First independently made map using GIMP

[Apa1994]

Read a tutorial today and after that I tried making a map without looking at it. For a first try I think it is pretty ok.
If anyone has any suggestions I welcome them more than gladly.

Map1.gif

[EricPoehlsen]

You could now select the light fill on the mountains and remove it, so it is not lighter than the papertexture
Alternatively and probably the better solution set the layer blend mode of the mountains to 'darken'

blendmode.jpg
Exaggerated example

[Gidde]

Looking pretty good so far You also might want to try some sort of shading in the water to differentiate it from the land.

[Lukc]

Another fine trick you can use is varying the width of the rivers. As rivers flow together the volume of water increases, this means that rivers further downstream are wider. Conversely, near the source, rivers tend to be pretty narrow, so it may be a good idea to indicate this with narrower lines on the map.