Which mapping software should I use?
So I have a world that I've created for which I want to create some maps of decent quality and detail. I'm a complete noob when it comes to mapping software, so I'm not sure which to get. I've done some research, on this forum and elsewhere, and it seems like the most recommended software for beginners is GIMP. However, I don't think this software is for me, because I don't want to just create a visual representation of the world I already have, but instead I want the process of making the map to aid me in further detailing my world. To my understanding, GIMP is just a graphical software that lets you create whatever kinds of images you want. Proficiency with this software allows you to create maps of higher quality than more limited software like Campaign Cartographer. But what I like about CC3, or more specifically Fractal Terrains 3, is that it not only creates maps, but also gives you statistics for your world, such as altitude, temperature, and rainfall stats. It can draw rivers on automatically based on the topography created. Realism is very important to me, so features such as these which help me ensure that my map is not just readable, but realistic, are very important to me.
See, the thing is, I'm not just creating a world, I'm creating a planet. I already have a rough idea of my planet's physical characteristics, including atmospheric pressure, average surface temperature, surface gravity, etc. (if anyone is looking for a resource for creating detailed, realistic planets for high-realism settings, I highly, highly recommend the book GURPS Space), so I want to create a map that is in line with those statistics and hopefully adds to them. (And also, just because I can't stop my self from sharing, I'm not just creating a planet, I'm creating a solar system. And dammit, if I can make a galaxy, I'll make that too. Again, HIGHLY recommend GURPS Space. It can do all this. Except maybe the galaxy. Don't know how to do that.) But because I like to make things hard for myself, I specifically have the goal to make my world as different as possible from Earth, while making it as realistic as possible. So the atmospheric pressure is 10x that of Earth, the average surface temp is 132oF (56oC), the surface is 85% water, and it has 1.4x the gravity of Earth. Oh, and the sky (and oceans) is purple. Oh, and the plants are blue (probably). All of this, to my knowledge, is both physically possible and inhabitable. For the next few million years. Did I mention that the planet is in the early stages of a runaway greenhouse effect? You know, like Venus.
So as you can see, I already I have a fairly specific conception of how my world should be. I want to create a world map for this planet (the planet is called Salvumar) that conforms to these physical characteristics and to the world map I've already drawn. I'm attaching two pictures with this post. The first is the hand drawn map I already have of Salvumar. I drew this map maybe six years ago with no regard for realism, and now I'm trying to make it realistic without actually changing it because I like it and it's been my world map for six years. The second picture is a document detailing various properties of my world, including the most of the ones I shared in the paragraph above. I've been told that both of these maps are unreadable, so good luck.
To sum up, I want a mapping software that...
- Can create realistic planetary maps with a great deal of flexibility as to the properties of the planet.
- Gives enough customization of the planet's landmasses to create approximately the same world map as the one I've drawn.
- Provides statistical information about the planet's physical characteristics.
Ok, so now to talk about the actual software available. Like I said, it doesn't seem like GIMP does much to make sure your maps are realistic, so I don't think it's the software I need. The obvious choice then seems to be Campaign Cartographer 3 and Fractal Terrains 3. There is also Fractal Mapper 8.0 w/Fractal World Explorer, which seems to do at least most of what I want and is substantially cheaper than CC3 and it's addons. This should be great, but it also gives much less detail about what it does, and I haven't heard much about it, which makes me think that it might not be as good as CC3 & FT3. So what software should I use? What software will be able to create the maps I want but also provide me with the level of rigor and realism that I want? It kinda feels like I'm asking for the best of both worlds here. I should say that I'm aware that CC3 has a steep learning curve and I have no experience in mapping software whatsoever. Well, I have two months left of summer vacation, so I should have the time to learn CC3. Right? Also, I watched Joe Sweeney's YouTube tutorials on CC3, and while I think I understand why people say CC3 has a steep learning curve, it appears to me that it is not all that hard when you've learned what each of the million different buttons and menu items do. So without really knowing what I'm talking about, I feel like I should be able to handle learning CC3. Of course, FT3 is really what I'm interested in. I'll likely just be using CC3 to add details to continents I've already created in FT3. I've seen but not watched Joe Sweeney's FT3 YouTube tutorials. Additionally, I should note that how good the map looks is much, much less important to me than whether it does what I want it to. Actually, I may very well create a detailed, functional map that's ugly as sin with whatever software, then redraw the map with GIMP to make it look pretty. That'll be years down the line, but I have that kind of time.
Now back to sharing, because I actually cannot stop myself. Like, I may have a problem. Send help.(If you're only interested in mapping software, feel free to stop here.)
If you can read my maps, you'll notice that the continents are all clustered together in an unusual configuration. In fact, comparing the drawing in the first picture to the mappy thing at the top of the second picture, you'll notice that all the continents are clustered together in an area about 25-30% of the total surface area of Salvumar - a continent supercluster, if you will. This is just the result of me initially drawing a crowded map and then later deciding that I wanted to make the surface 85% oceans. I'm justifying this setup by saying that the continents of Salvumar were just recently joined together into a single supercontinent - like Pangea - and are now drifting apart, forming instead a supercluster that will eventually break apart further until all the continents are spread out across the entire planet. You'll also notice that all the continents are rather small and snaky. Again, this is just how I originally drew the map, and now I have to justify it. This I'm justifying by saying that Salvumar has a high level of tectonic activity, which means it's tectonic plates are small and numerous. I believe this would create a larger number of smaller continents, as opposed to a smaller number of larger continents such as Earth has. Still I have to figure out if such a supercontinent would break apart as I've drawn it doing so. Incidentally, heavy tectonic activity, along with heavy volcanic activity and a hot, humid, hurricane prone climate make Salvumar quite a dangerous place to live. What fun!
I mentioned that Salvumar's sky and oceans are purple and it's plants are blue. I really want to make the sky purple because purple is my favorite color and also shut up. This turns out to be a difficult thing to do without making the planet uninhabitable, or at least without significantly changing the biochemistry of its inhabitants. I believe that I have a reasonable, if not a completely sufficient, explanation for how this is so. Salvumar's sun is fairly similar to Earth's, just slightly hotter, brighter, and more massive. This means the light coming from this sun is similarly composed (in terms of composition of different wavelenths) to that of our sun, just shifted slightly in the ultraviolet direction. Now, it's been a while since I did this research, but I believe that when our sun's rays hit Earth's atmosphere, the larger wavelengths such as red and green mostly pass through unabated while the smaller wavelengths, blue and violet, are scattered by the molecules in the atmosphere. Scattered light pings around the atmosphere for a while before it comes to Earth (or into outerspace, I presume), so when you look at any given point in the sky, you're seeing scattered light. This is why the Earth's sky appears blue. Violet is actually scattered more than blue in our atmosphere, so the sky should appear violet to us. It doesn't because our eyes don't work so well at the ultraviolet end of the visible spectrum. We're better at seeing blue than violet, so we see blue instead of violet when we look at the sky. Whether this violet would actually appear purple is unclear. Every visual representation I've seen of the visual spectrum has shown violet as purple, but MinutePhysics claims that this violet would appear more of a dark blue. But anyway, to make the sky purple, I'm currently saying three things: One, that Salvumar's sun is brighter than Earth's, so there is physically more violet light hitting Salvumar. Two, because Salvumar is more massive than Earth, it can hold light molecules in it's atmosphere. In particular, a significant component of its atmosphere is free helium, which reduces the density of Salvumar's atmosphere with respect to Earth's. Smaller molecules scatter smaller wavelengths, thus more violet light is scattered than in Earth's atmosphere. And three, I'm simply saying that the inhabitants of Salvumar have eyes that can see further into the utraviolet spectrum, so they can see all that violet more easily. Well, not so simple actually. I actually have six distinct civilized species living on Salvumar, which means five different kinds of eyes. Yup, five. One of the races doesn't have eyes. Because I'm edgy like that. I think what I'll actually do is make only most of the species see the sky as purple, to create some interesting conversations in my books.
I'm making the plants blue mainly because I don't want them to be green. Again, the light from Salvumar's sun is pretty close to the light from Earth's sun. On Earth, plants appear green because the chlorophyll in their leaves strongly absorbs blue and red light and reflects green light. So all I need to do is find or come up with a new chemical useful for photosynthesis that strongly absorbs green light and reflects some other wavelength of light, nominally blue light. That shouldn't be any problem for someone with virtually no background in chemistry (I'm actually a physics major right now in college, as well as a creative writing major, and I'm aiming to get a Ph.D. in physics. So maybe/hopefully I'll meet a chemist who can help me with this.). Actually, I'm just now realizing that the plants may not be blue, because even if they reflect blue light, all or most of the blue light is scattered in the atmosphere so they may not have any concentrated blue light to reflect. Would they be red? I remember at one point coming across a reason why the plants couldn't be red, but I don't recall the actual reason right now. If they're not green and they're not blue and they're not red, then what colors are left for them to be? Hmmm... maybe they would be very dark, almost black, perhaps with a slight blue tinge from the small amount of scattered blue light they're reflecting, and when you shine an artificial white light on them, they turn blue. Huh. THAT WOULD BE THE BEST. I'm just postulating here, I don't know how this would actually work. I need to research this further.
Whew, I think that's all. Well, no, not nearly. I could talk about my world for days, but I have to cut myself off somewhere. Hopefully this wasn't too much. Until next time!
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