I used to work at a furniture manufacturing facility. One day I snapped a few photos of a crumbling section of the concrete floor. I scanned them into Photoshop and isolated the main shapes that would later become the Orudan Empire. Then, I bought a floor tile from Home Depot that had some great textures and colors, like a satellite image of a continent with mountain ranges. I scanned this in as well, then merged the two images. I included the resulting map in earlier versions of my manuscript when I was seeking literary representation or having some editing done.
This version eventually morphed into the map that I included in the print verison of The Awakened. I ultimately decided to give it more of an "illustration on canvas" feel to be more compatible with the time period involved:
I created these next two in AutoCad, then imported the line drawings into Photoshop to add colors and textures:
