[WIP] Cooking up a world from scratch

[ev_maps]

Hi, I've been lurking on the forums for a while now and I decided it was about time I posted something!

This is the world I'm building from the ground up (from tectonics to climate). I've been reading up a fair bit on tectonics, so I have a decent grasp of the basic processes (although the geological side of things still eludes me).

Here's a tectonic map of my (as yet unnamed) world

PanTerra_tectonics.png

Here's the world with just the landforms

PanTerra_landforms.png

I was going for a prehistoric supercontinent type of setup so I kept the plate configuration simplistic. The mountain ranges are fairly vague at this stage (I'll produce a more detailed elevation map later when the need arises). As there are no continental collision zones, I figured the largest mountain ranges would be on the coast of the small northern continent. The other mountain ranges would be likely the remnants of earlier collisions, etc.

Would love to hear your thoughts/comments/critique, especially regarding the tectonics.

For instance, is it realistic to have so few plates or should I break the larger plates into smaller ones? Do the landforms look plausible given the tectonics?

Thanks for your time!

[Jean-Abdel]

Having only 7 plates is not a lot but ok if your world isn't very active geologically. For the mountains, remember that rifting also forms high volcanic mountains like the Ethiopian plateau. Have you checked that everything fits well on GPlates or Gprojector? Your world looks great, and big continents like yours are interesting.

[Gallien]

The tectonics look marvellous! I envy you.
(I've downloaded the file and checked the poles - they're good too.)

[ev_maps]

Having only 7 plates is not a lot but ok if your world isn't very active geologically. For the mountains, remember that rifting also forms high volcanic mountains like the Ethiopian plateau. Have you checked that everything fits well on GPlates or Gprojector? Your world looks great, and big continents like yours are interesting.

Good point about the volcanic mountains. They should probably be more evident at the rift zone. Mid-oceanic volcanic island arcs might also be a good addition.

I was thinking my world was currently at a geologically calm period, but the supercontinental plate is definitely due for a break-up soon.

The tectonics look marvellous! I envy you.
(I've downloaded the file and checked the poles - they're good too.)

Thank you! I'm taking care to keep the polar areas in line as I'm making changes.

[The Lazy One]

Good starting approach! Building a whole world is always challenging!

[ev_maps]

Good starting approach! Building a whole world is always challenging!

Thanks! I'm planning to keep the work stages relatively short to keep myself invested and to finish the world in a reasonable time frame.

[ev_maps]

I decided to break up the big plate into three. The rift is at an early stage so it doesn't have a huge impact on the overall landscape, except for volcanic activity and rift mountains around the triple junction.

PanTerra_new_rift.png

I'm also test running the technique for making my elevation map, just a few elevation levels at this point:

northern_continent_elevation.png

I modeled the geography of the region loosely after the South America, since it's the closest Earth analogue.

[The Lazy One]

I really like how the bottom image looks. What did you use for the elevations? I did something similar a while ago in Inkscape, but it DID take a while.

[ev_maps]

I really like how the bottom image looks. What did you use for the elevations? I did something similar a while ago in Inkscape, but it DID take a while.

Basically I just made a colour fill layer for each level of elevation and used the lasso tool to erase and add shapes from the layer mask. I could have used the brush tool instead, but I’ve found the lasso tool to be best for making sharp edges and shapes. For the rivers, I just used the regular brush tool with pressure sensitivity on. I’m using a graphics tablet, so that makes the workflow quite fast. Vector graphics would take a lot longer for me to make, but on the upside, it would scale better...

[ev_maps]

Took a small break for the holidays but now I can get back to building my world.

Okay, so I think I'm happy with my tectonics. There's probably still a lot I could tinker with there but I want to get on with the elevation map and start figuring out the climates. I might revisit the tectonics at some point. I should probably learn to use Gplates, so I can model the world's tectonic history.

Anyway, here's an elevation map of the world, with and without the tectonic boundaries.

panterra_elevation_map.png

PanTerra_elevation_with_tectonics.png

The mountain ranges in tectonically inactive regions are a result from earlier collisions and failed rifting.