The Köppen–Geiger climate classification made simpler (I hope so)

[Mysterious Mapmaker XXIII]

Okay, normally I'd never even consider double posting, but this thing's dropped to nearly the bottom of the second page of this forum.

In any case, anything new to report with this? Thanks.

[antillies]

Hi Azelor,

Thank you for such a wonderful tutorial. I'm doing my best to follow it, though I admit I'm sure it will take quite a few tries before I can get something precise (since I'm so new to this).

I'm running into a problem with the final (climate) step and the script. When I load it up in Photoshop, it loads as a folder with various sub-actions, like this:

climateScript.png

I'm not sure if that's how it's supposed to be loaded (I'm using CS6 if that makes a difference) but when I run the individual actions step-by-step, it doesn't seem to be behaving properly. I end up with an outline of my land in an icy blue color and a green square in the upper left hand side.

I'm sure I must be doing something wrong. If you might have any insight into what that might be I would greatly appreciate it. Thanks!

[Azélor]

Yes it is supposed to be like that for the moment. I planned to merge the different sections after people tested it. In the meantime, I keep it that way as it makes it easier to see if one step is not working properly.

It's not easy to identify the problem. If you could upload on image taken at the end of each step, I might be able to figure it out.

[antillies]

Thanks so much for the response, Azelor. And that makes sense about keeping the actions separate to make debugging easier.

After playing around with it some more, I believe the quirkiness I was experiencing was due to user error on my part and not the script. I've been able to get usable results with my last few passes and the most recent one worked flawlessly. Sorry to have sounded the alarm.

Edit:

Actually, I did have one question. The script is producing a color that doesn't match any on the legend. I think it may be Dwb but it's not an exact RGB match. I've attached a snippet of the map with regions of Dfc, Dfb, and the mystery color (which is [35,67,33]). Any idea which one it's supposed to be?

[Azélor]

It does look like it's the Dwb. Where does it appear on the map/ do you have other areas with this color?

[Charerg]

I guess it could be Cfc as well, doesn't look brown enough to be Dwb, at least not to my eyes. Any chance you'd share your map with us Antillles? It's always a joy to take a look at how the climate turned out after all that work of going through this tutorial.

Anyway, good to see that the thread is still alive and people are using the tutorial!

[antillies]

Any chance you'd share your map with us Antillles? It's always a joy to take a look at how the climate turned out after all that work of going through this tutorial.

You're sweet to encourage me, Charerg. I'll share but I still have a long way to go in terms of producing something's that accurate.

I'm attaching the latest output below. It's only a single continent at the moment and it's more of a proof of concept to see how the climates would fall with regards to latitude and general land shape. I do not have an elevation map at the moment and, for this pass, just assumed everything was relatively the same height. I apologize for its rather unformed appearance.

[Azélor]

I find it strange that the Db climates are located north of the Dc ones unless they are
1- located very far apart (for example Scandinavia is warmer than Siberia)
2- located at higher altitude

Also, the transition should be more like Db Dc or Cc and then tundra

So the color we were wondering about is clearly Cfb. But, as I explained a couple of pages ago, it's also Cfc. The difference between the two is not the monthly temperatures of July/January but the length of either winter or summer, I don't remember. To differentiate them, we would need to make more temperature maps and it would be a waste of time IMHO since Cc climates are uncommon. Actually, there is one temperature combination unique to Cc climates IIRC : 10-18 degrees all year long. But since the Cc climates tend to be located at high latitudes on Earth the difference of temperature between the seasons rarely allow this combination to occur.

To continue, there should be a transition between Cb and Dc. It's usually Db.

I am not sure that Dsa should cover that a large area, unless they are mostly located at higher altitude. It's located at the same latitude as the other Mediterranean climates but they have cooler winters, this is usually because of the altitude. but maybe it could be because of the continentality, I'm not sure.

W and S climates should not tough each other but they may be close if there is a mountains range. That could explain the difference in precipitations.

Your Dwc climate look way off the track. Are there mountains around?

Lastly, you need a transition. There is an area that turn from desert to Cfb but you need to put a steppe there. All the way to the Csa, Csb

[Charerg]

Ok, I'll leave the more detailed feedback to Azelor, but here's a theoretical "box continent" that may be helpful:

Box Continent - Climates.png

It shows the most common climate types (as well as approximately where they usually appear), as well as what the transitions from one climate type to the next generally look like. Basically, if your continent is just a "flat slab" and heights are not taken into consideration, the climates should fit the "box model" (approximately).

@Azelor:
Btw, I did the "box continent" fairly quickly, so if there are any obvious errors (in terms of latitude where a climate type appears), feel free to point those out.


Edit:

@Antilles:
Regarding your climate map, I agree with Azelor: if the center of the continent (the brown area) is Dsb and Dsa, there's definitely something wrong, as those climate types generally only occur on a few mountains on Earth. Basically almost all "D climates" should be Df, except in the eastern coast of large Asia-like continents, where Dw would appear (in the interior, the coasts should be Df).

Ds climates should only appear in mountainous areas, on the western coasts (on Earth, Ds appears in the Rocky Mountains, Caucasus, Pamir and the Hindu Kush).

[antillies]

Thank you guys for your feedback! Like I said, it was just a first try concept. I'm going to reapproach the temperature and precipitation maps and see if I can get something better.

@Azelor: As I told Charerg, I didn't include any height considerations this time around because I was just curious how the climates would fall with no mountains. But I'm glad to know it is Cfb. Now that I have a general idea of how the process works, I'm going to try again and see if I can get something that is not so strange, haha. Thanks.