Adjust an equirectangular map for use as a globe?

[Manitou]

I have a high-resolution equirectangular world map, that I'd love to use for a cooperative worldbuilding endeavor. Unfortunately, some of the continents just aren't working when I project this onto a globe. What I'm hoping to do is apply a distortion to the map, so that the ploar regions are stretched in order to make the map look "realistic" on a 3D projection. I'm using Photoshop CS6. The Polar Distortion filter didn't quite work, and the Spherical Mapping Projection, which seemed very promising, had no visible effect on the map. Thanks for your help!

Quintessence Map High Res Spherical Correction.jpg

[ThomasR]

You can google Maptoglobe, an online ressource to make globes and GIFs of rotating globes.

[Manitou]

To clarify, I can get my map onto a globe - the problem is that once it gets on a globe it has pretty severe polar stretching, so I'm trying to figure out how to easily distort my 2-d maps poles, so the 3d version looks normal, if that makes sense.

[johnvanvliet]

i use gimp to fix the poles

an example
https://www.cartographersguild.com/s...l=1#post350359