Edelle's Map Tutorial: Mountains (Image Heavy)

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"I want to see mountains again, mountains, Gandalf!"

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Hey there. So you want to draw mountains? What a coincidence, I happen to have a great, easy method!

Note: I used a drawing tablet for this, but if you don't have one of those fancy (expensive) gizmos there is still hope! You can easily create those attractive tapered lines by using a vector program (such as Inkscape, which is totally free, only crashes on occasion, and takes a long time to become pro at, or whatever the Adobe one is, but that's expensive) and your trusty mouse. The program I used was GIMP (also free), and I have no idea where I got that nice textured brush, but doing a search for some textured brushes for GIMP will get you something moderately okay (make sure it's an animated one, or a piped one or whatever they're calling it these days).

Let's get it started in here!
First, you're going to want to make a new document, whatever size you want your map to be. Next, make a new, transparent layer and shade in with your most favorite colour where you want your mountains to go. Is it a valley, a mountain range, or just a random cluster of peaks? This one is mine:

Now if that's not the most beautiful thing you've ever seen...
Don't worry, things get prettier from here on in.

We're going to make some new images. I worked with some 400x400 ones at 100 pixels/inch, just because. 5 mountains is a good number to work with.
First, slap down some wiggly, jagged lines forming the peak(s) of the mountain(s), use a smallish brush, but big enough so that you can see it alright if you're zoomed out 25%. You can make them look however you want, from realistic regal peaks to Seussian Mount Crumpet looking things. These are mine:

NICE. We have a good variety of jagged and lumpy, different numbers of peaks. Looking good... not really... but it will, promise.

Next, draw a line from the top of the peak all the way down the side, make it nice and jagged. It's hard to explain in words, so here are my pictures:

Okay, looking better. Make sure all of your lines are on the same side. Next, take your favorite textured brush and slap down some nice, rough shading between the line and the side of the mountain, and some lighter shading at the base of the mountain. Like so:

Okay, now it's starting to fall into place! Next thing you want to do is go to Colours -> Colour to Alpha. Make the colour white. Bam, now you have a black drawing on a grey checkered background. Do the same for all your other mountain images by hitting ctrl-f, and it'll just repeat the thing. Copy the mountain you want to use first, and then go to your map document and make a new transparent layer. Change the brush to "clipboard" (should be top left off the brushes panel) and stamp away. Keep in mind that it's better to start your mountains at the top of the image, otherwise you may run into layering problems. Copy the other mountains as you want to use them until it fills the desired space. You may want to set the pressure sensitivity to size, so the harder you press, the bigger your mountain will be. Adjust the scale slider as necessary.
You should have something like this:

Sometimes I even impress myself!
Now add your details and colour to your little heart's content. You can really go in any direction from here.
This is my end result:

I know, I know... It's because I haven't drawn a castle since I was maybe 9 or so. If I was less lazy, I'd have something waaay better looking, but as it is the mountains are not half bad.
I hope you've learned something today, because I didn't.

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