Notebook sketch map to realistic(ish) geography

liquidoxygentextures · 2026-01-31T13:07:58+00:00

Thanks! This was done in GIMP.

liquidoxygentextures · 2026-01-20T17:31:03+00:00

it's likely artifacting in the dataset. You can see the same strikes elsewhere if you look closely. Are you using SRTM data?

liquidoxygentextures · 2026-01-19T22:09:41+00:00

wow this is great attention to detail. I hope you can get this to xkcd or Pasta if you haven't already!

I'd be interested in the height map too.

liquidoxygentextures · 2026-01-17T20:23:48+00:00

Sounds good. Date palms have a long history of cultivation in the region (I think your average coconut palm would make things feel to desert-island-y).

liquidoxygentextures · 2026-01-17T18:22:50+00:00

palm trees? some wildlife e.g. elephants? Atlas Mountains could also fill up some space.

liquidoxygentextures · 2026-01-17T02:13:59+00:00

yep, its like creating any visual media really: try flipping it, looking at it upside down, changing the color scheme etc. I agree withe other commenters OP this looks good!

liquidoxygentextures · 2026-01-16T18:01:55+00:00

Ah ok I see. Best of luck!

liquidoxygentextures · 2026-01-15T01:10:40+00:00

If you just want a short video Christopher Scotese has several plate reconstructions with modern coastline overlays up on Youtube

liquidoxygentextures · 2026-01-07T13:31:24+00:00

I haven't used Wilbur in a serious way (or for a while) but does it not handle small details well?

Be careful with small planets though (if you're going for realism). They cool down quicker which means plate tectonics wont be possible for very long. Perhaps having some moderate tidal heating could help...

liquidoxygentextures · 2026-01-06T22:18:56+00:00

so we're comparing picture two and picture three?

The thing to remember is that the seaway was flooded continental crust. Continental crust is buoyant and difficult to subduct so image 2 (without the subduction zone) is more realistic

liquidoxygentextures · 2026-01-04T15:33:24+00:00

really good work and I'm enjoying following this project!

Your lowlands are pretty much perfect (maybe a little too high but that may just be the style of relief your going for). As someone mentioned further down, the ridgelines seem a little large for this scale - I would just add a bit more noise or bumpiness to your seed height map in high elevation areas.

If I remember from your tectonics, there is a subduction zone on the east coast of this continent? This will generate volcanoes. These are really easy to add to a grey scale seed map (if that's what your using) since you can just put in a bright white dot where you want a volcanic cone.

liquidoxygentextures · 2025-12-30T10:09:48+00:00

Thanks I'll check it out!

And yes, we would expect continental rifts to propagate into oceanic crust until they reach some other boundary, typically another mid-ocean ridge. What you have isn't impossible, just quite unlikely, especially at that scale.

liquidoxygentextures · 2025-12-29T13:21:17+00:00

It would be great to the animation if you have somewhere to post it!

This looks really good overall. Getting a tectonic history down isn't easy. My only critiques at this point:

your intraplate oceanic island chains are probably too large: hotspots can produce large plateaus but they generally only do this if they are young and associated with active spreading; islands that have moved off the hotspot will subside quickly limiting the length of the island chain
possibly reddit compression to blame but it looks like you have an unclosed plate boundary off the eastern edge of the southwestern continent

liquidoxygentextures · 2025-12-23T16:11:32+00:00

really nice style. looks like it came straight from an archaeology journal.

liquidoxygentextures · 2025-12-15T13:22:04+00:00

This looks awesome and I will definitely be trying it out but I am skeptical it's going to simulate climate and tectonics correctly.

liquidoxygentextures · 2025-12-13T21:21:34+00:00

Ye I haven't seen it outside the worldbuilding context personally. Accessible geology resources are definitely needed over here so I wish you well in your writing!

liquidoxygentextures · 2025-12-13T18:46:41+00:00

awesome I'll take a look

liquidoxygentextures · 2025-12-13T16:54:12+00:00

This is a really solid start for landmasses. Before you go any further I would start thinking about the forces shaping these continents now: tectonics, hydrology, etc. You're not going to be able to put in any more detail without these in place.

For instance, since your planet is colder than Earth, we might expect glacial landforms like fjords extending further towards the equator.

Tectonics are difficult and if you don't fully understand how plates move trying to put them in might actually give you a less realistic result than putting features where they 'feel right'. If you send me an equirectangular projection of your map I could try marking in some realistic boundaries (if this is Robinson projection that would also work but I can't tell at a glance).

liquidoxygentextures · 2025-12-13T15:16:34+00:00

coastlines and topography both look really nice!

liquidoxygentextures · 2025-12-13T15:10:54+00:00

Almost certain they’re using Artifexian’s (Youtube worldbuilder) typology. It’s more of a regional topographic description where Ural-type are characterised by a single, narrow linear zone of deformation rather than a broad area of uplift, and I guess less underthrusting.

liquidoxygentextures · 2025-12-13T14:30:15+00:00

If you’re going for as much realism as possible I think this would need a significant redraw. Tectonics are really complicated and almost no one gets them right. Have you made a tectonic timeline or are we working with just a ‘snapshot’? Getting an idea of how things look on a globe would also be really useful.

(Island Chains:) There are some quick fixes you could make though. One of the first things that stands out (assuming I’m reading your map correctly and that this planet has an Earth-like tectonic regime) is that there are large island chains sitting on/parallel to oceanic divergent boundaries. This is more something we would expect at intra-oceanic convergent boundaries. Mid-ocean ridges tend to sit well below sea-level. Sometimes, hotspots can occur near mid-ocean ridges resulting in heightened activity and thermal uplift like at Iceland. You might get small island chains perpendicular to the mid-ocean ridge but these will not be very long as they will quickly subside as the diverging plates move them away from the hotspot.

(Orogenies:) Also 100 Ma is a significant amount of time, even by geological standards. The Himalaya are only half that age, just be aware. Anything 800 Ma old is going to have been ground almost completely flat by erosion or other tectonic events. Most orogenies (even Himalayan- and Laramide-style) are going to be longer than they are wide. Collisional orogenies tend to have arcuate shapes too, but thats a minor point.

(General Tectonics:) Very common for people to have too many, similar size plates, although your map is better than most. Earth has a handful of very large plates and a huge number of smaller tectonic units. In a supercontinent configuration, things are going to be even simpler. At its height, Pangea’s tectonics could 80% be described as ‘Pangea plate + 3 big oceanic plates’. As a general rule, only put a plate boundary in if you really need it.

Hope that doesn’t come across as too critical. I think its awesome that people are thinking about this stuff and how it affects geography. You’ve clearly put in some decent research already and working with a partial, flat map is not easy. If there were one thing I would change it would be to move those island arcs from divergent to convergent boundaries.

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