Map Projections

Link Roundup: Mid-July Edition
Facebook app whereyougonnabe? gets an upgrade focusing on integration with other platforms (previously). Diana Eid takes a look at map art, focusing on three artists we’ve seen before: Matthew Cusick, Elisabeth Lecourt and Susan Stockwell (via GeoCarta). On the… »
Posted on Saturday, July 19, 2008 at 8:43 AM
Categories: Art, Blogs, Copyright, Facebook, Geotagging, Google Earth, Map Projections, Triangulations (Links), Video
This Isn’t England
This Isn’t England: “So for the last two years I’ve been taking pictures of Britain on world maps. Not accurate maps, but drawings or illustrations of maps. The differences are amazing. You might assume that all maps were accurate, or… »
Posted on Wednesday, July 9, 2008 at 10:16 AM
Categories: Map Projections
New Location for Map Projection Gallery
Paul Anderson writes to inform us that his Gallery of Map Projections (see previous entry) has moved to a new server hosted by the Center for Spatially Integrated Social Science at the University of California, Santa Barbara. Here is the… »
Posted on Friday, April 11, 2008 at 8:24 AM
Categories: Map Projections
Shaded Relief World Map and Flex Projector
Tom Patterson of Shaded Relief wrote in to announce his new project, a physical map of the world. As was the case with his relief map of the United States, it’s free and freely available in several formats, including… »
Posted on Monday, March 17, 2008 at 8:21 AM
Categories: Map Projections, Miscellany, Software
Geography Tutor Videos
Excerpts from TMW Media Group’s Geography Tutor video series have been posted to YouTube; map-related clips include the above video on map projections, this clip on the International Date Line and this clip on the use of colour in… »
Posted on Friday, February 29, 2008 at 7:55 PM
Categories: Education, Map Projections, Video
More on the Robinson Projection
On his relatively new Terra ETL Blog, which I had not noticed before, Dean C. Mikkelsen has a nice post explaining the Robinson projection, the compromise projection created for aesthetic purposes by the late Arthur Robinson. (You may recall that… »
Posted on Monday, October 22, 2007 at 12:30 PM
Categories: Blogs, Map Projections
Arno Peters Documentary
ODT Maps, the publisher (and chief promoter) of the Peters map (and general source of thought provocation about map projections and representationality), has produced a documentary about the map and Arno Peters. From the press release: This fascinating 30-minute documentary… »
Posted on Sunday, October 14, 2007 at 12:24 PM
Categories: Map Projections, Video
Two Map Videos
Global Concepts in Maps is an abbreviated excerpt from a longer educational film about map projections; more information here. I want to see the whole thing, but my, that doesn’t mean it’s good. The risible style of 1950s educational films… »
Posted on Friday, July 13, 2007 at 2:02 PM
Categories: Libraries, Map Projections, Video
Cahill’s Butterfly Map
Arno Peters was not the first person to come up with a map projection as an explicit critique of the Mercator projection (or at least its use as a general world map rather than as a navigation tool), nor… »
Posted on Friday, July 6, 2007 at 11:32 AM
Categories: Map Projections
Peters vs. Fuller
In a November 2005 article for The American Surveyor, Angus Stocking considers — and compares — two “alternative” map projections: the Gall-Peters projection, proselytized by Arno Peters, and the icosahedral Dymaxion projection by Buckminster Fuller. To put it mildly, he… »
Posted on Monday, June 18, 2007 at 12:24 PM
Categories: Map Projections
Global Map Projector
NASA’s Global Map Projector — G.Projector for short — is a lovely little program that transforms any equirectangular map image (one is included) into another projection. It’s a tremendous amount of fun, and a very useful way of visualizing… »
Posted on Tuesday, March 20, 2007 at 11:56 AM
Categories: Map Projections, Software
New URL for Gallery of Map Projections
On MapHist, Paul Anderson reports that his Gallery of Map Projections site (previously mentioned last December) has been moved to galleryofmapprojections.com; the former URL now throws a 404…. »
Posted on Tuesday, October 17, 2006 at 6:00 AM
Categories: Map Projections
BBC News: The Map Gap
BBC News’s magazine article, The Map Gap, is all over the map: a discussion of how hard it is to present a true representation of the planet ends up touching briefly upon such diverse elements as map projections, Google Earth,… »
Posted on Monday, October 16, 2006 at 10:22 AM
Categories: Map Projections
Interactive Album of Map Projections
I like Penn State’s Interactive Album of Map Projections: it’s a truly dynamic tool that redraws a world map (or portion thereof) based on the parameters you give it — including 10 different projections — rather than an interface to… »
Posted on Saturday, August 19, 2006 at 3:53 PM
Categories: Map Projections
The Power of Projections
Via Ubikcan (a blog I really wish I’d found out about sooner) comes word of a relatively new book that sounds like an excellent counterpoint/complement to Seeing Through Maps: The Power of Projections: How Maps Reflect Global Politics and… »
Posted on Wednesday, August 9, 2006 at 12:04 PM
Categories: Books, Map Projections
Review: Seeing Through Maps
Seeing Through Maps by Denis Wood, Ward L. Kaiser and Bob Abramms ODT, 2006. Softcover, 160 pp. ISBN 1-931057-20-6 It’s really not a difficult concept: there are no “right” and “wrong” cartographic projections. Each has its own advantages and disadvantages,… »
Posted on Tuesday, July 25, 2006 at 11:25 PM
Categories: Book Reviews, Map Projections, Video
Java World Maps Projection Page
Henry Bottomley’s Java world maps projection page dynamically redraws a map of the world based on your choice of projection and other parameters. You can also apply the projections to other layers (topographic Earth, Earth at night, Moon, Mars,… »
Posted on Friday, July 21, 2006 at 10:12 AM
Categories: Map Projections
The Impossible Map
Hidden amongst the 50 animated short films put online by Canada’s National Film Board (via Boing Boing) is a 10-minute educational film about cartographic projections from 1947: The Impossible Map. Directed by Evelyn Lambart, the film uses grapefruit peels… »
Posted on Saturday, July 15, 2006 at 3:47 PM
Categories: Map Projections, Video
New Edition of Seeing Through Maps
A new edition of Seeing Through Maps, by Denis Wood, Ward Kaiser and Bob Abramms, is now available. It’s the second edition of the book; the first edition, still available on Amazon.com, came out in 2001. This edition, however,… »
Posted on Monday, July 3, 2006 at 9:54 AM
Categories: Books, Map Projections
Review: How to Lie with Maps
How to Lie with Maps (Second Edition) by Mark Monmonier University of Chicago Press, 1996. Softcover, 220 pp. ISBN 0-226-53421-9 While reading this modern classic by Syracuse University geography professor Mark Monmonier (see previous entry), I was struck by how… »
Posted on Monday, May 29, 2006 at 8:34 AM
Categories: Book Reviews, Cartography, Map Projections
A Gallery of Map Projections
A huge collection of map projections; they’re just outline maps in PDF formats, and there isn’t much in the way of documentation or explanation, but it seems awfully thorough. If you’re looking for a specific — even obscure — map… »
Posted on Tuesday, December 20, 2005 at 7:25 AM
Categories: Map Projections
Map Projection Pages
Carlos A. Furuti’s Map Projection Pages comprise the most extensive resource on projections that I have yet seen online, including why a given map projection is used and the math involved in creating a projection. Thanks again to peacay. See… »
Posted on Sunday, September 18, 2005 at 7:49 AM
Categories: Map Projections
India and the Mercator
Writing in India’s Financial Express, Y. R. K. Reddy calls for India to discard the “racist” Mercator projection, which makes “our country look so small on the map,” and advocates a switch to the Peters projection (about which see previous… »
Posted on Sunday, June 26, 2005 at 10:32 AM
Categories: Map Projections
Dymaxion Map Projection
Mark writes to tell us about the Dymaxion Projection Animation site: “The site is dedicated to showcasing Buckminster Fuller’s ‘Dymaxion Projection’ map. The Dymaxion Projection is reputed to be the most accurate flatmap of the earth, but I love the… »
Posted on Monday, December 6, 2004 at 10:07 PM
Categories: Map Projections
Arthur Robinson
This past week the media reported the death of Arthur Robinson, whose eponymous projection was adopted by the National Geographic Society for its world maps. He died Oct. 10 at the age of 89. Obituaries from the Arizona Republic (reprinting… »
Posted on Saturday, November 20, 2004 at 4:51 PM
Categories: Map Projections, Obituaries
The Peters Projection
The Cartographie tribe had an interesting discussion a while back about the Peters projection, which, in its attempt to spread distortion evenly among the continents by distorting at the equator as well as at the poles, is as much political… »
Posted on Wednesday, June 16, 2004 at 12:48 AM
Categories: Map Projections

Note: Entries from 2003 were not categorized and will not appear in the category archives. Please consult the monthly archives.