Fractal Terrains 3

[Dark Knight]

I am a new mapper thinking about incorporating Fractal Terrains 3 into either GIMP or Photoshop. Is there anyone here with some experience with this program?

[ladiestorm]

I just recently purchased Fractal Terrains 3 myself. If I may ask, do you have any of the other Profantasy products? Have you ever used CC3+ or any of its predecessors? I ask because there is a bit of a learning curve, especially if you are used to working with programs like photoshop. I'm not saying it can't be done... I'm not familiar with photo shop, and I'm barely familiar with Gimp (I use cc3+ pretty exclusively). But I do know from what I have learned so far, you can export fractal terrain worlds into other programs, as long as you save it to the right format.

There are others on this website that have much more experience with FT3 than I do - two come to mind: Mouse, and Waldronate. I know there are others, but these two are probably your best bet for experience of what fractal terrains can do.

[Dark Knight]

Hello,

I own several of the Pro Fantasy products like CC3+ and Dungeon Designer, plus several annual products. I am at the point after been practicing with CC3+ for a while now, where I want to stem out. I would highly recommend CC3+ just because it has so many add on options. How do you like using GIMP? I know that several people here use it with great results..

[Mouse]

Hello Dark Knight

I use all kinds of software these days: CC3+, DD3, CD3, Perspectives, Fractal Terrains 3, Wilbur, Krita, Blender, Sketchup, Truspace, Corel, and until Win 10 messed up the relationship between GIMP and my Wacom drawing tablet I used GIMP as well. In fact most of my recent maps were done in GIMP and CC3+ by exporting jpg images between the two apps. The maps I'm planning will most likely be done in Krita and CC3+ and its add-ons.

There is no direct way to plug Profantasy products into things like GIMP. You need to export jpg or png images from one and import them into the other, but you can certainly use them in tandem to make a map where you get the best of both worlds. For example I did an island recently where the background of the ocean and island were created in GIMP, and all the houses, trees and other details were added in CC3+. The labels were CC3+ because labels are easier and can be drawn along a curve a lot better in CC3+ than they can in GIMP. Houses in particular shade themselves automatically in CC3+ depending on the angle of the sun, though GIMP is better for doing the soft and variable shading of the background.

You can also use GIMP to create your own new symbols for use in CC3+ I have lots of my own artwork as symbols, including an entire set of trees that I created in Blender, processed in GIMP, and imported to CC3+.

Where I am swapping GIMP out for Krita, I will become even more reliant on CC3+ for labelling, since Krita's text handling system seems to be virtually non-existent.

The reason I'm rambling on about CC3+ and not Fractal Terrains is because I haven't done a lot of work between FT3 and GIMP. In fact I've only ever started one world map that way. Progress stalled because I got involved in a string of challenges and haven't had time to go back to it yet, but yes - its really very easy. All you have to do is create your world in FT3 and export it as a jpg or png, then use it as the base of a map drawn mainly in GIMP/PS.

And to be perfectly honest I haven't even scraped the surface with what FT3 can do, because I tend to use it primarily for creating believable worlds without all that hassle of having to incorporate polar distortions into freehand maps. Here is an example exported JPG from FT3 in a number of different projections (the same world in each case), in which you can see for yourself that drawing the polar distortion in the equirectangular projection, for example, would be something of a nightmare without FT3:

Example world.jpg
Equirectangular projection

Example world Hammer.jpg
Hammer projection

Example world Azimuthal Equidistant.jpg
Azimuthal Equidistant projection

Example world AE Hemispheres.jpg
AE Hemisphere projection

And here is the same example exported as a spin sequence of 200 images directly from FT3 and turned into an animation in GIMP

Example.gif

FT3 is a very powerful tool and in my opinion well worth the purchase. But I do think that I am barely qualified to chatter on for too much longer about its capabilities and uses, since I simply don't know the full extent of what it can do.

For that, you really would need someone like Waldronate, or at least a much more experienced user than me

EDIT: All the above images are relatively small to be able to upload them here in a single comment. You can export really very large images from FT3 to work on. Also the colour scheme is unique to me. I prefer a more muted base map than the default colours to work with.

[Dark Knight]

Thanks Mouse. I particularly like the Hammer Projection view.

[Mouse]

That's a good one isn't it

The most transferable map projection is the first one - the equirectangular projection, which can be imported into lots of other apps, though you will need to trim the background edges off the export before you use it that way.

I hope we managed to answer a few of your questions.

If you want to have a play there's a trial version of FT3 here. Its limited in its capacity compared to the full version, but it should give you a rough idea of how things work.

[Dark Knight]

I actually have already purchased FT3 and several CC3 products which I do recommend.

[Mouse]

Then we shall be looking out for new worlds from you in the future