[Tutorial] Using GPlates to model continental drift

[Charerg]

Thanks Charerg, I was also curiouse, could I not just keep the Pangea at present day 0 mya and have the whole time line go from like 200 mya to 200 million years into the future and figure out the before and the after? Is this possible?

I suppose that should be possible, though I have never tried it out.

[Pixie]

An alternative way, which I'm using as well these days:

draw your pangaea and set the pieces to start moving at, say, at 200 Ma.
set your rotations.rot so like this:

0 90.0 0.0 0.0 000 ! The end, but you will never get to zero Ma, just letting g.plates use it
1 XX YY RR 000 ! This is your real final position, which will happen when the clock shows 1 Ma

latest date worked out... XX YY RR 000 ! As you work out new positions, you can update the rotation in 1 Ma, and your simulation keeps the plate still in the period you haven't still worked on

200 90.0 0.0 0.0 000 ! Starting position (Pangaea)

So, the basic idea is to aim at 1, while leaving a 0-rotation for the date 0 Ma, which g.plates needs, and at the same time, working with time moving forward, wich makes it easier for us as well.

[kacey]

So I've imported a raster image and traced out a couple of continents just for testing, but when I set the reconstruction polygons to continents under the image file it clips out only one plate and leaves the rest blank...wtf! I saved two plate id's under continents so why am I only getting one from my raster. As I can recall this happened last time I tried to figure out G.Plates too but I don't remember how I resolved it that time.

Any ideas what I've done wrong to cause this?

Sorry for cluttering up this thread with questions.

[Charerg]

So I've imported a raster image and traced out a couple of continents just for testing, but when I set the reconstruction polygons to continents under the image file it clips out only one plate and leaves the rest blank...wtf! I saved two plate id's under continents so why am I only getting one from my raster. As I can recall this happened last time I tried to figure out G.Plates too but I don't remember how I resolved it that time.

Any ideas what I've done wrong to cause this?

Sorry for cluttering up this thread with questions.

Did you remember to update the rotation file as well? Remember that each time you add a new Plate ID you need to set that up in the rotation file.

[kacey]

It’s not the rotation file, I think maybe I forgot to save some changes when I made the plates, not really sure but Started fresh and it seems to be working now, sorry for the bother.

[Charerg]

As a bit of an inspiration for potential users (I hope), I thought I'd post a WIP video of the tectonic project for my own conworld. It uses most of the toolkit explained in this tutorial, though this remains a work-in-progress, so some pieces are missing, some details are a bit off, and so forth. But without further ado, here is the video:

 

Feel free to ask any questions, and keep drifting!

[shadixdarkkon]

Hey Charerg, I know that this tutorial is pretty old, but I had a quick question. Do you know if there is any way to create a feature with a conjugate plate ID without having to manually edit the .rot file each time? I've tried setting the conjugate ID when I create the feature, but it doesn't work for some reason, and the feature (in this case of a subduction zone) won't move with the piece of continental crust that it is supposed to be moving with.

[Charerg]

Hey Charerg, I know that this tutorial is pretty old, but I had a quick question. Do you know if there is any way to create a feature with a conjugate plate ID without having to manually edit the .rot file each time? I've tried setting the conjugate ID when I create the feature, but it doesn't work for some reason, and the feature (in this case of a subduction zone) won't move with the piece of continental crust that it is supposed to be moving with.

You could initialize the feature to be conjugated to begin with. For example:

Plate ID	Time	Latitude	Longitude	Angle	Conjugate plate	Comment
100	0.0	90.0	0.0	0.0	200	Plate A
100	500.0	90.0	0.0	0.0	200	Plate A

In the above case Plate 100 would follow the movements of Plate 200. However, if you're just setting up a feature like a subduction zone, you probably just want to give it the same Plate ID as the plate it's supposed to be moving with (in which case you don't need to touch the rotation file).

[Bobemor]

Hi,
Found this tutorial really useful for getting me started on some stuff. Was just wondering if someone could cast there eye over what I've currently got and tell me if it just looks roughly like plates could look. Thought I should get that checked before I even begin moving stuff about.

 

image_0.00Ma.jpg
The little trianlges just mark oceanic crust. The Big light blue one on the south pole is also one but triangle doesn't show up!

[RedKellBell]

Hello there!

I was wondering if anyone could help me out with an issue. I got as far as moving the pole around, double checking all of my work, but I am unable to get the "Modify Reconstruction Pole" to light up. It's greyed out, i.e., disabled. I've searched the manual as to why this could be with no clear answer. Thank you for any help you can give!