  When you have something that you like, hit ctrl+shift+E (this merges all visible layers and puts the final output on it's own layer while leaving the rest of the layers below intact).
> 6.  Image-adjustments-brightness/contrast=set the contrast up to 100.
> 7.  If you see places where you want to make some further adjustments, then delete the top layer and go back to the painting layer.  When happy repeat steps 5 and 6.
> 8.  When you finally get to something that you can live with, rename the contrast adjusted layer to "base" and rename the "background copy" layer to "ocean".
> ...


Hey all, just found the site and am giving your tut a try.  I am also using PS 7.0 and have had some difficulty following along.  Couple of questions.

Question 1:
At step 5, you merge all the visible layers.  Which layers should be visible at this point?  When I complete this step all the layers are visible and I end up with just one.  I dont understand the rest of the layers below intact part.

Question 2:
Your tutorial is great but I dont understand the whys of doing something.  If I could understand them, I would be better equipped to solve problems when I run into trouble.  For example, rather than step 3-4 I could just select or create a copy of the clouds layer and then perform step 6 on it right away and I get the cow like pattern of black and white without having to use the airbrush on a new layer.  What am I not getting?

Thanks in advance for any assistance.

----------


## Ascension

Ah, typo on step 5.  It should be create a new layer and then hit ctrl + alt + shift + E.  As for your other question, if you didn't like the results then you'd have to dump the layer and start over.  By painting on an empty layer you never alter the clouds and if you don't like the results then you just add more black or white or erase a bit on the empty layer.  You can do it your way, nothing wrong with that.  Try it and see.  By the way, the tut is not the Bible so you can edit and tweak things 'til your heart's content.  There are many steps and many tools and filters so play around with all of them and see what you come up with.   :Smile:

----------


## smyrin

Thanks for the quick reply.  I think the tutorial you wrote is an excellent tool and I heartily appreciate all the hard work you have done including answering the pestering questions of those following after you.  You are genius, man!

Aside the accolades, I muddled through and managed to put something together once I understood what needed doing.  I found a cool way of changing the gradient for different areas of the land mass which I will mess with.  

I'm gonna try a few things and if I get something worthy of looking at, I will post.  Thanks again for your work!  By the way, do you have any other tutorials to look at?  Is there a post somewhere that has links to ALL of them!  I want more!!!

----------


## Ascension

I have a few other tuts in the Tuts section for different styles, some good some not so much (the forest one is pretty bad and the volcano one is confusing).  I never got around to putting links to them in my signature like others have done.  It would probably be handy if I did that but I sort of see it as shameless self-promotion...not that there's anything wrong with that  :Smile:

----------


## smyrin

My first attempt:

See attachment.

----------


## smyrin

Wow that came out too big!  How do you do that attached thumbnail thing I see most posts have.  Lemme know asap and I will edit the post and fix it!

Sorry....

----------


## Steel General

After clicking the "Edit" button, click on the "Go Advanced" button and use the file upload tool there.

----------


## smyrin

> After clicking the "Edit" button, click on the "Go Advanced" button and use the file upload tool there.


Thanks a million!

----------


## impervius

I am truly not seeing anything like your picture by the time i've reached step 22.  :Frown: 

i attach a screenshot- what have i missed out? 
http://img704.imageshack.us/img704/1...reenshotee.jpg

----------


## Ascension

You're missing the _land_ layer that goes between the _ocean_ layer and the _hills_ layer.  The layer styles that you have on the base layer go on the land layer.  The base layer should never be seen, it is only used to define selections.

----------


## TheJayde

I am totally stuck on Step 21.  The Adding Style Layers is where my problem is.  Could I get a quick sub-tutorial on how I am supposed to add them? I dont see that there is a particular place with which Im supposed to add them, or if they are a layer, or what.  Or what kind of style layer, or what have you.  Please help! 

Edit: Are the Style Layers completely blank layers with Color Overlays and nothing else?

21.	Ctrl-click on the “base” layer (in the layers palette) to load it as a selection (in newer versions of Photoshop you have to ctrl-click on the thumbnail in the layers palette).  Select > Inverse then hit the delete key then deselect.  Add a layer style; we’ll use 4 colors with 5 stops as follows:  color 1 at the 5% position is flat white, color code FFFFFF (rgb 255, 255, 255); color 2 at the 35% position is a dark olive green, color code 405018 (rgb 64, 80, 24); color 3 at the 60% position is the same dark olive green; color 4 at the 85% position is a dark flesh, color code DAC094 (rgb 218, 192, 14 :Cool: ; and color 5 at the 100% position is a papyrus, color code F0E6BE (rgb 240, 230, 190).  Set the blend mode of the gradient to hard light with 100% opacity.  Next we’ll add a layer style of outer glow:  use a light blue, any will do for now and you can change it later but I use 40C8FF (rgb 64, 200, 255).  Set the blend mode of the outer glow to screen at 25% opacity and a size of 11.  If you want a lighter gradient then add a layer style of color overlay of white and set the blend mode to soft light and then turn down the opacity until you are happy with it.

----------


## Ascension

At the bottom of the layer palette, or layer stack, you will see a black circle with a white cursive f...that is the button to click to add a layer style to a layer.  The layer style affects everything on the layer so if the layer is empty then nothing gets affected.  You can "fool" the computer by turning the fill down to zero but it knows that there are pixels there somewhere and so it will try to do what you tell it to do with the layer style.  From reading your other post I can also tell you that you should have multiple layers, not just one.  You should have a layer with clouds, a layer called ocean, a layer called land, a layer called hills, a layer called mountains, and a layer called base.  The base layer gets nothing done to it.  The first clouds layer is there in case you mess up so you have something to go back to in order to start over.  The ocean layer gets a gradient map of blues, the land layer gets a layer style of gradient overlay and color overlay, the hills and mountains each get color overlays.  Also, this is for Photoshop so it won't work in Corel or Gimp or Paint Shop.

----------


## TheJayde

This is where I'm at.  I may be starting over just to make sure I didnt mess up, but i REALLY dont want to start over.

----------


## TheJayde

I redid another one, and I found out where my error was most likely.  I must have messed up on one of the steps.

Edit: After getting to the same point, I still have no clue how to proceed from this point on.  I believe the following is problematic in the description to my brain.

Add a layer style;

You say that, and then you go on to number off a bunch of colors and what not, but you dont explain where they go persay.  Also, I'd like to point out that I had no issue with the previous command which made sure that I had the correct number of layers, and as to how they were labeled.  Are you meaning to say that in the order you mentioned those layers in the previous command, are to be done in order, one at a time with the current command I'm stuck on?

----------


## Ascension

This is what step 21 says:

Ctrl-click on the “base” layer (in the layers palette) to load it as a selection (in newer versions of Photoshop you have to ctrl-click on the thumbnail in the layers palette).  Select > Inverse then hit the delete key then deselect.  Add a layer style of gradient overlay; we’ll use 4 colors with 5 stops as follows:  color 1 at the 5% position is flat white, color code FFFFFF (rgb 255, 255, 255); color 2 at the 35% position is a dark olive green, color code 405018 (rgb 64, 80, 24); color 3 at the 60% position is the same dark olive green; color 4 at the 85% position is a dark flesh, color code DAC094 (rgb 218, 192, 14 :Cool: ; and color 5 at the 100% position is a papyrus, color code F0E6BE (rgb 240, 230, 190).  Set the blend mode of the gradient to hard light with 100% opacity.  Next we’ll add a layer style of outer glow:  use a light blue, any will do for now and you can change it later but I use 40C8FF (rgb 64, 200, 255).  Set the blend mode of the outer glow to screen at 25% opacity and a size of 11.  If you want a lighter gradient then add a layer style of color overlay of white and set the blend mode to soft light and then turn down the opacity until you are happy with it.

So far it looks like your fine and have just finished step 20.  I'm not sure what's the problem here.  Layers styles are the button at the bottom right that looks like fx...since I'm using an older version of PS mine is a white f on a black circle.

----------


## TheJayde

I figured it out.  For some reason, I couldnt find the words gradiant overlay in the document.  Though It's all good and this tutorial has given me a lot of education in the creation of maps and the like.  I even took your idea and tweaked a lot of the ideals put out in yours.  Like, I made my mountains more prominent as an example. I did that by copying the mountain ranges twice, and one of them had the color overlay of pink, so that the other and all the other layers balanced it out to a more solid brown color.  

Anywho, when Im not being  tardus, the tutorial works great.  Thanks a lot!

----------


## TheJayde

The more I look at this and the more I do, the only thing that I have an issue with with this map style is that the mountains and hills aren't defined as well as I would like them to be, and forests aren't defined at all.  Also my world has north  being closer to the equator and there is a lot of jungle involved, so the gradient overlay doesn't really suit a jungle region.  Great if you want tons of desert though, which means on the other continent of my world, I am likely to use this style for it, but until then.

Edit: As I think about it, I could just erase the areas that I wanted to be jungle in the Base layer, and build a base 2 layer in the areas where the jungle is going to come into play.

----------


## Nokomys

Hi there, I am new to your forums. Well kind of, I have been lurking for probably 1 or 2 months off and on. I am trying Ascensions TUT here and I want to say this is awesome and thanks for sharing it. I am confused I think and stopped after I got a ways into it. I got lost int he duplicate layers so I am sure that I have killed off a layer that I need. I am missing the Base [ this was merged with ocean after making a copy of the background copy and so base is gone]. I noticed that something was amiss when I got to hitting ctrl+f to drop the last used lighting effects on Land. In the beginning of the TUT I was really confused so I started writing it out as i went looking at Ascensions TUT for the guide of course and this is what I have. Maybe someone can tell me what I have done wrong? Any detailed answers on the steps would be greatly appreciated.
Screenshots
Steps as I understood them:
Step 1. Layer 1= Rename to BG and render clouds on it.

Step 2. Layer 2= Duplicate layer 1, it will be called BG 1 Copy.

Step 3. Layer 3= Create new layer, Click EDIT>Fill set to 50% gray. On layers list click on the dropdown where it says normal and select hard mix. Rename this layer to Base.

Step 4. Select BG 1 Copy and start painting. {Grab a big airbrush and at the top of the screen reduce the flow to 10%.  I start with the Airbrush soft round 300 and use smaller airbrushes as needed.  Use black to define the ocean and white to define the land.
9.	 
}

Step 5. Duplicate BG 1 Copy and name it Ocean. Select it and Base then right click and select link.

Step 6. now you want to Merge them. Click layers>Merge or ctrl+e.This is going to leae you with Base. [Rename to Ocean?]

Step 7. Select>Color Range. Click the eye dropper and click on black, set Fuzzyness to 200. Click ok. Now click Delete. Now deselect ctrl+d.
**NOTE to Photoshop Elements users: If you are using Photoshop Elements then you will have to use the Magic Wand tool and click on a black pixel somewhere then delete and deselect.  Hide the “base” layer and click on the “ocean” layer. **

Step 8. Duplicate this layer and rename it from Ocean Copy to Hills. Now select Filter>Render>Difference Clouds, then hit ctrl+f to do it again and duplicate it to call it Mountains.

Step 9. Hide the Mountains layer. Click hills then Filter>Noise> Add Noise 5% gaussian and monochromatic.

Step 10. Click on the Mountains layer and then Filter > Render > Lighting effects = use the following settings:
Light type: Spotlight
Intensity= 25 Full
Focus= 100 wide
Properties--
Gloss= -100 Matte
Material= 100 Metallic
Exposure= 0
Ambience= 8 Positive
Texture Channel = Red
Hight= Mountains 100
Click ok

Step 11. Hide Mountains layer and select Hills. And then 
Filter > Render > Lighting effects = use the following settings (there are 5 omni lights all with the same settings...to add a new light click on the light bulb):
Change light type to Omni and change Intensity to 6 full and leave the rest the same as is. Move the center of the circle to the lower right corner of your map.

Step 12. Hide the Hills layer. click on Ocean. Duplicate it and rename to Land. Hit ctrl+f to repeat the last lighting effects again.

----------


## Ascension

You have to duplicate the ocean layer.

----------


## Nokomys

Ok I know it has to be duplicated... I guess maybe I did not make it clear.. sorry... I am redoing this and here is where I am currently confused...
Step 8 says "8.	*Click back on the “ocean” layer (on the layers palette) and duplicate it*.  Grab a big airbrush and at the top of the screen reduce the flow to 10%.  I start with the Airbrush soft round 300 and use smaller airbrushes as needed.  Use black to define the ocean and white to define the land.

Then Step 10 says "10.	*When happy, duplicate this layer (it will be named “ocean copy”)* and click on the “base” layer.  Link the “base” and “ocean copy” layers together; on the layer palette you will see a box with an eye and a box with a brush in it – the brush means that this is the active layer and the eye means that the layer is visible.  If you click in an empty box a chain will appear...this is the link.  Once the layers are linked then merge down (ctrl+e) or Layer > Merge down.

so on this when looking at it.. I would see Ocean ... Ocean Copy ... Ocean Copy Copy.
So do you paint on Ocean Copy and then duplicate it [ocean copy copy] then link ocean copy copy to Base and merge? because this is what I would have. Right now I have [in order from bottom to top] Background / Ocean / Ocean Copy [which I have painted on to fix the ocean / Base.] Do I duplicate Ocean copy then link and merge it to base? I hope I am not confusing you hehe.

** Correction it makes Ocean Copy 2...

P.S. Sorry to be a pain in the butt....

----------


## Ascension

No you should have ocean and ocean copy and base.  When base merges down to ocean copy, if linked, the resulting layer will be named base.  At that point you should have ocean and base.

----------


## Nokomys

ah ok. now I follow, I do apologize again for being a pain it just for some reason could not wrap my head around it and was so confused.

----------


## Nokomys

Now that I have that straight, I had a question about the position of the layers on your instruction it says:
20.	You should have 6 layers; from top to bottom: “base”, “mountains” and “hills” (all hidden) then “land”, “ocean” and “background” (all visible) and you should still be on the “land” layer.  

Currently I have Mountains, Hills, Base, Ocean, Background. I ran into this on the other attempt and when i moved it [Base] to the top to match what your instruction had there I had more problems with what was displayed. Also when I attempt to start adding the color instead of the landmass being filled gradient the sea fills.
Image set 3. I will keep trying to get this figured out and post if I solve it but in the meantime if you get a chance to look at it let me know what you think I did wrong. Thank you... *NOTE I did move Base to the top to match what you listed in the screen shots and then tried to add on the gradients. =)

----------


## Nokomys

Ok I had to skip Select>Inverse to get it right.

----------


## Nokomys

another update.. I feel stupid now as I discovered that I did indeed totally miss a step.. Hide base and duplicate ocean to name it hills. I had been duplicating Base and then moving forward. I bet it all works perfectly now. lol jeesh.. thank you for putting up with me and sorry I spammed the forums here. I think I may be ok now. I'll post a image when it is done.

----------


## Ascension

No problem, man...happens all the time.  I write difficult tuts so people are bound to get confused so I do my best to help.

----------


## Nokomys

Ok I did indeed get something that looked pretty good. I will probably follow the rest of the tut later on but now I got a wild hair to experiment a bit with the process now that I have an idea how to do some of it.
Here is what I stopped with.. Click Me I spent some time looking at the River Police stuff and I hope that I did not violate the laws of river hehe but I am not to sure.

----------


## Ascension

Looks like you stopped before adding layer styles to the hills and mountains but looks like you have it down.

----------


## arsheesh

Gidde, I'm new to the Guild and am nearly finished with my first map.  This map was made in GIMP, and for the most part, was created by means of your tutorial.  I want to thank you fro taking the time to write up this tutorial.  I have only a fledgling understanding of GIMP, and none at all of Photoshop.  I sincerely doubt that I would be able to do a conversion of Ascension's Atlas Style on my own.  You have earned "rep" in my book.

Cheers,

Arsheesh.

(Oh, almost forgot; here is a link to my map):

http://www.cartographersguild.com/sh...8ish%29-Style!

----------


## Blackknight1239

Wooo, first post. Alright.

So, I'm having a little trouble with the tutorial so far. Step 17, in fact. I can't seem to figure out how to do the lighting on the "hills" layer right. Any tips?

----------


## Ascension

Uh no, not really.  Everything is in the tut.  If you throw up a screenshot maybe I can see what's going on...it's usually a case of a missed step elsewhere.

----------


## arsheesh

Ascension, it just occurred to me that I never properly thanked you for your tutorial.  Your work is inspirational in and of itself.  Yet the fact that you are willing and take the time to share your techniques with the rest of us has impacted this community tremendously.  I can find traces of your style in many of my favorite maps on this site.  My own map is 90% or more a derivative of your Atlas style.  I, and many others here are indebted to you.  Thanks for this and your many other amazing tutorials.  Here is a tiny bit of rep to add to your already immense fame.

Cheers,

-Arsheesh

----------


## Ascension

No prob, man, you're welcome...and thanks.  That's why I'm here - help teach and learn and it makes us all better...one map at a time.

----------


## Immolate

arsheesh,

I heartily agree! Ramah was my inspiration, but Ascension, through his tutorials and commentary, is my mentor. 

Jasmine coast is one of the most visually stunning maps I've ever seen.

Thanks Ascension!

----------


## Ascension

Thanks, Imm.  Y'all are too nice.   :Smile:

----------


## Rongar

Okay, first of all: Thanks *Ascension* for this great tut and thanks *Gidde* for your translation to GIMP!  :Smile: 

After a few abortions & retries I finally made it quite far through the tutorial, but now I seem to be stuck. 

In the GIMP version by Gidde it reads:




> 34. New layer (Transparency), name it Adjust2. With Adjust2: 
>     a. Airbrush tool, using colors from *step 22* to paint extensions of desert/plains 
>     b. Layer mode to Hue 
>     c. Add layer mask (Channel: Coastline)


But step 22 reads:




> 22. Hide Mountains, Snowcaps, and MountainColor layers.


Umm, huh? Can anyone help me out?  :Question:

----------


## arsheesh

Yeah, that stifled me too at first.  I eventually concluded that this was a typo and that what Gidde meant was not "step 22" but "step 33" since the colors in step 33 were the only ones that I could find mentioned throughout the tutorial that actually made sense for deserts and plains.  Yet I might have been mistaken about this, and if I am, I hope someone will correct me.  Hope that helps.

Cheers,

-Arsheesh

----------


## Rongar

Oh snap, that makes sense.  :Very Happy:  Thanks mate.  :Smile:

----------


## arsheesh

No problem.  Oh, and be sure to post your map when you get a chance.

Cheers,

-Arsheesh

----------


## xandder

Hey I'm running through this tutorial (on PS CS2), and at step 20 I've run into a problem. I've got 2 ocean copy's and no base copy. 1 is just a white area where the land is and the other is a clouded area covering the same land area. This led (I think) to step 21 resulting in just the color red covering the land area. So which ocean copy is supposed to be base? Do they get merged? Does one get deleted? Any help is much appreciated.

----------


## Ascension

You missed a step somewhere and I think I know where you are what we're dealing with but I need a screenshot to be sure.

----------


## xandder

Alright, well I think I've gotten that straightened out somehow. Now I've gotten to the mountain stage and I've noticed a few things. I've got a couple wierdly colored areas where differently colored zones interact. Also my mountains seem patchy and small in general and the polar and equatorial areas seem plain and undetailed. I don't know if this is normal for this stage, but it doesn't look similar to the tutorial's screenshot.

----------


## Ascension

Looks right on track to me...it's been so long that I've done this that I can't be sure at only 16.7%

----------


## xandder

Okay I'm up to the rivers step, and everything looks good except for one issue. In the tutorial pictures there are small bumps all over the terrain which I'm lacking, and there is a definite lack of terrain around the polar and equatorial regions, everywhere else has nice terrain features, but these areas are just solid colors.

----------


## Ascension

The problem with the white is that the airbrushing is solid...you should have reduced the flow on the airbrush tip (it's at the top of the screen, default is 100% but you should use 10% and slowly build things up).  For now, what layer is the white airbrushing on?  Take that layer an either change the blend mode or reduce the opacity.

----------


## xandder

Okay, so i checked the airbrush level, and well it does cause some issue, its effect isn't that great. Stripping down all but the land and ocean layers, it looks like the original gradient overlay for the land has created this problem. In the gradient areas colored olive, there is nice detail and it looks good, but the desert and polar areas are just solid white/papyrus. I tried fiddling around with the layer and I just can't seem to get it so that both the details and the colors are there. Is there maybe a better color selection so that the detail shows up? I tried fiddling with that as well, too no good effect.

Edit: I think I've solved my own problem here. Instead of creating the desert and polar areas alongside the temperate regions by method of the gradient overlay, I created a solid gradient overlay of olive green, which preserved the land texture and detail everywhere. I then created desert and polar areas using the appropriate colors and the 10% flow airbrush on the 'adjust 2' layer, which also reduced detail, but only where I decided it could be reduced.

----------


## NicolaiBrix

Oh no... This toturial will keep me up all night now, and THANKS buddy. Thats some nice work.  :Smile: )

----------


## geoff_nunn

Gidde and Ascension, 

Thank you so much for doing this. I was going through Gidde's Gimp translation last night and I got everything looking pretty good. The only problem is the tutorial uses a technique for generating random mountain range locations. While it appears to be possible to remove parts of them, I can't figure out how to simply draw them in. I am creating the worldmap for a D&D campaign that is currently in progress, and my players have already explored through some very specific mountain ranges. Any ideas on techniques for replacing the random generation through cloud layers with one that results in the same look, but in a pre-planned layout? 

I should note that I tried applying Rob A's technique from his regional map tutorial, but I couldn't get the styles to mesh well.

Also, W00T post 200 on this thread!

----------


## Ascension

Well the easiest thing to do is use a lasso tool, wrangle up a nice chunk of mountains from somewhere, and then move them where you want them.  If Gimp supports a fuzziness then the edges will not be cut hard, if it doesn't have fuzziness support then I'd use a very low opacity eraser (around 5%) and erase around the edges until it blends seamlessly.

----------


## arsheesh

Hey guys, I just posted this in response to Geoff's quarry on his Westerlands WIP post, but I have an idea for a possible way to manually arrange mountains that might be slightly more hassle free.  Instead of waiting till after mountain completion (step 20 in Gidde's pdf) to erase/move the already finished mountains, why not simply move the mountain cloud patterns themselves (this step would take place in-between 15a. and 15b. of the Gidde pdf, I'm not sure which step it would occur in within Ascension's tutorial) to where you want the mountain ranges to be. If you do this it would save you from having to do as much "touch up" detail after the fact, since all of the subsequent steps in mountain creation would simply work with the newly arranged clouds patterns.  Well, just a thought.

Cheers,

-Arsheesh

----------


## Ascension

It's a thought but in the PS version that might take longer, maybe not, shrug.  I find it easier to use a feathered lasso and move mtns around much easier than moving grayscale clouds around.  Also, moving the grayscale clouds around would create empty places that would have to be airbrushed in with a layer underneath so the the spot is totally filled.  This is all PS specific so I'm not sure how this would work in Gimp.

----------


## geoff_nunn

Hey,

I tried to comment earlier, but apparently it didn't show up. First off, Ascension and Gidde, thanks for the awesome tutorials. I made sure to throw you both some rep.

I used the lasso technique on the WIP map that Arsheesh linked to above. It worked fairly well, but there were a couple issues.
1. dragging the mountains around caused them to become out of sync with the hills layer. Gidde's technique uses the same cloud layer to generate both the hills and mountains. When you don't have to hand place them, this has the result of automatically creating foothills around all of the mountains, in addition to some other scattered hills.

When I manually adjusted the mountain layer, it pulled this lovely effect all out of sync. Unfortunately, if I had waited and flattened the hills and mountains into a single layer before doing anything, I would have wound up with little green foothills in the middle of my mountain ranges wherever I had to paste the mountains into place.

2. Dragging them also caused some of them to float over some of the lakes on my map... Again, when I was physically placing them.

I think I'm going to have another go at this using a hybrid between the random technique in the above-mentioned tutorials and the layer sandwich technique Rob A uses in his Artistic Regional Map Tutorial.

----------


## Ascension

If you keep a basic black and white shape for your continent on it's own layer or in a channel then you can use that as a mask and never have stuff in the water.  Man-handling mtns into the right place will create those hard edge lines if your lasso tool does not have a feather or fuzzy feature.  To fix that you may have to use a low opacity eraser (5%) to blend them in.

----------


## geoff_nunn

I had the lasso set to a 25px feather on the edges.

----------


## hohum

I thank my lucky stars for coming back to this thread and reading it through. Thanks to Ascension for sharing his style, Gidde for converting it to GIMP and arsheesh for proving to me that the kind of map I was wanting to do could be done. I had given up on my project as unattainable, but now I have hope.

I sincerely hope that Gidde's PDF and zip pack (containing the gradient and palette) will be included in the first post and in the PDF section. I found it difficult to locate.

I would like to add that I found it easier to use a large feathered brush to get the desired effect in steps #1e and #20b. I think I under erased the mountains and that may have contributed to my issues with hills. I also felt like I was having difficulty with selecting the hills by color after it had had the noise filter added. @arsheesh: Did you raise the hills level when you used it as forest?

I also struggled with the lack of screen shots for some of the selection and creation steps with the hills and mountains. So my advice is just follow the tutorial, the mountains don't look right until step #18, and then bang!

I will also re-iterate that in step #34a where it says use the colors from #22 is a typo. Use the colors from the previous step.

The only other typo I've found is #40e, it should be Threshold 15 (not 150).

I still need to jazz up/ bevel the rivers or something and I skipped the Nation and labeling part for now. Except for the hills I am fairly happy with the result.

Thanks again.

P.S. Ascension, Gidde and arsheesh all repped.

----------


## arsheesh

Nice job Hohum!  To answer your question, I do not recall raising the hills layer itself.  I added two Hill (i.e. "tree") color layers above the hills layer and set them each to soft light.  Since making my original map I have worked on developing a more controlled method for getting trees exactly where you want them.  If you are interested in the details I can send you a beta-test version of a tut I've created that outlines the process (just send me a private message with your email address and I'll send you the pdf).

Cheers,
-Arsheesh

----------


## Aenigma

Hey. I've been trying this tut out now in Ps CS4. After several attempts I've made it to step 21 and now I'm stuck.
I simply cannot select>inverse. It says "warning: no pixels were selected"

Also: Why does it say at 8: "Click back on the “ocean” layer (on the layers palette) and duplicate it." and then at 10: "When happy, duplicate this layer (it will be named “ocean copy”)" ?
When I do this, I end up with "ocean copy 2" and thus I still have an ocean layer and an ocean layer copy when I've linked one of the ocean copies (I did it with ocean copy 2) and the base layer together.

I'd be glad for any assistance.

Thanks in advance.

----------


## Ascension

I think I know what happened but I need a screenshot to be sure.  Make sure the layers palette is visible.  My guess is that you have not deleted the black on the "base" layer but I want the screenshot to be sure.

----------


## Aenigma

> I think I know what happened but I need a screenshot to be sure.  Make sure the layers palette is visible.  My guess is that you have not deleted the black on the "base" layer but I want the screenshot to be sure.


Ok, thanks for the quick response =D  Here's the screenshot you asked for. (I've done up to step 20 here)
Note that I've linked the "base layer" with the "ocean copy 2" layer that I got due to what was written in steps 8. and 10.

(btw other than those little snags, I think it's an awesome tut  :Very Happy: )

----------


## Ascension

Yep, your base layer is completely filled.  You missed a step somewhere, 11 I think.  Click on the base layer.  Select - color range = black with a fuzziness of anything.  Hit the delete key and deselect (ctrl-d).

----------


## Aenigma

I did exactly that.
Or do you mean that I have to select "black" in the same selection screen as where I selected "fuzziness" ? Because that was not possible. I just assumed that I should have black as my chosen colour so that I could paint black with a brush.

Can I simply go back to step 11 and edit there or do I have to do everything from 11 to 20 again?

thanks for the help.

----------


## Ascension

Select - color range uses the foreground color as a default, no choosing something different once the screen is open.  My previous post is all you need to do then once that's done go back and continue at step 21.

----------


## Aenigma

> Select - color range uses the foreground color as a default, no choosing something different once the screen is open.  My previous post is all you need to do then once that's done go back and continue at step 21.


A great many thanks  :Smile:

----------


## matt_s

Very nice style and the tutorial looks good to

----------


## Aenigma

Huh. It still says "Warning: No pixles were selected" when I ctrl-click on the base layer in the layer palette. I've tried several times.

Has this happened to anyone else? Could it be because I'm using Cs4? 

;_;

----------


## Ascension

You have to delete the blacks first, that will leave you with the solid white landmasses.  Click on the base layer to make it active.  Select - color range = black.  Hit the delete key on your keyboard then deselect (ctrl-d).

----------


## Aenigma

> You have to delete the blacks first, that will leave you with the solid white landmasses.  Click on the base layer to make it active.  Select - color range = black.  Hit the delete key on your keyboard then deselect (ctrl-d).


That's exactly what I did  :Surprised:

----------


## Ascension

The previous screenshot shows black in the thumbnail on the base layer.  Show me another screenshot I guess.

----------


## Aenigma

You know what? I'll just do everything from the beginning, veeeery slowly  :Razz:

----------


## Ascension

I was thinking that myself as I was writing my previous post   :Smile:   But I hate to tell folks to start over.

----------


## Gidde

I'm sorry Hohum, I missed your post there and my translation pdf disappeared with the rest of my attachments in my bonehead deletion move last week. Here it is again:

----------


## Torius

Could Gidde's conversion of this method to GIMP be linked on the master Tutorials thread?  Thanks

----------


## DracoDragon

Hey there Ascension and everyone else. I'm currently having an issue with the water elevation, specific step 42-44 on the Shelf Layer. My water doesn't look like the screen shot provided basically. I was wonder if there is a step or something I'm missing from the tutorial. Thanks in advanced!

Also, where do you get the starts with circles around them to note a capital city?

----------


## Ascension

The reason is that you deleted the area that is supposed to be the shelf and left the area that is open sea.  So when you bevel it it will look backward.  The continental shelf is made of land so think of it as an enlarged landmass and not a hole.

----------


## DracoDragon

Thanks. I have found where I made the error and fixed it! Wootness.

----------


## Sinastir

I tried this tutorial to make my first map.  I had a hard time following a few things (maybe because I use cs4 ext?) but I think I pulled through.  I'll post the result here, but I think I will start up a WIP thread as well.

Thanks for the great tutorial!

----------


## Valtharius

Ascension.... you are nothing short of a miracle worker! Thank you so much for this great tutorial! This is my first time using Photoshop for a project (other than cropping pictures of the kids and grandkids lol) and the steps were easy to understand. 

My original post was from quite a while ago... WIP - Argontath. Between the time of my computer burning out and picking up a decent laptop I trolled the forums on my iPhone and gleaned what I could from the work you and others have done. I must have read and re-read your tutorial a hundred times.

I worked out a preliminary map and played around with the tutorial until I was comfortable with it. Then I started five maps (of the six continents) at the same time and followed the steps 3 or 4 at a time. Once I was on the third map I was more comfortable and working much quicker. I took to heart what you said about the tutorial not being a bible and to play around with the settings. It took a bit of courage, but I screwed with the continental shelves and the effect looks a bit different. I am happy with the effect. I am going to sit down and figure out the river system now. Now that I am somewhat comfortable I will most likely re-do the maps in a much larger size to apply more detail, but I wanted to share what I have done so far.

*Lantier* _(1100x1100)_ is an undiscovered and uninhabited continent to the north of the continent of Khaitaer-Ypriss. Perhaps there are ruins of an ancient civilization?

*Tathis* _(2600x2600)_ is the eastern continent and one of the two primary continents for my world  (in terms of where the campaign characters are from). The western regions are explored and inhabited. the far eastern and far southern reaches are unexplored territory.

*Kaitan* _(1200x1200)_ is a continent to the far south east and unknown to the 'civilized' world. Its inhabitants are a feral race hell-bent on conquering whatever lands they find. They are just starting to explore the world in which the players live... and will not hesitate to make their presence known.

*Khaitaer-Ypriss* _(2600x2600)_ is the western continent and one of the two primary continents for my world (in terms of where the campaign characters are from). The northern continent of Khaitaer is inhabited in the western and eastern regions. The central region is ringed by mountains that holds a vast swampland-jungle. The southern continent of Yppris is largely unexplored territory and inhabited by bands of tribesman.

*Ascalon* _(1600x1600)_ is an unknown continent to the far northeast. It holds thriving and ancient civilizations that are largely disinterested with outward expansion and focus more on their maintaining their borders with the other countries in their part of the world.


Thank you again Ascension for everything you have taught me!

~Val

----------


## Ascension

Ah I see, you have a much more subtle shelf...looks good.  The one thing to watch out for is the gradient overlay that puts the colors in (the land layer I think) so unless those two lands on the left are near the poles you might want to tweak the gradient.  You have some nice looking shapes going on and that's like the second thing that people notice after colors...so far so good.  And thanks for the props, it's what I do - teach.   :Smile: 

edit:  never mind what I said about the gradient, saw your other post and everything checks out just fine.

----------


## cu11

*Apologies for my images - i have no idea how to resize them down thought the site might of done it for me.*

I too having difficulties - im quite proficiate at finding my way around photoshop.. but theres one part that confuses me.

IT says:




> 20.	You should have 6 layers; from top to bottom: “base”, “mountains” and “hills” (all hidden) then “land”, “ocean” and “background” (all visible) and you should still be on the “land” layer.  Now we have our basic elevations set up so let’s add some color.  
> 21.	Ctrl-click on the “base” layer (in the layers palette) to load it as a selection (in newer versions of Photoshop you have to ctrl-click on the thumbnail in the layers palette).  Select > Inverse then hit the delete key then deselect.


At 20 i was like thats correct ! Then 21 throws me.


So i apply the gradient... after deselecting and yet it affects the ocean rather than the land..i knew it was going to happen from read the in steps but not until i saw your picture at stage 22 that some thing is a miss.

Can you explain what i got wrong?

----------


## Ascension

Well, first off, you're missing two layers - the Land layer and the Mountains layer - so you must have skipped a few steps.  When done correctly you should be on the Land layer, the Base layer should be a big white landmass (black is the ocean) so when you ctrl-click on the Base layer and Select - Inverse and delete you end up deleting the ocean from the Land layer.  As for the uploading, click on "Go advanced", scroll down to "Manage attachments" and click on that, then use thingamabob to upload your image as an attachment.

----------


## cu11

Oh yeah i went back a few steps than took the picture but kept the images of the layers that i got wrong.

The pure white land was becomes a difference cloud when i merge the layer with base how ever which is where it goes wrong for me.

This part:
10.	When happy, duplicate this layer (it will be named “ocean copy”) and click on the “base” layer.  Link the “base” and “ocean copy” layers together; on the layer palette you will see a box with an eye and a box with a brush in it – the brush means that this is the active layer and the eye means that the layer is visible.  If you click in an empty box a chain will appear...this is the link.  Once the layers are linked then merge down (ctrl+e) or Layer > Merge down.

----------


## Ascension

The base layer should be filled with 50% gray (not 50% opacity but true medium gray - RGB of 128, 128, 12 :Cool:  and the blend mode should be hard mix.  So what you should see would be what I call cow spots.  And when you merge down, since there should be no problem now, everything turns out fine.  Then you delete the black ocean and the base layer has the white continents on it.  Then you use that base layer for the later steps.

----------


## MediocreMemory

I loved this tutorial so much, I made a script for cs4 to get it done quicker. The steps are in order of the tutorial and the stops are for the hand drawn parts. I also added an action that creates a height map from the image. Thank you so much for sharing your tutorial!

[ Action Script Download ]

----------


## Ascension

Thanks for making the action - I never got around to doing it.

----------


## Lord_Infinitus

I did Giddies Version, I kinda like GIMP more than Photoshop.

I can add a few warnings: 
If you mess with the colorslider wrongly to prevent overwhitening in the northern region you get the whitened areas in the desert. I still don't know correctly when this happened, but the same problem occurs with the mountains, I overbrushed the with the color, and well... you see it on the image.

it was late at night and i probably wasn't paying full attention, but the mountain problem and the salt-desert problem popped up at a quite late step, I actually noticed them only the next day... maybe it is because I suck at brushing.

Maybe I was to groggy.

Anyways thanks you two. In complement with the techniques RobA and the Photorealistic Forest-Guy presented, they are very instructive and the whole tutorials are awesome.

After doing standard GIMP tuts, I thought I might try these ones... well they are a treasure for everyone, not only for cartographers, thanks.

----------


## Ascension

That looks nice, I dig it a lot.  If you want to go back over the deserts then create a new layer and paint some color in and mess with the blend modes or opacity.

----------


## Lord_Infinitus

Well, this one was primarily thought for testing out the tutorial. Whereas I noted: Paintbrush over the mountains after you adjusted the color.
Thanks for the additional tips. But for a final map I am sure to use a diagonal line instead of the horizontal one to adjust it, because you can get more stuff in there.
I don't know when I have time to do another map, but it is the next one I will do. Probably you might want to add a method to extract single countries from the map, to create a regional map of them.

and I noticed another thing, if you choose a not rectangular map in GIMP, you will have to scale the two noise sizes when generating solid noise.
So if you are doing 2000 x 1200, and the solid noise generation says 9 and 9, you will have to do 9 and 5.4; it is to keep the ratios, so your clouds won't look streched.

----------


## Ancient

First of all, it is a VERY FANTASTIC Tutorial, surely one of the best (including the results) i've stubmled over so far. Just a question, i don't know if I made a mistake.

- After creating the landmass (step 9 in the word document) my coastlines look as such in closeup:



- You usually don't notice that if zoomed out, however zooming in because not so pretty.
- Any idea how to "smoothen" the coastlines using some sort of filter? I tried a while, but neither result made me happy. Anyone any ideas?

----------


## Ascension

Yep, pretty easy fix.  While the "Base" layer is still black and white hit the filter Noise-Median and choose 1 or 2.  This will smooth out your coasts.

----------


## Ancient

Worked nicely, thanks. Just another small question. While creating the "land" layer from the ocean layer, u practically use a "plain clouds" layer with the "hill" lightning effects (the 5 omni lights). This leaves me with a far more black/whiste contrasted "land" layer than in screenshot no. 22. I have very dark and very bright spots. So i think, there might something be missing?!

----------


## Ascension

Hmmm, might be that your monitor is set up differently than mine but no matter there's an easy fix.  Just grab the large airbrush tool, turn the opacity down to 5-10% and paint over the lightest/darkest areas with black/white on the layer before running the lighting effects.

----------


## verdilak

I am having an issue at Step 21 and 22. I Have just my land mass with my ocean gone (transparent white and grey boxes). The land mass has the gradient and everything. But when I look at the picture in Step 22, my land mass doesnt show the mountains and hills or anything, it is just a flat image. I've tried changing the order of the layers, but no go. Where might I have gone wrong?

Oh, and I am using CS5 is that makes any difference.

----------


## Ascension

Gimme a full screenshot so that I can see your layer palette.

----------


## verdilak

Here it is.

Now, I can bring my Mountains (which I have already done step 23 & 24 with) to the top and they will show through the base, but the rest of the layers completely overpower the base unless I lower the opacity. Could this just be that I am rushing the gun (in that I will be getting rid of the ocean in the hills and land layers in a later step)? I dunno, since it seems like in the Step 22 pic that you are showing the hills and land layers as well as the mountains layer through the base layer.

----------


## verdilak

> EDIT: Alright I seem to have found my problem. When you start to add colour, I first selected the base layer, so all further layer styles were applied to that layer, instead of to the land layer.


 I figured my problem out and it was this issue as well.

----------


## verdilak

I figured it out, thanks man!

Also, I tried to get your sat mountains tutorial to work but they didn't turn out very well, so I undid those changes to it.

----------


## Ascension

Looks fine so far except for the river that goes to two oceans (just chop out the middle so that you get two rivers each going to a different ocean) and the lake that goes to two oceans (same thing).  As to the mtns, the easiest thing to do is to just duplicate the mtns layer...it sort of beefs them up a bit.

----------


## Ancient

> Hmmm, might be that your monitor is set up differently than mine but no matter there's an easy fix.  Just grab the large airbrush tool, turn the opacity down to 5-10% and paint over the lightest/darkest areas with black/white on the layer before running the lighting effects.


Mine is calibrated (Spyder 3, Adobe RGB) but that might be of course. The difference is enormous however, I will try. That you recommend i did on my first try (still with rugged coastlines), here it is:



It is and will remain unfinished, because of some issues I started over again. I think i'll need to some other "mountain" technique, they're not bad but don't make me too happy on the other hand. Of course, this is the best "regional map" i've created using photoshop.

BTW: What actually means "WIP"?

----------


## jtougas

Work In Progress...which is pretty much EVERY map I'll ever make....

----------


## Ancient

aaaah...BINGO :-)

----------


## verdilak

Fixed rivers (thanks for catching that) w/ stronger, more pronounced mountains, and one with the sat mountains from a different tut of yours.

----------


## Ascension

Yeah, I know my mountains aren't the best but the main thing is that you learn a simple technique that has a lot of variables to it.  I teach you how to walk but it's up to you to learn how to run, so to speak.  What that means is that you have some basic knowledge and you can now take that and try a bunch of different stuff to produce new and interesting things.  If you never go beyond this then, cool - you have a nice lil map; but if you like to experiment (like I do) then you can do all sorts of things and have some fun.

----------


## mearrin69

I like the mountains as-is.  :Smile:  Just used them in a map in fact.
M

----------


## Raic

Ascension wrote in Atlas Tutorial:




> 8.	Click back on the “ocean” layer (on the layers palette) and duplicate it.  Grab a big airbrush and at the top of the screen reduce the flow to 10%.  I start with the Airbrush soft round 300 and use smaller airbrushes as needed.  Use black to define the ocean and white to define the land.


Hi Ascension,

In the step above, when creating the oceans and landmasses can I use a fill-adjustment layer - threshold - then with the burn and dodge tool create them instead of brushing them in per your instructions. I ask because I find this method to be very quick and I have better control over the shapes I create. I wonder though if there is a specific reason for using a brush that will impact the look of the map later on. 

Thanks for your help.

Raic

----------


## Ascension

The problem is with the Base layer...it's all gray.  It should be white land and black ocean, like your current ocean layer.  So the mistake came earlier.  I suspect that you got confused on the layers.  The 50% gray layer should be set to hard mix, then do the airbrushing, then merge those layers together and you get the cow-spots of black and white.  That layer, then, is renamed to Base layer.  You select the blacks and delete them leaving a white landmass on the Base layer.

----------


## Raic

Yeah I figured out my mistake and removed my post with the screen captures. All good now. I think I got the technique down and I am plugging away at creating maps with it now. Thanks for the help and the fantastic tutorial. Just by working with it I have learned a lot of new methods for creating maps that I will be using outside of Atlas mapping.

----------


## Ascension

No prob, man.  Happy mappin.   :Smile:

----------


## CC_JAR

Here's my attempt, I think I did alright..

----------


## jtougas

Looks good  :Smile:  what do the colored lines represent?

----------


## Steel General

> Looks good  what do the colored lines represent?


I would guess political borders...

----------


## CC_JAR

yep, it did it like that in the tut, so I did it on my attempt.

----------


## raindog308

This may seem like an elementary question, but what is the text effect used for the gold chrome-ish country names?  I can't seem to get the PS settings right.  It really is a good contrast.

----------


## Ascension

I just got back from vacation so I'll look this up tomorrow night, it's all layer styles so I'll post up the screenies.

----------


## Marcus.Grayson

Can't get it to work. There either a step missing or I'm too dammed dumb to figure it out (I attended public school in the south). 
I'm using PS CS5 on a Mac (I know, elitist asshole, or just ass according to the Ex), and I'm consistently unable to get past step 21. I can get to that step, but once done I don't have anything remotely resembling the picture in the tutorial. 
There are, for me, some sticking points. 

Step 10, when Merging Down, should I end up with a layer named "base" or "ocean"
Step 20, I end up with 6 layers each time (eight successful attempts that have made it to step 20)
Step 21, my feeble public school educated mind can't handle all this at once. 
So first I'm supposed to chose the "base" layer. Then I'm supposed to go to the Select menu, the choose Inverse. BUT, I can't. There's something that I'm supposed to do first, it just escapes my mind (was it ever there?)  What is the point of this step? Maybe if I know what I'm supposed to accomplish, I can (with the help of magical cats) come up with a work around that won't fall out of my head. 
The picture in step 22 is not what I have at point. No matter what layer I hide or not. I'm assuming, again, that I'm supposed to be in the "Land" layer at that point. I've done that and ended up with this


With all that, where did I go wrong?
Anyone, so my internal sarcasm can end.

----------


## Sharpe

Did I read that someone converted this tut to GIMP? Anyone have a link to it? Thanks.  :Smile:

----------


## Ascension

Ctrl-click on the base layer (in the layer palette)...on mac I think it's cmd-click.  Then click back on the land layer.  Select-Inverse.  Hit the delete key on the keyboard.  Deselect.  Your land will now be trimmed to the shape of the base layer.

----------


## Marcus.Grayson

Wow, that worked. I feel like i dropped 75 IQ points somewhere. 
Thanks
You sir, are a scholar and a gentleman.

----------


## hohum

I cannot seem to find the link to Giddes conversion anywhere so here it is

----------


## lordnago

Around page 22 or so someone mentioned a .zip file with Gidde's GIMP gradient file.  I can't seem to find it anywhere though.  Does anyone have it?

Thanks

----------


## barbierossa

Hi all,

I finally invested in a copy of Photoshop Elements 9.0 and I'm trying to work my way through this tutorial, but I've gotten stuck at step 21. 

Ascension writes: _"Add a layer style of gradient overlay;"_, but I can't seem to locate how to do this in PSE 9... When I click on the layers menu, I get the following options:
New, Duplicate Layer, Delete Layer, Rename Layer, Layer Style (Drop Down Options = Style Settings & Hide All Effects), New Fill Layer (Drop Down Options = Solid Color, Gradient, Pattern), etcetera, etcetera...

I'm now a wee bit stumped as to where to go next and I'd appreciate any advice to remedy my inexperience with PSE 9!
 Thanks in advance,

Tom (Barbierossa) :Question:

----------


## Ascension

Don't use the Layer menu at the top...use the cursive f on the layer stack.  The other thing is I don't know what sort of options you have with Elements...all I know is that you're limited with that since it doesn't have all of the options available, just some basic ones.

----------


## barbierossa

> Don't use the Layer menu at the top...use the cursive f on the layer stack.  The other thing is I don't know what sort of options you have with Elements...all I know is that you're limited with that since it doesn't have all of the options available, just some basic ones.


Thank you, thank you, thank you for the prompt reply. I'm off to give that a try and I'll let you know how I get on (or perhaps, more likely, be back with more questions!  :Blush: )

Tom (Barbierossa)

----------


## tuore

Hehe, my first post after 10 months of lurking.
I don't know if this has been asked before... but I've made 3 maps using this guide, and in none of them, the mountains look as good as in this tutorial. In the step where you make the color overlay and then start removing mountains, the result is nothing like the example image. The mountains are dark and ugly, whereas the guide shows them to be lightly brown and bright on top.
As a comparison, here's the guide image:



And here's what my best attempts create, just after the part where you've added bevel&emboss and the color overlay:



What am I doing wrong? The only parts where I've altered from the guide is when I made the entire project 4000x4000 and edited the order of the gradient.

----------


## Ascension

You have to delete the darks before the erasing part as in step 23:  "Click on the 'mountains' layer.  Make sure that black is the foreground color then Select > Color range = use black with a fuzziness of 200.  Hit the delete key then deselect.  This erases the darker grays."  That will take out those dark and garish blacks and leave you with the lighter, pretty colors.

----------


## tuore

Thanks for the quick reply! I was thinking that the problem might have been that part, since I didn't completely understand it. "Use black". Black as a foreground color or some weird list object somewhere? Here's what I used, using the default colors (black as foreground color):

----------


## Ascension

Looks ok to me so long as you're on the mountains layer then hit the delete key (otherwise you delete the blacks from some other layer).

----------


## tuore

When I tried it again, it removed the dark areas, but the remaining parts looked more like bubbles. I'll make a new one to see if I can avoid the problem.

----------


## tuore

Yes, I managed to do it! Thank you!

----------


## Ascension

No prob, man.

----------


## sindustries

> Around page 22 or so someone mentioned a .zip file with Gidde's GIMP gradient file.  I can't seem to find it anywhere though.  Does anyone have it?
> 
> Thanks


I couldn't find a gradient file either.  I worked around using a gradient by just creating a custom palette with the colors Ascension uses, and then just painting the colors onto the land color layer.

First, fill the entire layer with the dark green.  Then, using a huge brush at 100% opacity paint in the white at the top where you want snow, and the desert color where you want desert!  Then just select your smudge tool, set the opacity low, at like 25%, and smudge, smudge, smudge to create your gradient effects.  I really liked the way it turned out.  And this way you aren't limited to having the same color at the same lattitudes.

Gidde's GIMP conversion pdf (post 223 of this thread) should be included on the first page of this thread!!!  I just discovered it yesterday and its a HUGE boon for us GIMP noobs.   :Smile: 

I really want to go home and finish up what I had started last night and post my results...  argh, stupid work.

----------


## sindustries

Here's what I have so far following through Gidde's GIMP conversion. Next step is to download RobA's tapered stroke plugin and give it a go with making some rivers.

----------


## TotenMaus

Awesome Tutorial, Ascension, but I'm having a terrible time trying to figure out what I'm doing in regards to steps 10-20. I get that you copy the ocean layer (ocean layer), and you link it to the base layer, but then you make a turn-around and say to merge down. I couldn't tell if you meant to merge the base and ocean copy layer down, the ocean copy and ocean layer down, or what have you. It made little sense to go through the work of linking it when I'm just about to merge them together. My best guess was that you meant to merge the base and ocean layer copy into one, of which then you tell me to copy that twice for the mountains and hills, screw around with lighting and difference clouds on those, and then tell me to copy the ocean again, when I already have the base+ocean copy merged layer. On top of that, you tell me again that I should still have my base layer, when I already merged it with ocean copy on step 20, where you simply lose me. Am I following perfectly or what? It doesn't seem very right when I need to do an extra step and do an extraneous function (renaming the merged "ocean copy" to base and the merge in the first place, after I linked them)...

Also, I think you doubled a step on your latest version of the tut, #'s 8 and 10. An older version omits the second duplication, and again, it seemed confusing to have 2 ocean copies where I never hear of the second one again.




> 8. _Click back on the ocean layer (on the layers palette) and duplicate it_.  Grab a big airbrush and at the top of the screen reduce the flow to 10%.  I start with the Airbrush soft round 300 and use smaller airbrushes as needed.  Use black to define the ocean and white to define the land
> 
> 10. When happy, _duplicate this layer (it will be named ocean copy)_ and click on the base layer.  Link the base and ocean copy layers together;


Feel free to berate me for being a terrible instructions follower.

----------


## Ascension

I haven't had any sleep tonight so let me read this sometime this afternoon and get back to you, otherwise I'm liable to make a mush of things trying to explain   :Smile:

----------


## TotenMaus

Take your time. I wrote that without much sleep as well.

----------


## Ascension

OK, step 10 should read "When happy link the base and ocean copy layers..." - there was an extra duplication in there so you were right about that.  The linking is unnecessary, really, but if you don't link things then the names of the layers will be different from the tut and that could mess you up.  For instance, if you don't link the base and ocean copy layers and then merge them the resulting layer will be called ocean copy instead of base.

----------


## SSJPabs

Is it possible for you to repost the images? When I try to open them it tells me I can't because it uses Word 97 and I've got Works 8.5

----------


## Ascension

Did you try the pdf?  I actually made it on Open Office (free) so that would work as well.  I'm not spending oodles of cash on MS Office and I deleted Works when I fired up the pc for the first time.

----------


## The_Colorless_Mage

Ascension,

I used your tutorial last night and came up with what is the makings of a really nice map.  So thanks!

Of course...there's a "but..." attached.  When I was first drawing the map, I made the mistake of making my landmass far too large (there's really little more than slivers of ocean surrounding it).  Now that I'm at the point here I want to attach a compass rose and legend to it, this is a real problem.  So my question:  Do I need to basically start from scratch, or is there a way that I can add to the surrounding water easily?

Thanks in advance,

TCM

----------


## Ascension

Well, it's complicated but I can explain how to do it.  You might mess it up a few times because it's tricky.  Make a new image at the size you want and fill it with clouds.  On your original image and take the clouds layer from that, copy it, and paste it into the new document.  You should see a clearly defined edge between the two clouds layers.  Now take your "base" layer from the original and copy that into the new document - this lets you know where to stop editing or airbrushing.  Now take an eraser with an airbrush tip and low opacity and erase the edge.  I mean low opacity, like 5% or less.  Flip back and forth between black and white colors and airbrush places where the eraser doesn't seem to work well.  What you want to end up with is something where the "new" ocean is much darker and the areas around the coast are lighter and the hard edge is blended out into oblivion.  If you have a tablet you can have much greater control of erasing and airbrushing.  Once you have this then delete the "base" layer from the new document and merge the two cloud layers together.  Now do the steps in the tut for ocean colors and then copy everything from the original document into the new one (ctrl-click a layer in the original, edit - copy then edit - paste - this will keep things centered so they should all line up properly in the new document).  All you have to do now is save the document as something like "continent tweaked" or something like that.

----------


## The_Colorless_Mage

Ascension,

Thanks, first, for your prompt reply!   :Smile: 

My learnings, after trying the method you suggested:  It works...but the final result still isn't nearly as appealing as the initial map appeared.  Thus, I've decided to start over from scratch.  I feel that, after going through the entire procedure once, I can apply much of what I learned to make a much better map that even my first attempt (which looked pretty good, in my estimation, actually).  As they say:  Practice makes perfect.

I'd like to ask one more question, if I might, in closing.  The landmass I'm creating is something like Iceland:  Cold and mountainous.  Do you have any specific tips in setting up my colors and altitudes to reflect this?  I guess what I'm asking is at what stages in particular can I alter these two characteristics of the map (I'm a relative novice with Photoshop, as you no doubt suspect).  I need my map to look icy and my mountains to be real spires!!!

Thanks again for the wonderful tutorial!!!


TCM

----------


## Ascension

Well, I don't really know how to make them look pointier from a top down view...never thought about it.  You could always do a few more renditions of the difference clouds step but this just makes them wigglier and not really pointy but it does give a different look.  I'll have to think on it and experiment and get back to you on that but if I don't then that means I haven't found anything.  To have some accentuated peaks I use a 3-pixel hard round brush tip (on a new layer after everything else is done) with at least 300% spacing, some big scatter, and some size jitter and then I emboss that and it sort of makes individual peaks but they're not really pointier or anything.  As for making the land look frigid and barren (hey, sounds like my last girlfriend badum dum) take the "base" layer and set it's blend mode to color.  This will make your land grayscale then add a color overlay of a nice brown and mess around with blend modes until you get the blacks looking brown and the whites staying white - you may have to mess around with blend modes, opacities, and different browns to get a good result.  Then on a new layer airbrush in some greens and tans wherever you want, but sparingly, and with small brushes (also set your brush to be textured, under the brushes menu, and mess around with the various patterns available to get a nice mottled look).  Here, again, you will have to experiment with different greens, blends, and opacities.

Here's a sneak peak at a map I'm currently experimenting with showing the mountain techniques to give you some idea of what I mean.

----------


## The_Colorless_Mage

Ascension,

First:  Those mountains look FANTASTIC.

Second, thank you again for the advice.  If you discover anything to make them appear "pointier", I'd certainly appreciate knowing about it.

As far as your tip on "frigid barrenness" goes, are you saying to apply those changes to the base layer AFTER the map's finished or during the step in which we've created it?

TCM


P.S.:  After I posted this, I finished the second iteration of my map.  I'm much happier with the mountains now and found a way to help my map look more "frigid" (via altering the gradient map of the landmass), but I've run into a different problem altogether.  While all the differentiation during the "cloud creation" portion of my map-making helped my mountains, it's really made my oceans look...well, bad.  Attached are two pictures depicting issues I've run into that I hope you can help me with:



I realize those are low-rez captures (I was trying to be conscious of server load), but in Ex1, you can see all the "noise" in the water, preventing it from having a smooth appearance.  Instead, it looks very mottled--and is MUCH worse when seen from a zoomed out view.  In Ex2, you can see that there is a noticeable bevel in the middle of a lake...and it appears to be RAISED, not sunken.  Is there a way for me to easily take care of both problems?

TCM

----------


## Ascension

The bevel problem is pretty much something I cause and will do so forever - it's where the light source is situated.  In my maps I put the sun in the lower right as if dawn in the east.  Most people assume a top left light source which is opposite of what I do.  Top left light makes it look raised while bottom right make it looks sunken.  So you can just move the light source on the bevel/emboss window.  As to the ocean, just airbrush in some more darker colors to smooth things out or do like I do and just put a layer of solid color over the unimportant parts.  Most people don't really care too much about the bathymetry except near coasts.

----------


## The_Colorless_Mage

Ascension,

I see!  Well, it's all good.  After doing some extensive playing around with the map, I was able to ameliorate both the color issues and the too-prominent bevel.  I appreciate all of your help, nonetheless!

Right now, I'm moving on to your volcano tutorial.  I mean, hey--what would an Iceland-like map be without some volcanic activity, no?   :Wink: 


TCM

----------


## Ascension

That tut is a lil confusing so you might need lots of experimenting with it.  Someday I'll rewrite it to fix it but think of it as more a general idea than actual step by step.

----------


## The_Colorless_Mage

Ascension,

If I have any problems with it, I'll let you know!  I think I should be okay, though.  I was lucky enough to have one of my mountains appear with a very prominent (and obvious) crater on its peak.  As I scan over your tutorial, it seems to me that having that is half the battle.

TCM

----------


## SSJPabs

> Did you try the pdf?  I actually made it on Open Office (free) so that would work as well.  I'm not spending oodles of cash on MS Office and I deleted Works when I fired up the pc for the first time.


I used to use open office, but I found it ran much more clunky and had fewer options than Works, and so after a few years, I removed it recently. The images in your tutorial didn't work for me even when I used open office to view it. The PDF however works.

Thanks for your helpful response.

----------


## ShadowBlade

Hey there, new to the Guild!  :Very Happy: 

This is a fantastic tutorial, and after some effort and struggling with the continental shelves a bit, I'm almost done. However, I've run into a problem now that I want to add that thin black stroke around the Land layer. Instead of drawing said stroke properly, the effect is instead placing what looks more like a color _overlay_ over the ocean (i.e. what's outside the layer). I have no idea why this is happening, though I realize missing a single step along the lengthy process can bring nefarious consequences later on... I must've done something wrong along the way.

----------


## Ascension

There are a lot of layers and colors interacting so my advice would be to make a duplicate of the Base layer, move it to the top, set the fill to 0, and then add a stroke layer style.

----------


## ShadowBlade

That still creates that bothersome overlay instead of a proper stroke.  :Question:

----------


## Ascension

If it's on the very top of the layer stack there should be no interference whatsoever since there are no other layers above it.  My only guess is that the base layer has a bit of blur to it and not precise and crisp.

----------


## ShadowBlade

I don't think there's any blur, since I don't remember the tutorial requiring such... Anyway, I probably botched something along the way. It's not a big deal at any rate.

I've been tinkering with the ocean layer and derivatives, making it darker and more ocean-like. In addition to that and testing with less opaque (and extended) shelves, I fiddled with patterns to try and give the surface some texture. The latter's more apparent on lighter areas of the water. I don't know if it _should_ be that way, realistically, but here's the result...

*EDIT:* Added a tiny bevel effect on the shores on the second picture, to detach the land a wee bit further from the ocean.

----------


## Ascension

As to patterns, it all depends on the blend mode and/or opacity of the pattern affecting things below it and whatever may be above it affecting it.  Bottom line - yes patterns may look odd at times with my style because I don't use them very much.

----------


## Sergei Zybin

Great tutorial, I find some new things for myself. Keep it coming (new awesome map-making secrets).

----------


## J0kk3

> Lemme know if you have any problems


I tried the "borders-part" of this tutorial to get some nice-looking borders on my map, but after all that marking and deleting...nothing! What gives? I dont know how to explain more, I did all the steps and I filled each one with white. Didnt want different colors, but nothings there when i link and merge.

I'd apreciate any help, any atall.
Thanks

----------


## Ascension

I'll need a screenshot to diagnose.

----------


## Ukko

My second attempt at a map. :Very Happy:  My first being from Tears tutorial, which was a big help in getting me more aquainted with the PS ins and outs.

My map.

----------


## Broken Clock

I don't know why, but I just keep messing up somewhere along the line.  It seems like I have too many layers, or something.  I've included a video that mostly goes step by step so you can let me know what I did wrong.  I stop when I get to the colour gradient, since its way too disastrous to continue.

http://youtu.be/WYDMGXZr0LM

----------


## Ascension

I couldn't see the layer stack in the video as it is too small but I figured out how to go full screen (yay me, I learned a new tech thing today - I'm very tech illiterate) and I think the problem is with the layer of 50% gray.  The 50% does not refer to 50% opacity but to true neutral solid gray of 128, 128, 128 (where black is 0, 0, 0 and white is 255, 255, 255).  The next step is to set the blend mode of that layer to hard mix - you only get that blend mode with Photoshop CS and up; PS7 and below do not have it.  Then you put an empty layer underneath the gray layer and use low-opacity or low-flow airbrushes to define your land (don't use soft round brushes or hard round brushes as they will create an edge while an airbrush has an edge that fades out completely).

----------


## Broken Clock

Got it.

----------


## Ascension

There ya go.  Might want to reduce the size of the giant lakes but that's just my own opinion.

----------


## Alak

@Gidde or someone who understand gimp better than i (and that's very easy!):

first step of the tutos:

1. We need to make a channel for our caostline.
a.Rename the background layer to ocean (double-click layer name to rename)

but i don't know what is the background layer, when i run gimp there is no layer!

----------


## arsheesh

Have you created a new document yet, or simply just opened GIMP?  Once you open GIMP you can create a new document by going to the File menu and clicking "New".  This will bring up a pop-up window that will allow you to select the parameters of the new document.  Once you click "OK" you should get a new white canvas layer in GIMP (unless of course you selected another background color).  In your the "Layers" dialogue of your "Layers, Channels and Paths" doc, you should now see a white layer entitled "Background" (see the attached image).  This is what Gidde is referring too.  To rename it, simply double click on the title of the layer and type in the new name.  Hope that helped.

Cheers,
-Arsheesh

----------


## Fenrisnorth

Good sir, this is an amazing technique. I learned things doing this that I can take to all the other aspects of my digital art. I have one question. Is there a way to take an already sketched  out map and use this technique? 

I have a client who wants me to do the map for his campaign world, and has given me a sketch with where mountain ranges, deserts, forests, and such go. 

1. Is there a way to color the "land" layer by hand so I can put the proper terrain features in?

2. Is there a way to force the Difference clouds to cluster in particular places (so I can have hilly terrain and mountains in predetermined places)?

Thank you in advance.

Also, here is my first go at your style.

----------


## Ascension

Where you have those adjustment layers above the land layer, just make a new layer and paint whatever colors you want wherever you want.  You don't even have to use the gradient overlay, if you don't want to, and just paint everything by hand...it takes a lot longer but that's up to you.  If you want to force the terrain into a preset map then make a new layer above the difference clouds layer and use black and white airbrushing to darken or lighten the terrain.  Lighter terrain will render as mountains.  Once you have things how you like then you can proceed.

----------


## silvestine

I'm having problems with the Gradient Overlay using CS5.

I create the first one using the little 'fx' button, but then I can't create anymore. If i do it my add-layer style (or some such) i applies the gradient not on the land mass (as it does the first time) but over the entire layer (in fact, it creates a new layer each time). I am either missing something here or am doing things wrong.

----------


## Ascension

No idea there, I don't have CS5.

----------


## dubya

Hello, 

I am a total beginner with PS I DLed the PS 5.5 trial just to try this tut.  Do you know why I can't render lighting effect on any layer let alone the mountain layer.  The lens flare and lighting effects are not selectable. Also before that step adding noise to the hills, I was not able to select the monochromatic box.

Thanks,

Dubya

----------


## Ascension

2 reasons come to mind: 1 you're using photoshop elements or 2 you need to be in 8 bit mode and not something higher.  16 bit mode and higher chews too much memory so it won't work.

----------


## Mesphia

Hello. Umm I am having the same difficulties as Dubya and I do indeed have Photoshop Elements. Is there some way to fix the monochomatic/lighting effects problem that you know of or should I just skip it and move on?


Also I just want to make sure I'm doing everything alright so far. I feel a bit unsure on my first go at things.

----------


## Ascension

Lighting effects always outputs black and white, the color comes from later steps.  As for what you have so far, there's a lot that needs correcting.  First, the painting you did needs to be done with an airbrush tip and not a soft round tip.  The soft round and hard round tips give you the circular effects while the airbrush tip is much more subtle, especially if you lower the flow to around 10%.  Also, you need to be in brush mode and not pencil mode.  Second, as for the effects, it's not the same.  The effects window you have showing looks more like a combination of various other photoshop filters and not the actual lighting effects filter (elements does not have lighting effects filter that I am aware of - my old copy of elements doesn't have it).  Third, doing this on elements will produce vastly different results and the programs are similar but elements is a stripped down version of photoshop.  You might try downloading Wilbur (free) or Bryce 5 (free) or Terragen (free version) and run your grayscale image through that to get the mountains to look 3dish then import it back into photoshop for the following steps.  Something about the layers seems to be wrong but I don't have access to the tutorial right now to go over it (lost everything in a crash 2 weeks ago and I'm putting things back together slowly).  In the end, you won't get the same result as in the tutorial because the programs and filters are different.  I think there was a conversion of my tut for elements but you would have to go back a few years when searching the tut section.

----------


## Mesphia

Alrighty. I didnt think it looked right. Thank you.

----------


## adzamoose

Hey guys, just thought I'd say a massive thanks for this tutorial and all the support in the following threads. Thought you may want to see my 2nd attempt at a map for my new campaign using it and the advice given. I was completely new to PS before I started having always had access to it I have wanted to learn for a long time and these beautiful maps have inspired me to do so. Thank you so much and I hope to contribute more in the future.

Any advice or criticism on my upload will be greatly appreciated too, think my coastlines were a little pixelated and I have only just finished the initial stages of the inner glow part so they need tweaking but otherwise I'm very happy with my results so far.

Cheers

----------


## Ascension

Looks like you did a great job.  Only thing I would tweak is that nation border up there in all of that ice, scale it back to encompass the green, for sure, but less of the ice.

----------


## casusev

Long time lurker. Just wanted to thank you Ascension for this guide. I'm a novice to map making and PS, so this has been a breath of fresh air. 

This is the second map (much better than the first attempt). I made it for a buddy of mine for his D&D game. Still a WIP. I'm waiting on the names for all the cities and landmarks before they get entered in. Anyway let me know what you think and/or if you have any tips!

----------


## Pandi

Hey guys,
This is my first post to your awesome forum and by the looks of it this is the place to start.
I am a first time PS user and i have cs5
I am having trouble with step 8 right after you create the copy of ocean and set it to grey 50% and name it base. I get something similar to your picture. but after...
it says click on ocean and duplicate it then get your airbrush and define the land mass and ocean. do i do that on the base layer? because if i try and brush on the ocean copy layer i cant see any changes under the pure black/white pic. I also didnt understand your explanation on how to 'link' layers. my link chain button is greyed out.
Any help is GREATLY appreciated. Loving the site already
pandi

----------


## Pandi

Stopped being lazy and finally got through this tutorial. I think i did pretty well for a first time PS user.

----------


## Ascension

Yep, looks pretty good.  I'd suggest going to the shelf layer and use a low-flow eraser and erase some of the stuff in the ocean just so that it doesn't look so busy.

----------


## JediKnight83

Ascension, 
Thank you so much for this tutorial.  I have done a couple of very large scale maps with it, Though I think it might be better if I did separate continent maps.  I was just curious what the scaling was?  In step 51, you have lat/long lines drawn at every 200 px.  What would the degrees be?

----------


## siby

Hi,

I was trying this tutorial tonight but I'm having trouble with step 21.  When I do the five color gradient overlay I only get a grey selection.  No color shows up.  How do you do the multiple colors? just do the gradient overlay over five times?

I'm in RGB color mode.




> 21.	Ctrl-click on the base layer (in the layers palette) to load it as a selection (in newer versions of Photoshop you have to ctrl-click on the thumbnail in the layers palette).  Select > Inverse then hit the delete key then deselect.  Add a layer style of gradient overlay; well use 4 colors with 5 stops as follows:  color 1 at the 5% position is flat white, color code FFFFFF (rgb 255, 255, 255); color 2 at the 35% position is a dark olive green, color code 405018 (rgb 64, 80, 24); color 3 at the 60% position is the same dark olive green; color 4 at the 85% position is a dark flesh, color code DAC094 (rgb 218, 192, 14; and color 5 at the 100% position is a papyrus, color code F0E6BE (rgb 240, 230, 190).  Set the blend mode of the gradient to hard light with 100% opacity.  Next well add a layer style of outer glow:  use a light blue, any will do for now and you can change it later but I use 40C8FF (rgb 64, 200, 255).  Set the blend mode of the outer glow to screen at 25% opacity and a size of 11.  If you want a lighter gradient then add a layer style of color overlay of white and set the blend mode to soft light and then turn down the opacity until you are happy with it.


Thank you for this great tutorial and my apologies for not being able to follow your directions.

Siby

----------


## libraryian

> Sorry for the delay in posting ... between the tablet temporarily going haywire and how darned hard the continental shelf was to translate, this part took a while.
> 
> No matter what I did, I couldn't get that shelf to look right (again, differences between ps-bevel and gimp-map). Any suggestions or ideas would be very welcome.
> 
> As always, we have a PS shot following Asc's tut to the letter (or trying to), a gimp shot showing the translation, and a pdf for the steps followed.



I know this post is almost 2 1/2 years old now, but is there any way those PDFs you mention in this post and a few previous?

----------


## Gidde

did they disappear? i have a copy i think, but my interwebs got knocked out by a lightning strike last night so it'll be a couple days before i can get it uploaded (can't attach from the phone)


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

----------


## Gidde

Ok, I've added the Gimp translation PDF to the top post in the thread after reading through the thread and making sure Ascension had intended for that to happen (and yeah, he did say that at one point). Unfortunately the palettes and such that I had developed got lost with my recent hard drive wipe  :Frown:

----------


## Kindari

I loved this style so much, I made a document to present it with more shortcut keys and such. I think it can help people learn shortcuts in Photoshop and such (I learned a lot just writing it). You can find it here: http://www.cartographersguild.com/sh...Style-Tutorial

----------


## carsonw

This looks intimidating, but this weekend i'll give it a try.

----------


## wisemoon

Hi Ascension,

I am actually using Kindari's re-worked version of your tutorial, but I had a question. I have a fairly powerful computer (tri-core AMD Phenom II, plenty of RAM) and yet when I am working on a map using your method, Photoshop slows to a CRAWL. I am wondering, do you think it might be slow because of all the layer styles in your method? I like the effects, but if that is what is causing the huge rendering times I am thinking it might be better to find other ways to get the same effect.

If you don't have any idea, I guess I will just have to experiment. From working with Gimp, I know there are ways to get similar types of effects by simply stacking layers and using different filters. Although, I'm not sure that PS has the same filters as Gimp...some are the same, but oddly enough sometimes Gimp can do things that Photoshop can't, even though PS has a lot of great features and a lot of automation that Gimp doesn't have.

Anyway, I will play around with some things and if I find other ways to get the same effect, that don't slow PS down so much, I will post them.

wisemoon

----------


## josephgene

> snip


I have this same problem. The resolution of the actual file i believe is 1000x1000 so not too large and i have created images that were much larger.

----------


## S1L3N71

As an amateur PS user, I am pretty embarrassed to admit that I got stuck after shaping the land and water when I'm supposed to link and "merge down" the layers... lol




> When happy, copy this layer and click on the “Base” layer. Link the “Base” and “Ocean Copy” layers together then merge down.


Which layer am I supposed to select and merge, base or ocean copy? They are linked but when both are selected there is no option to "Merge Down." Using CS5.1

----------


## Gidde

Instead of selecting both, right-click on the "top" one. Merge down should then be an option in the right-click menu.

----------


## Phae O' Brien

First post on the forum and I already need help!  :Razz: 

I've downloaded the pdf of this tutorial and am trying to do it justice, but there is only problem I can't seem to find out how to work around. I already have designed the lineart of my atlas on another PSD file and I'm not keen on straying from my original landmasses and oceans for something completely random that this tutorial offers. So, I was wondering if there is a way to incorporate my own lineart in a layer somewhere somehow and create the same effect on my atlas.

Thanks a lot for an amazing tutorial!  :Smile:

----------


## Gidde

Sure there is! Instead of using clouds and a hard mix layer, just import your lineart coastline, and do a fuzzy select to select the sea. Then fill the sea black, invert your selection, fill your land white, and continue from there.

----------


## Sorpaw

GIMP?  How do you import an image from CC2 Pro/CC3 into it and modify the image?  Is there a basic "cartographer software user's guide" to GIMP?  I would love to be able to add things to/from maps as necessary.  As I understand it,

1.  You save the file in an extension that GIMP understands (.bmp, .jpeg, etc.)
2.  You open this file in GIMP
3..  How do you select what you want to alter?

The tutorials are over my head - they are not sufficiently simple (I may be thick, too); I will have to do the contrast by hand, line by line, if necessary.  I appreciate all the guidance I can get!!

Sorpaw

----------


## JefBT

Awesome amazing tutorial

----------


## Archimald

So obviously this tutorial produces a fairly large scale map. Does anyone have any good estimates as to the scale of the maps in terms of miles per pixel?

----------


## caslumali

Nice work! Good colours

----------


## Siggy442

I don't know if he's still around, but I'd just like to thank Ascension for this tutorial. It was my first attempt at a map (and one of my first real ventures with Photoshop) and it came out brilliantly after only a day of work. 

I had one question I was curious if anyone could help me with. I was wondering if there was an easy way of editing the mountain and hills after the process is completed. Say, I'm done, but decided I wanted to add a little something here, remove something there, etc. Removing is easy, I know - just erase the hills, etc.. Adding... seems to be a little more complicated. 

Thanks!

----------


## JavaJoeCoffee

> I don't know if he's still around, but I'd just like to thank Ascension for this tutorial. It was my first attempt at a map (and one of my first real ventures with Photoshop) and it came out brilliantly after only a day of work. 
> 
> I had one question I was curious if anyone could help me with. I was wondering if there was an easy way of editing the mountain and hills after the process is completed. Say, I'm done, but decided I wanted to add a little something here, remove something there, etc. Removing is easy, I know - just erase the hills, etc.. Adding... seems to be a little more complicated. 
> 
> Thanks!


Hi Siggy,
Not sure if you're still interested, but minutes ago I posted my first map using this tut: http://www.cartographersguild.com/re...tml#post256318

For my badlands area, I used a variation on the tundra section of the tut. 
1. Create a new layer and draw a black area over where the new mountains go. 
2. Magic wand select the black, then contract and feather the selection.
3. Select the mountain layer and copy/paste to create a new layer. 
4. Again, Magic wand select the black, then contract and feather the selection. 
5. Select the original mountain layer and click the layer mask button, make sure the mask is bracketed and paint bucket fill the selection with black. This will non-destructively remove the old mountains from the area.

If you want entirely new mountains replace "step 3" with this...
3a. Filter > Render > Clouds, and then, Filter > Render > Difference Clouds (x2), and apply the layer effects (overlay and bevel) from the tutorial. Voila new mountains in a limited area.
... then do the remaining steps above to knock out the old mountains. Of course you'll have to do the same with the hills too! So, yes, it's not quick.

----------


## Bebhionn

Beautiful work. I am looking forward to trying it out.  :Smile:

----------


## Killachong

I just wanted to give thanks for you taking the time to make this tutorial and being cool enough to share your methods! muchos gracias

----------


## 3E208

I love this style! :Very Happy:

----------


## NotThanksI'mGood

I'm having trouble at step 21. When applying the gradient overlay, everything seems fine on "Normal" blend mode but when I change it to "Hard Light" the colours are way too dark and the gradient looks much more abrupt than before.
Does someone have a solution?

----------


## Qoff

Edit: Nevermind, just got it.

----------


## Murph

Ok so I'm pretty new at this like fresh off the boat new. I found your tutorial to be phenomenal. Though difficult to read. I have two concerns or issues. In PSC6 is there an alternative to representing height as white while applying the lighting effects. Either i am special and cannot find the button or it is no longer available. My other issue was the shelf layer. Occasionally to fairly frequently the bevel appears to inverse itself while i am working on other layers.

----------


## woekan

Question. When i use the lightning effects, the center seems to be unaffected. Any tips on how to fix that?

----------


## Dungeoneer

I seem to be having a little trouble.  None of the mountain textures seem to be showing up and the gradient seems completely different to the tut.  I even had to reverse the order of the colors otherwise I had a desert in the north and snowbound lands in the south.

----------


## dglott

ok I have tried to use this but this seems to be an older photoshop version then the one I have and im a bit confused on a few of the things seeing as they don't translate over to the newer version!!! I got to right b4 applying the mountians and stuff but once I started to add the light effect is where I got lost!!! PLEASE HELP thanks

----------


## themantheycallcris

Thanks for another great contribution.  Looking forward to running through the steps and seeing what I get!

----------


## themantheycallcris

Wasn't sure if this had been shared in the 36 pages here or not.  For those who might be working in GIMP and have pixilated edges on their land borders, the "Median Filter" found in PS can be replaced by the functionality of:  Filters---- Enhance---- Despeckle (uncheck "Adaptive" and "Recursive", set the black level to -1, and crank the white level all the way up to 256).  Discovered this here... http://dossy.org/2007/08/what-is-gim...median-filter/

----------


## themantheycallcris

Got through the GIMP steps, now just need to get to labeling!



### Latest WIP ###

----------


## Malverno

Hello everyone, this is my first post in the Guild!

I have been working on a couple of Maps following this amazing tutorial (well, the GIMP version by Gedde of it at least) and this is my latest Work In Progress. I am quite proud of it and can't wait to get on with the next steps (rivers, borders, roads and naming), but I have ended up being stuck for a few issues.



I apologise if I ask any silly question or anything already asked before, but it is kind of hard/not very user friendly (at least to me) navigating this forum and this specific thread, and on top of that I am a basic user when it comes to image editing programs. Still, I am amazed at how much I could learn and the result I could produce thanks to this fantastic tutorial!

On with my issues, to which I would appreciate if anyone can help me with:

1) There is no clear explanation on lakes. How should I go about them, or what can I refer to if there is a separate guide? The original tutorial by Ascension has also lakes included, but the GIMP process leaves them out.
Should I draw them like I draw the rivers and borders, or is there anything that takes into account the "height map" in the Ocean Layer and automatically can map lakes in the areas of depression?

2) I am absolutely not satisfied with my mountains. I am fairly sure I followed the process religiously until now, but the mountains do not look as "sharp", but rather grainy. And the snowcaps are not really around. You can see a closeup below.
Am I doing anything wrong? Maybe I am using an outdated version of the tutorial? Is there a separate guide for mountains somewhere else?
Also, I would like to add a few mountains, but there is only mention of deleting them in the tutorial.
I do not mind redoing the whole mountains/hills/snowcaps etc process again.

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## Wil

I'm following them to the letter, but when I get to  step 1l (removing the Noise, Clip and Coastline layers) I am left only black sea which doesn't match the screenshots.

Does anyone know what order the noise, clip and coastline layers should be in? My guess from the tutorial is that they are in that order. I'm using GIMP 2.8 BTW.

It also might be relevant that I already have a coastline, so I am using the selection of that outline to limit the area I am painting for the land clouds.

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## tom555x

I'm struggling to find the palette for Gidde's GIMP version of the tutorial, where is it?

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## roguecartographer

I followed the Gimp tutorial (at least up to the adding tiny details bit of it) and this is the result. I am pretty happy with it.


I noticed there were quite a few steps where Gedde assumed people knew where effects were and didn't clearly explain when certain things needed to be hid or unhid (selected or unselected, as well). I was able to get through it pretty well with my experience in the program, but I think it would be worth revising with a few clarifications. I may try to get around to it, with Gedde's approval (I am new and don't want to step on someone's toes). I am really happy with my results and can't give Gedde enough praise for the tutorial (as I would have been lost trying to replicate Ascensions original tutorial into GIMP).

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## science&creativity

Is anyone else trying to use this with GIMP 2.10? 
even looking at the GIMP version of the tutorial there have definitely  been some significant changes to menus/tools in the interim.

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