Waterman Butterfly Map Projection | Waterman Butterfly 7727 좋은 평가 이 답변

당신은 주제를 찾고 있습니까 “waterman butterfly map projection – Waterman Butterfly“? 다음 카테고리의 웹사이트 https://ppa.charoenmotorcycles.com 에서 귀하의 모든 질문에 답변해 드립니다: https://ppa.charoenmotorcycles.com/blog. 바로 아래에서 답을 찾을 수 있습니다. 작성자 BAbramms 이(가) 작성한 기사에는 조회수 1,656회 및 좋아요 13개 개의 좋아요가 있습니다.

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waterman butterfly map projection 주제에 대한 동영상 보기

여기에서 이 주제에 대한 비디오를 시청하십시오. 주의 깊게 살펴보고 읽고 있는 내용에 대한 피드백을 제공하세요!

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d여기에서 Waterman Butterfly – waterman butterfly map projection 주제에 대한 세부정보를 참조하세요

This unusual and visually beautiful wall was meticulously prepared by the late, self-taught, nuclear physicist, Steve Waterman of Montreal, Quebec. It is a 14-sided polyhedral projection addressing both distortion and partitioning of land masses. The butterfly layout combines legibility and low distortion. Learn about other mind-stretching maps by watching our 30 minute map video, MANY WAYS TO SEE THE WORLD.
The entire 30-minute film is on-line now at: www.youtube.com/video/aALCuA9H2KI
Video available for free home viewing. For commercial or classroom use please request permission from Media Education Foundation. Order here: https://shop.mediaed.org/many-ways-to-see-the-world-p191.aspx Or phone: 800.897.0089 | 413.584.8500 Fax: 800.659.6882 or send them an email at [email protected]
Buy ODT maps at: https://shop.reachandteach.com/maps-postcards-and-geography-related-products

waterman butterfly map projection 주제에 대한 자세한 내용은 여기를 참조하세요.

Waterman Map – Etsy

Watercolor World Map Poster / Cahill Map / Waterman Butterfly / Pacific View … Waterman Butterfly Projection World Map Cross Stitch Pattern – For map …

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Source: www.etsy.com

Date Published: 1/4/2022

The Waterman butterfly projection [1800 x 1279] : r/MapPorn

712 votes, 45 comments. 2M subscribers in the MapPorn community. High quality images of maps.

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Source: www.reddit.com

Date Published: 9/7/2021

Waterman Butterfly map | Earth map, Infographic map, Map

Waterman “Butterfly” World Map – my favorite version of the world map; I … Map no. 245 [Waterman butterfly projection of the world]. More information.

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Source: www.pinterest.com

Date Published: 9/30/2021

주제와 관련된 이미지 waterman butterfly map projection

주제와 관련된 더 많은 사진을 참조하십시오 Waterman Butterfly. 댓글에서 더 많은 관련 이미지를 보거나 필요한 경우 더 많은 관련 기사를 볼 수 있습니다.

주제에 대한 기사 평가 waterman butterfly map projection

Author: BAbramms
Views: 조회수 1,656회
Likes: 좋아요 13개
Date Published: 2016. 3. 11.
Video Url link: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_zmQInsMsXc

What is the Waterman Butterfly Projection used for?

The Butterfly projection is — in the best sense of the word — a compromise projection. Mercator preserves angles (locally), Hobo-Dyer preserves areas (but distorting shapes). Waterman Butterfly does neither, but it is very good at preserving the overall shape of the continents.

What is the most accurate map projection?

AuthaGraph. This is hands-down the most accurate map projection in existence. In fact, AuthaGraph World Map is so proportionally perfect, it magically folds it into a three-dimensional globe. Japanese architect Hajime Narukawa invented this projection in 1999 by equally dividing a spherical surface into 96 triangles.

What is the major weakness of the Mercator projection?

Disadvantages: Mercator projection distorts the size of objects as the latitude increases from the Equator to the poles, where the scale becomes infinite. So, for example, Greenland and Antarctica appear much larger relative to land masses near the equator than they actually are.

How many map projections are there?

Three of these common types of map projections are cylindrical, conic, and azimuthal.

How accurate is the world map?

It is known as a “compromise projection” because, while it doesn’t entirely eliminate the common flat map distortions regarding area, direction or distance, it minimizes them as much as possible. This ultimately means that almost every part of the map is distorted in some way, just not excessively.

What is the Authagraph map?

Authagraph is an equal-area type world map projection that was invented by Japanese architect Hajime Narukawa in 1999. While conceptually in the category of an equal-area projection, it would require further subdivision to qualify as an actual equal-area map.

What map projection does National Geographic use?

Cartographers at National Geographic chose to use a version of the Mollweide projection for their map highlighting ocean floors, published as the map supplement in the September 2012 issue of National Geographic magazine. This Mollweide projection is referred to as a pseudocylindrical projection.

What is the most popular map projection?

Cylindrical Projection – Mercator

One of the most famous map projections is the Mercator, created by a Flemish cartographer and geographer, Geradus Mercator in 1569.

What are 4 types of map projections?

What Are The 4 Main Types Of Map projections

Azimuthal projection.
Conic projection.
Cylindrical projection.
Conventional projection or Mathematical projection.

Why do we still use Mercator projection?

This projection is widely used for navigation charts, because any straight line on a Mercator projection map is a line of constant true bearing that enables a navigator to plot a straight-line course.

Why is the Mercator projection wrong?

The popular Mercator projection distorts the relative size of landmasses, exaggerating the size of land near the poles as compared to areas near the equator. This map shows that in reality, Brazil is almost as large as Canada, even though it appears to be much smaller on Mercator maps.

What are the 3 advantages of the Mercator projection?

Advantages of Mercator’s projection: – preserves angles and therefore also shapes of small objects – close to the equator, the distortion of lengths and areas is insignificant – a straight line on the map corresponds with a constant compass direction, it is possible to sail and fly using a constant azimuth – simple …

What are the 5 most common map projections?

Top 5 different world map projections you need to know about

The Mercator Projection.
The Mollweide Projection.
The Peters Projection.
The Winkel Tripel Projection.
The Robinson Projection.

What is the difference between a map and a map projection?

Similarly, a map projection is a method by which cartographers translate a sphere or globe into a two-dimensional representation. In other words, a map projection systematically renders a 3D ellipsoid (or spheroid) of Earth to a 2D map surface.

Which country has the best map in the world?

Top 10 Countries with the Most Beautiful Shapes (on the map)

Italy. Italy. There it is.
United Arab Emirates. United Arab Emirates. Look at that. …
Cyprus. Cyprus is the third largest island in the Mediterranean, after Sicily and Sardinia. …
Chile. Chile. …
Greece. Greece. …
Russia. Russia. …
Croatia. Croatia. …
Sri Lanka. Sri Lanka. …

What is a Winkel Tripel projection map?

The Winkel Tripel is a compromise modified azimuthal projection for world maps. It is an arithmetic mean of projected coordinates of Aitoff and equidistant cylindrical projections. The projection is known to have one of the lowest mean scale and area distortions among compromise projections for small-scale mapping.

Who made the Robinson projection?

The Robinson projection is a world map projection developed in the early 1960s by the distinguished geographer Arthur H. Robinson as a compromise between equal-area and conformal projections that produces a good quality overall view of the world map.

What is a Goodes map?

Goode homolosine is an equal-area pseudocylindrical projection for world maps. It is most commonly used in interrupted form. It is a combination of Mollweide (or homolographic) and sinusoidal projections, hence the name homolosine.

Does the Mercator projection distort direction?

Because the linear scale of a Mercator map increases with latitude, it distorts the size of geographical objects far from the equator and conveys a distorted perception of the overall geometry of the planet.

Waterman butterfly projection

Polyhedral compromise map projection

Waterman projection centered on Atlantic, with Antarctica divided

Waterman projection centered on Pacific, with Antarctica detached

Waterman sphere cluster W5

Waterman polyhedron w5

The Waterman “Butterfly” World Map is a map projection created by Steve Waterman. Waterman first published a map in this arrangement in 1996. The arrangement is an unfolding of a polyhedral globe with the shape of a truncated octahedron, evoking the butterfly map principle first developed by Bernard J.S. Cahill (1866–1944) in 1909. Cahill and Waterman maps can be shown in various profiles, typically linked at the north Pacific or north Atlantic oceans.

As Cahill was an architect, his approach tended toward forms that could be demonstrated physically, such as by his flattenable rubber-ball map. Waterman, on the other hand, derived his design from his work on close-packing of spheres. This involves connecting the sphere centers from cubic closest-packed spheres into a corresponding convex hull, as demonstrated in the accompanying graphics. These illustrate the W5 sphere cluster, W5 convex hull, and two Waterman projections from the W5 convex hull.

To project the sphere to the polyhedron, the Earth is divided into eight octants. Each meridian is drawn as three straight-line segments in its respective octant, each segment defined by its endpoints on two of four “Equal Line Delineations” defined by Waterman. These Equal Line Delineations are the North Pole, the northernmost polyhedron edge, the longest line parallel to the equator, and the equator itself. The intersections of all meridians with any one Equal Line Delineation are equally spaced, and the intersections of all parallels with any one meridian are equally spaced.[1] Waterman chose the W5 Waterman polyhedron and central meridian of 20°W to minimize interrupting major land masses. Popko notes the projection can be gnomonic too.[2] The two methods yield very similar results.

Like Buckminster Fuller’s 1943 Dymaxion Projection, an octahedral butterfly map can show all the continents uninterrupted if its octants are divided at a suitable meridian (in this case 20°W) and are joined, for example, at the North Atlantic, as in the 1996 version.[3][4]
See also [ edit ]
References [ edit ]

How to Make a Beautiful Map

How to Make a Beautiful Map

We love maps. So Fabian Ehmel and I made a beautiful butterfly world map just using open source tools and public data.

There is something weird and wonderful about analogue maps. They are increasingly useless yet incredibly beautiful. The obsessive level of detail of Ordnance Survey Maps, the typographic excellence of Swiss National…

Which is the best map projection?

The ‘orange peel problem’ is perhaps the most widely-cited analogy that geographers use to explain why a three-dimensional world cannot be represented in two dimensions sans any kind of distortion. Try as you might, you just cannot flatten an orange peel without tearing, squashing or stretching it. Likewise, when cartographers try to flatten the Earth for a map projection, distortions in terms of shape, distance, direction, or land area are inevitable to creep in.

Depending on the purpose they are trying to serve, the number of possible map projections is limitless. However, which map projection should be used for general purposes, such as, for hanging in classrooms or on TV news? Here’s how some popular projections weigh against each other:

Mercator

The most popular map projection in the world has been around for 448 years now. It was created by Flemish cartographer Gerardus Mercator in 1569 – a time when Antarctica hadn’t even been discovered. Mercator was designed as a navigational tool for sailors as it was most convenient to hand-plot courses with parallel rules and triangles on this map.

In most maps, when you try to fix one kind of distortion, you increase another kind of distortion. However, Mercator is one of those rare maps whose answer to latitudinal distortion was to ensure that the longitudinal distortion is equally bad!

On a Mercator projection, Greenland is roughly the same size as Africa. In reality, Africa is almost 14 times larger, and Greenland can fit inside China no less than four times. The map also suggests that Scandinavian countries are larger than India, whereas, India is actually three times the size. And yet, Google Maps, Bing, Yahoo and even OpenStreetMaps continue using some version or the other of the Mercator to display the world.

Pros: Sailors loved it; preserves angles and directions in a small area

Cons: Bad for understanding the real size and shape of continents and countries

Related: After this video you’ll never trust a map again

Gall-Peters

The biggest criticism for the skewed Mercator projection came in 1973 from German filmmaker and journalist Arno Peters. Peters argued that by enlarging Europe and North America, Mercator maps were giving white nations a sense of supremacy over non-white nations.

His solution? An equal-area projection that would show the correct sizes of countries relative to each other. Not that the Gall-Peters projection came without any flaws. In its quest of removing size distortions, the map stretched some places near the poles horizontally to a shocking degree. It also stretched land masses vertically near the Equator. So, if the map looks really odd to you, it’s because the shapes and angles are all wrong – exactly the reason why we don’t see this map online much. Nevertheless, it’s quite widely used in the British school system.

Pros: The only ‘area-correct’ map of its time; got featured in The West Wing (S2E16)

Cons: Galled the cartographic community in the 1980s

Suggested: Do you know how maps of Game of Thrones were created?

Robinson

American geographer and cartographer Arthur H. Robinson came up with this projection in 1963, focusing more on the ‘look’ of the map than precise measurement of places. Robinson intended the map, which is neither equal-area nor conformal, as a general purpose tool.

In fact, he told the New York Times in a 1988 interview, “I decided to go about it backwards. I started with a kind of artistic approach. I visualized the best-looking shapes and sizes. I worked with the variables until it got to the point where, if I changed one of them, it didn’t get any better. Then I figured out the mathematical formula to produce that effect. Most mapmakers start with the mathematics.”

Hopefully, this map would replace Mercator in classrooms.

Pros: Shows the entire world at once

Cons: Compromises both area and angles, especially at the poles

Interesting: Which map did Christopher Columbus use?

Winkel-Tripel

Proposed by German cartographer Oswald Winkel in 1921, the Winkel-Tripel projection is quite the opposite of Robinson. The map resorts to mathematics to curtail three major types of distortion – area, direction, and distance (and hence the German term for ‘triple’, Tripel, is in the name). This map projection shows Greenland as the same size as Argentina, and not as the size of all of South America.

The National Geographic Society has been drawing all its standard maps using the Winkel-Tripel projection since 1998, and many US schools have followed suit. However, despite its popularity, since the map doesn’t preserve angles, it is nowhere close to replacing Mercator for navigation purposes.

Pros: Reasonably accurate shapes and sizes of countries

Cons: Land masses closer to the poles still enlarged

Must see: These 5 tools will let you master map projections

AuthaGraph

This is hands-down the most accurate map projection in existence. In fact, AuthaGraph World Map is so proportionally perfect, it magically folds it into a three-dimensional globe.

Japanese architect Hajime Narukawa invented this projection in 1999 by equally dividing a spherical surface into 96 triangles. These triangles were then projected onto a tetrahedron, which not only helped maintain the proportions of land and water, but also helped to unfold the map into a perfect, flat rectangle. Narukawa, however, insists that if the map is refined a step further to increase the number of subdivisions, its accuracy will improve and it can officially be called an area-equal map.

Nonetheless, AuthaGraph realistically represents all oceans and continents, including the neglected Antarctica. And while the general shape of the continents is maintained, you will notice that their orientation is skewing upwards – as if in a smile!

Pros: Most accurate; will win you Japan’s biggest design award; can be folded into a 3D globe

Cons: The Arctic Circle gets somewhat squashed

Is your favorite map projection not on the list? Let us know in the comments below!

Map Projections & What They Say About You

Comic by Randall Munroe at XKCD

Most people go through life perfectly happy in the knowledge that the real earth looks like it does on a standard Mercator projection map. Cartographers, map nerds and those that have seen this scene from the West Wing know that this is not really the case.

Wikipedia sums up why map projections are necessary in the first place:

Map projections are necessary for creating maps. All map projections distort the surface in some fashion. Depending on the purpose of the map, some distortions are acceptable and others are not; therefore, different map projections exist in order to preserve some properties of the sphere-like body at the expense of other properties. There is no limit to the number of possible map projections.

The comic above by Randall Munroe at XKCD looks at What your favorite map projections says about you (assuming you have one).

For those that don’t, here’s a basic explanation of each type:

Mercator

Map created by Strebe via Wikimedia

What it says about you: You’re not really into maps.

Summary:

The Mercator projection is a cylindrical map projection presented by the Flemish geographer and cartographer Gerardus Mercator in 1569. It became the standard map projection for nautical purposes because of its ability to represent lines of constant course, known as rhumb lines or loxodromes, as straight segments that conserve the angles with the meridians.

Advantages:

The two properties, conformality and straight rhumb lines, make this projection uniquely suited to marine navigation: courses and bearings are measured using wind roses or protractors, and the corresponding directions are easily transferred from point to point, on the map, with the help of a parallel ruler or a pair of navigational protractor triangles.

Disadvantages:

Mercator projection distorts the size of objects as the latitude increases from the Equator to the poles, where the scale becomes infinite. So, for example, Greenland and Antarctica appear much larger relative to land masses near the equator than they actually are.

Source: Mercator projection on Wikipedia.

Buy: Mercator: The Man Who Mapped the Planet

Van der Grinten

Map created by Strebe via Wikimedia

What it says about you: You’re not a complicated person. You love the Mercator projection; you just wish it weren’t square. The Earth’s not a square, it’s a circle. You like circles. Today is gonna be a good day!

Summary:

The van der Grinten projection is a compromise map projection that is neither equal-area nor conformal. It projects the entire Earth into a circle, though the polar regions are subject to extreme distortion.

Advantages:

It was made famous when the National Geographic Society adopted it as their reference map of the world from 1922 until 1988.

Disadvantages:
[…] polar regions are subject to extreme distortion… is an arbitrary geometric construction on the plane.

Source: Van der Grinten projection on Wikipedia

Buy: World Satellite Map – Van Der Grinten – Physical Topography

Robinson

Map created by Strebe via Wikimedia

What it says about you: You have a comfortable pair of running shoes that you wear everywhere. You like coffee and enjoy The Beatles. You think the Robinson is the best-looking projection, hands down.

Summary:

The Robinson projection is a map projection of a world map which shows the entire world at once. It was specifically created in an attempt to find a good compromise to the problem of readily showing the whole globe as a flat image.

Advantages:

The Robinson projection is neither equal-area nor conformal, abandoning both for a compromise. The creator felt this produced a better overall view than could be achieved by adhering to either. The meridians curve gently, avoiding extremes, but thereby stretch the poles into long lines instead of leaving them as points.

Disadvantages:
[…]distortion close to the poles is severe, but quickly declines to moderate levels moving away from them. The straight parallels imply severe angular distortion at the high latitudes toward the outer edges of the map.

Source: Robinson projection on Wikipedia

Buy: USA Markable Map/World Markable Map (Modified Robinson Projection)

Dymaxion

Map created by Eric Gaba via Wikimedia

What it says about you: You like Isaac Asimov, XML, and shoes with toes. You think the Segway got a bad rap. You own 3D goggles, which you use to view rotating models of better 3D goggles. You type in Dvorak.

Summary:

The Dymaxion map or Fuller map is a projection of a world map onto the surface of an icosahedron, which can be unfolded and flattened to two dimensions. The flat map is heavily interrupted in order to preserve shapes and sizes.

Advantages:

It has less distortion of relative size of areas, most notably when compared to the Mercator projection; and less distortion of shapes of areas, notably when compared to the Gall–Peters projection. … More unusually, the Dymaxion map does not have any “right way up”.

Disadvantages:

It is not a gnomonic projection, whereby global data expands from the center point of a tangent facet outward to the edges.

Source: Dymaxion map on Wikipedia

Buy: Fuller Projection Dymaxion Air-ocean World

Winkel tripel

Map created by Strebe via Wikimedia

What it says about you: National Geographic adopted the Winkel-Tripel in 1998, but you’ve been a W-T fan since long before “Nat Geo” showed up. You’re worried it’s getting played out, and are thinking of switching to the Kavrayskiy. You once left a party in disgust when a guest showed up wearing shoes with toes. Your favorite musical genre is “Post–”.

Summary:

The Winkel tripel projection (Winkel III), a modified azimuthal map projection of the world… The projection is the arithmetic mean of the equirectangular projection and the Aitoff projection: The name Tripel (German for “triple”) refers to Winkel’s goal of minimizing three kinds of distortion: area, direction, and distance.

Advantages:
[…] the Winkel tripel fares well against several other projections analyzed against their measures of distortion, producing small distance errors, small combinations of Tissot indicatrix ellipticity and area errors, and the smallest skewness of any of the projections.

Disadvantages:

The lines of latitude in Winkel Tripel they are slightly curved and non-parallel.

Also:

The Winkel Tripel projection is not equidistant; there is no point or points from which distances are shown accurately […] The Winkel Tripel projection is not azimuthal; there is no point or points from which directions are shown accurately.

Sources: Winkel tripel projection on Wikipedia and Winkel Tripel Projections

Buy: World Decorator (Laminated National Geographic Reference Map – Winkel Tripel projection)

Goode Homolosine

Map created by Strebe via Wikimedia

What it says about you: They say mapping the Earth on a 2D surface is like flattening an orange peel, which seems enough to you. You like easy solutions.You think we wouldn’t have so many problems if we’d just elect normal people to Congress instead of Politicians. You think airlines should just buy food from the restaurants near the gates and serve that on board. You change your car’s oil, but secretly wonder if you really need to.

Summary:

The Goode homolosine projection (or interrupted Goode homolosine projection) is a pseudocylindrical, equal-area, composite map projection used for world maps. Normally it is presented with multiple interruptions. Its equal-area property makes it useful for presenting spatial distribution of phenomena.

Advantages:
[…] an alternative to the Mercator projection for portraying global areal relationships. Goode offered variations of the interruption scheme for emphasizing the world’s land masses and the world’s oceans.

Disadvantages:

In its most common form, the map interrupts the North Atlantic, the South Atlantic, the South Pacific, the Indian Ocean, and the entire east/west meridian of the map.

Source: Goode homolosine projection on Wikipedia

Buy: Map of world from Goode’s homolosine projection

Hobo–Dyer

Map created by Strebe via Wikimedia

What it says about you: You want to avoid cultural imperialism, but you’ve heard bad things about Gall-Peters. You’re conflict-averse and buy organic. You use a recently-invented set of gender-neutral pronouns and think that what the world needs is a revolution in consciousness.

Summary:

The Hobo–Dyer map projection is a cylindrical equal-area projection, with standard parallels (where there is no north-south nor east-west distortion) at 37.5° north and south of the equator.

Advantages:

The original ODT map is printed on two sides, one side with north upwards and the other, south upwards. This, together with its equal-area presentation, is intended to present a different perspective compared with more common non-equal area, north-up maps.

Disadvantages:
[…] the map stretches the low latitudes vertically less than Peters, but at the price of greater compression near the poles.

Source: Hobo–Dyer projection on Wikipedia

Buy: The Hobo-Dyer equal area projection world map

Plate carrée (Equirectangular)

Map created by Strebe via Wikimedia

What it says about you: You think this one is fine. You like how X and Y map to latitude and longitude. The other projections overcomplicate things. You want me to stop asking about maps so you can enjoy dinner.

Summary:

The projection maps meridians to vertical straight lines of constant spacing for meridional intervals of constant spacing, and circles of latitude to horizontal straight lines of constant spacing for constant intervals of parallels.

Advantages:
[…] the plate carrée has become a standard for global raster datasets, such as Celestia and NASA World Wind, because of the particularly simple relationship between the position of an image pixel on the map and its corresponding geographic location on Earth.

Disadvantages:

The projection is neither equal area nor conformal. Because of the distortions introduced by this projection, it has little use in navigation or cadastral mapping […]
Sources: Equirectangular projection on Wikipedia

A Globe

What it says about you: Yes, you’re very clever.

Summary:

A globe is a three-dimensional scale model of Earth.

Advantages:

Same shape as the earth.

Disadvantages:

Can’t hang on a wall.

Buy: Replogle Globes Illuminated Diplomat Globe

Waterman Butterfly

Map created by Steve waterman via Wikimedia

What it says about you: Really? You know the Waterman? Have you seen the 1909 Cahill Map it’s based— …You have a framed reproduction at home?! Whoa. …Listen, forget these questions. Are you doing anything tonight?

Summary:

The arrangement is an unfolding of a globe treated as a truncated octahedron, evoking the butterfly map principle first developed by Bernard J.S. Cahill (1866–1944) in 1909.

– Waterman butterfly projection on Wikipedia

Advantages:

The Waterman projection show the equator clearly, as well as continental shapes, distances (within 10 %), areas (within 10 %) angular distortions (within 20 degrees), and relative postions, as a compromise: statistically better than all other World maps.

– Butterfly Project

Disadvantages:

The North Polar meridians are drawn at conspicuously different longitude-widths, which produce visible stretch-distortion of Ellesmere Island and Greenland.

– Review of Waterman Octahedral World Map

Peirce Quincuncial

Map created by Strebe via Wikimedia

What it says about you: You think that when we look at a map, what we really see is ourselves. After you first saw Inception, you sat silent in the theater for six hours. It freaks you out to realize that everyone around you has a skeleton inside them. You have really looked at your hands.

Summary:

The Peirce quincuncial projection is a conformal map projection developed by Charles Sanders Peirce in 1879.

Advantages:

It has been used recently to present spherical panoramas for practical as well as aesthetic purposes, where it can present the entire sphere with most areas being recognizable.

Disadvantages:

It is conformal everywhere except at the four corners of the inner hemisphere (thus the midpoints of edges of the projection), where the equator and four meridians change direction abruptly (the equator is represented by a square). These are singularities where differentiability fails. […] the Peirce quincuncial has been rarely used for geographic purposes.

Source: Peirce quincuncial projection on Wikipedia

Gall–Peters

Map created by Strebe via Wikimedia

What it says about you: I hate you.

Summary:

The Gall–Peters projection, named after James Gall and Arno Peters, is one specialization of a configurable equal-area map projection known as the equal-area cylindric or cylindrical equal-area projection. It achieved considerable notoriety in the late 20th century as the centerpiece of a controversy surrounding the political implications of map design.

Advantages:

On Peters’s projection, […], areas of equal size on the globe are also equally sized on the map.

Disadvantages:

Peters’s chosen projection suffers extreme distortion in the polar regions, as any cylindrical projection must, and its distortion along the equator is considerable. Several scholars have remarked on the irony of the projection’s undistorted presentation of the mid latitudes, including Peters’s native Germany, at the expense of the low latitudes, which host more of the technologically underdeveloped nations. The claim of distance fidelity is particularly problematic: Peters’s map lacks distance fidelity everywhere except along the 45th parallels north and south, and then only in the direction of those parallels. No world projection is good at preserving distances everywhere; Peters’s and all other cylindric projections are especially bad in that regard because east-west distances inevitably balloon toward the poles.

Source: Gall–Peters projection on Wikipedia

For a further explanation of the comic please see 977: Map Projections on Explain XKCD. For even more map projections see: List of map projections on Wikipedia.

For more from Randall Munroe see:

Finally to learn more about map projections in general have a look at:

Have a favourite map projections? Please let us know below:

Types of Map Projections

The ways in which we visualize the world are varied- we have pictures, maps, globes, satellite imagery, hand drawn creations and more.

What kinds of things can we learn from the way we see the world around us?

For centuries mankind has been making maps of the world around them, from their immediate area to the greater world as they understood it at the time. These maps depict everything from hunting grounds to religious beliefs and speculations of the broader, unexplored world around them.

Maps have been made of the local waterways, trade routes, and the stars to help navigators on land and sea make their way to different locations.

How we visualize the world not only has practical implications, but can also help shape our perspectives of the Earth we live in.

There are many kinds of maps made from a variety of materials and on a variety of topics.

Clay tablets, papyrus, and bricks made way for modern maps portrayed on globes and on paper; more recent technological advances allow for satellite imagery and computerized models of the Earth.

Certain map projections, or ways of displaying the Earth in the most accurate ways by scale, are more well-known and used than other kinds.

Three of these common types of map projections are cylindrical, conic, and azimuthal.

Cylindrical Map Projections

Cylindrical map projections are one way of portraying the Earth.

This kind of map projection has straight coordinate lines with horizontal parallels crossing meridians at right angles. All meridians are equally spaced and the scale is consistent along each parallel.

Cylindrical map projections are rectangles, but are called cylindrical because they can be rolled up and their edges mapped in a tube, or cylinder.

The only factor that distinguishes different cylindrical map projections from one another is the scale used when spacing the parallel lines on the map.

The downsides of cylindrical map projections are that they are severely distorted at the poles.

While the areas near the Equator are the most likely to be accurate compared to the actual Earth, the parallels and meridians being straight lines don’t allow for the curvature of the Earth to be taken into consideration.

The mercator map projection is one of the most well known cylindrical map projections. Map: Caitlin Dempsey.

Cylindrical map projections are great for comparing latitudes to each other and are useful for teaching and visualizing the world as a whole, but really aren’t the most accurate way of visualizing how the world really looks in its entirety.

Types of cylindrical map projections you may know include the popular Mercator projection, Cassini, Gauss-Kruger, Miller, Behrmann, Hobo-Dyer, and Gall-Peters.

Conic Map Projections

Secondly, conic map projections include the equidistant conic projection, the Lambert conformal conic, and Albers conic.

These maps are defined by the cone constant, which dictates the angular distance between meridians.

These meridians are equidistant and straight lines which converge in locations along the projection regardless of if there’s a pole or not.

Like the cylindrical projection, conic map projections have parallels that cross the meridians at right angles with a constant measure of map distortion throughout. Conic map projections are designed to be able to be wrapped around a cone on top of a sphere (globe), but aren’t supposed to be geometrically accurate.

Conic map projections are best suited for use as regional or hemispheric maps, but rarely for a complete world map.

The distortion in a conic map makes it inappropriate for use as a visual of the entire Earth but does make it great for use visualizing temperate regions, weather maps, climate projections, and more.

The Albers projection is an example of a conic map projection. Map: Caitlin Dempsey.

Azimuthal Map Projection

The azimuthal map projection is angular- given three points on a map (A, B, and C) the azimuth from Point B to Point C dictates the angle someone would have to look or travel in order to get to A.

These angular relationships are more commonly known as great circle arcs or geodesic arcs.

The main features of azimuthal map projections are straight meridian lines, radiating out from a central point, parallels that are circular around the central point, and equidistant parallel spacing.

Light paths in three different categories (orthographic, stereographic, and gnomonic) can also be used. Azimuthal maps are beneficial for finding direction from any point on the Earth using the central point as a reference.

Lambert azimuthal equal-area projection centered on the North Pole. Map: Caitlin Dempsey.

Map projection types all have their pros and cons, but they are incredibly versatile.

Even though it is nearly impossible to create an entirely accurate map projection there are uses for even the most imperfect depictions of the Earth.

Map projections are created for certain purposes and should be used for those purposes. In the end each and every map projection has a place, and there is no limit to the amount of projections that can be created.

Reference

Geokov. Map Projections: Types and Distortion Patterns. 2014. Web access 28 November 2014. http://geokov.com/education/map-projection.aspx

Furuti, Carlos. Map Projections: Cylindrical Projections. 2 December 2013. Web access 28 November 2014. http://www.progonos.com/furuti/MapProj/Dither/ProjCyl/projCyl.html

Furuti, Carlos. Map Projections: Conic Projections. 13 December 2013. Web access 28 November 2014. http://www.progonos.com/furuti/MapProj/Dither/ProjCon/projCon.html

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