WIP- unnamed fantasy world

[ascanius]

Hey everyone. Back in the game.

Ok here is the latest update.
WM prvw 6.jpg

I drew tentative boundary for the area above plate five and adjusted the divergent boundary to the west of plate five, creating two micro-plates.
I corrected the direction of plate six to better reflect what I have in gplates. Not certain about having it a transform boundary seeing that plate six and two interact at a 90 degree angle for most of that boundary. Maybe along the southern portion I should change to transform.
I then removed the southern tips of plates 1 and 3 leaving in it's place a single plate with the island chain showing a suture zone, not sure this is possible between two oceanic plates though.
Lastly I increased the size of the subduction boundary circles though now that I look at it it doesn't seem like I increased them enough.

[Pixie]

Well, it seems a few of us are back in the game (my busiest period at work is over, hurray!)

Jumping into your map, ascanius, like I said before, it's pretty damn good and you did a splendid job with g.plates, so all that remains to do is fine tuning the details. Some comments:
- I think the junction of plates 14/10/33 is beautiful, don't you dare change that. It will result in a fine mountain range with plenty of wrinkles.
- plates 31/32 could be the way you drafted them, just don't forget to put the divergent side of plate 32 on the other side of the map
- your central ocean is still a bit messy, and along with plate 16, there are a lot of places where it seems to be that you have subduction at the wrong places/directions (see below)
- interaction between plate 6 and 2 is fine as it is (subduction), but I'd place it a little further from the coastline.
- those former tips of plates 1 and 3 may have become a suture zone, yes, although it will probably erode and subduct with time (oceanic crust always gets recycled) - at its southern end, it should have already been "eaten" by plate 7.
- indeed, those circles need to get bigger

Now, about ocean/ocean boundaries, let me revise an important mechanism that isn't clear on your map. I took a shot from the boundary 5/16 to use as example.
whichoceansubducts.gif
Younger crust always imposes itself on the older oceanic crust. Whenever you have ocean vs ocean, you have to consider which of the sides is further away from its source (the divergent boundary) - this is the easiest way to do it, neglecting that spread rate differs from ridge to ridge.

alternative.gif
This is how I picture the boundary. The continuous "rolling back" of that trench would also probably create reasonably large volcanic islands close to the edge of plate 16, with both active and extinct volcanoes.
Further south, plate 5 still has fresh ocean crust being created, so, again, it would impose on plate 16.

There's a few other places I could use as examples as well. I think this is the one mechanism you still need a better grasp of. (Please don't take the "lecture" in the wrong way, I tend to be a mr.know.it.all and I know that can be annoying)

[groovey]

Glad to hear from you again ascanius, I guess that means your wrist it's fine now, so that's good.

Again, I'm not of much help but I agree, the subduction circles are still a tad small. Perhaps it'd work better with a bit of less circles (more spaced), but bigger.

Pixie, I personally loved your last post, that factor had never even crossed my mind when doing mine, so it was really interesting and enlightening to learn about.

[ascanius]

It's cool Pixie I appreciate the criticism it helps make a better map. I just hope that I didn't miss an area.
Yup Groovey the wrist is better. For whatever reason when me and my cousins get together one of us gets hurt, last time it included a trip to the ER.

Ok here is the latest update. Mostly I went back and changed the curvature of the subduction boundaries to reflect what Pixie mentioned in the last post. Hope I got all the spots. there are a few areas I wasn't sure about such as the eastern boundaries of 18 and 19 which I extended eastwards and rounded out the boundary so it is no longer a straight line. Not sure if I should do the same with the divergent boundary with plates 5 and 17.
The other area that I simply don't know what to do with is the area north of plate 5. I keep going back and forth and cannot decide if I should break it up into multiple plates with a new divergent boundary like I did in the previous post or should I just leave it the way it is? Or do you guys have any other ideas on what I should do with that spot.

One thing though. What happens to islands on a plate that is being subducted? Do they get subducted too, or do the islands sorta merge with the other plate?

And lastly I increased the size of the blasted circles. Out of curiosity what resolution and dimensions are you guys working with. I working with 600ppi at 20x10 inches or 12000x6000 pixels.

WM prvw 7.jpg

Currents prvw1.jpg

I also added a ocean currents map that I've been working on when the tectonic map stops making sense. It's still rough and I am going to change a few things and add smaller currents in the bays and seas. I'm hoping that I can call the plate tectonics finished after this post but let me know if there are still areas I need to fix. Thanks guys you've been a ton of help.

[groovey]

What really caught my attention with your last version of the tectonic map is the side of subduction on oceanic/continental boundaries. For example 4/22.

As I understood, the whole "curvature of the boundary indicates the side of subduction" is for oceanic/oceanic, but for oceanic/continental, since in your case the boundaries are so close to the coast, wouldn't subduction circles point into the coastal side, what ever the curvature of the boundary with that coast is, since the continental side "eats" the oceanic side?

However, you can argue that those boundaries are not placed right in the line between the coast and the ocean so the boundary it's not really continental/oceanic, yet, but then what happens when the continental bit gets close to the subduction boundary, shouldn't then the "continental eats oceanic" occur? Then the subduction circles would have to change direction wouldn't they? Can they do that? I have no idea.

As you may know, I know nothing about currents, but visually it looks very neat.


My map is 60x30cm which is 7087x3543px, and 300ppi resolution, thought when it's time to export some finished maps I might increase the resolution. Your working file must be big with such high specs. Mine at one point was double its size, but then I realized in my case it didn't add much and only occupied more unnecessary space on the pen drive I save a back-up, so I increased the ppi resolution a bit instead.

[Pixie]

Yeah, ascanius, althought your tectonics looks alright, your circles are in the wrong side - all of them.
Other than that, I think I would do a few things slightly differently, but mostly it's stuff on the placing of ocean/ocean subduction, so it doesn't really matter.

As for the currents, more than adding small currents on bays, add generic movement with a thicker brush. As it stands, it seems like most of the water is still except for some very rigid corridors. But! But you got all the currents correct so it depends whether you want a neat looking thing or not. You just forgot the south pole return current (East -> West)

[ascanius]

What really caught my attention with your last version of the tectonic map is the side of subduction on oceanic/continental boundaries. For example 4/22.

Yeah, ascanius, althought your tectonics looks alright, your circles are in the wrong side - all of them.
Other than that, I think I would do a few things slightly differently, but mostly it's stuff on the placing of ocean/ocean subduction, so it doesn't really matter.

As for the currents, more than adding small currents on bays, add generic movement with a thicker brush. As it stands, it seems like most of the water is still except for some very rigid corridors. But! But you got all the currents correct so it depends whether you want a neat looking thing or not. You just forgot the south pole return current (East -> West)

hehe.....after burying my head in the sand I placed the circles on the correct side.

Does this mean I have the Pixie stamp of approval? Though I'm curious what it is that you would change. Otherwise right now I'm mostly trying to get major themes pinned down, tectonics, continents, currents etc. I'm going to go back later and recolor everything and fix things to fit the style once I have a better idea of what palette I want to use and how I want to do geological features.

One other thing? At what Latitude is the south pole return current? I kinda assumed at the poles the currents simply circulated.

Here is the redone tectonic map with corrected subduction boundaries.
WM prvw 7.jpg

Next is a map showing the pressure belts and prevailing winds for July in the northern hemisphere.
I'll be honest this is a mess and there is a lot I am unsure about. I'm not really sure how the ITCZ behaves in the southern hemisphere along the equator. I know it is pushed northwards but I'm not sure about its southern limits in such a case. second the prevailing winds, I'm not sure how they act when situated along the south western continent, the way I have it leaves a long corridor going east across the ocean.

pressure belts
ITCZ greenish color mostly along the equator
STHZ reddish color
Polar front yellowish color.
winds
High pressure Red
Low pressure Blue.
WM climate northern summer.jpg

Edit: I just realized the prevailing winds for the north and south pole are wrong. there should be a single low pressure zone at the poles not the numerous ones I have. So the arrows in the Polar front are incorrect.

[Pixie]

Does this mean I have the Pixie stamp of approval? Though I'm curious what it is that you would change.

I still spot a few regions that are inconsistent, mainly areas where the amount of ocean crust on both sides of a divergent boundary aren't equal without subduction to explain it. If I find the time, I might make a few quick captions to tell you where.
So, as for the stamp of approval - we all have my stamp of approval by now - your map, groovey's, akubra's. In your case it isn't 100% consistent, but it's way above 80%.

One other thing? At what Latitude is the south pole return current? I kinda assumed at the poles the currents simply circulated.

Currents are formed where the winds at surface are consistent. That's why you get currents westward at the equator and roughly at 60º to 70º (north/south) and currents eastward around 40º. All these are formed by dominant winds so you should have matching prevailing winds in these regions.

As for your map. Are you using my yet-unfinished tutorial? Not to brag, but I think it could provide some help to resolve your issues.

[ascanius]

Hey guys.

Thnx for the link pixie going to redo the currents and winds eventually. I think I have an idea of which areas are unsymmetrical, going to change them when I find the will power to do so.

Ive been working on figuring out how I want the finished map to look and am leaning towards a satalite view.
WM prvw 9.jpg

I tried to get all three types of boundaries in along with tropical shorelines, and islands to see how they look. What do you guys think?

[Pixie]

Amazing, ascanius, that oceanic ridge looks just right the real thing. Is it a hand-paint job? It looks like, with a sort of oil paint style.