:You stitch them together in a paint program?  Ah.  That will only work with a mercator projection.  I use either Lambert Azimuthal or Orthographic.  Orthographic is far better for obscure places, like mid ocean islands. 

 :What paint program do you use.  I use irfanview for labeling.  I bought a really cheap digital camera 6 years ago, that came with an adequate paint program.  I downloaded gimp about six months ago.  I keep meaning to learn how to use it.  It is supposed to be really powerful. 

 :When I first started making maps I came across some really beautiful ones.  And the guy who made those maps had recently added to a page where some people were developing standards for map colours.  He didn't use OMC.  Unfortunately I didn't make note of his userid or the location of those standards pages.  Maybe it came to nothing.  It is a good idea however.