The Times Comprehensive Atlas of the World, 15th Edition

Published on by Jonathan Crowe

How exactly do you review an atlas?

The Times Comprehensive Atlas of the World (HarperCollins) is the flagship of the Times World Atlas line. (The others, in descending order of size and price, are the Concise, the Universal, the Reference, the Desktop and the Mini.)1 It’s the latest in a long line of Times atlases, tracing its heritage to the original 1895 atlas published by the Times and the 1922 Times Survey Atlas of the World produced by the venerable Scottish mapmaking firm, John Bartholomew and Son. Like its predecessors, it’s absolutely gargantuan: with the slipcase, it’s 47 × 32.5 cm (16.5 × 12.8 inches) in size and weighs 5.7 kg (12.6 lb). Only the National Geographic Atlas of the World is a little bit larger, and even it weighs less than the Comprehensive (4.5 kg or 9.9 lb).2

The 15th edition of the Times Comprehensive Atlas came out on 6 September 2018 (and on 15 November 2018 in North America). HarperCollins has sent me a review copy, and I’ve been trying to come up with something to say about it.

Continue reading “The Times Comprehensive Atlas of the World, 15th Edition” →

New York Times: How Location Data Is Gathered, Shared and Sold

Published on by Jonathan Crowe

A long exposé from the New York Times explores just how much location data is collected from mobile apps, to the point where the identity of an anonymous user can be reconstructed from where they’ve been. The key point: whatever purpose the app is collecting your location for (for example, to give you your local weather), that location data may be shared with and sold to other parties.

Crowdfunding a Book of James Niehues’s Ski Resort Art

Published on by Jonathan Crowe
James Niehues, “Big Sky Resort,” 2013.

We’ve talked about James Niehues before: the legendary artist has painted hundreds of maps of ski resorts and recreational areas since the late 1980s. I was excited to learn that he’s producing a coffee table book that includes all of his maps. It’s being crowdfunded on Kickstarter. Pledging $75 or more gets you a copy of the book; other pledge levels get you a high-quality print. Clearly there’s some interest: at the moment the project has raised more than $223,000 from nearly 2,000 backers, 28 times its target of $8,000, with three weeks still to go. [Kottke]

Previously: A Video Profile of James Niehues, Ski Resort Map Artist; James Niehues Passes the Torch; James Niehues’s Ski Resort Maps; James Niehues Profile.

Map Gifts for Children

Published on by Jonathan Crowe

On The Map Room’s Facebook page I was asked, in the context of this year’s gift guide, whether I had any suggestions for younger readers. All I could come up with was The Ultimate Mapping Guide for Kids. Writing in the Guardian, Vivien Godfrey of Stanfords does rather better than I did, providing a list of maps, books, games and puzzles for children. Very much British-focused. [WMS]

Grand Canyon Mapping Conference and Competition

Published on by Jonathan Crowe

The Mapping Grand Canyon Conference, to be held at Arizona State University from 28 February to 1 March, 2019, “explores the art, science, and practice of Grand Canyon cartography. […] Free and open to all, the conference promises a full two-day program of map-based story-telling, transdisciplinary analysis, state-of-the-art geospatial and cartographic demonstrations, engaging hands-on activities, and open community dialogue.”

The conference also includes a Grand Canyon map competition. Open to students, the competition seeks entries in three categories: artistic map, data driven map (static) and data-driven map (dynamic). Deadline is 20 January 2019. [NACIS]

Popular Mechanics Proselytizes Paper Maps

Published on by Jonathan Crowe

Popular Mechanics: “Even in 2019, there are good reasons to own a paper map, whether it’s the kind you can grab at the gas station or a sturdy road atlas […] that lives in your car.” This is a listicle, so six reasons are given, some of which are absolute rubbish: paper maps aren’t “nearly flawless” in terms of accuracy (they do go out of date), and they’re not inherently more comparative (checking vs. online maps) than checking one online map against another (e.g. Google vs. Apple vs. OpenStreetMap). Valid points about reliability and being able to plot out your own routes, though. [CCA]

The Writer’s Map

Published on by Jonathan Crowe

The Writer's MapMy review of The Writer’s Map: An Atlas of Imaginary Lands went live today on Tor.com.

Edited by the historian of exploration Huw Lewis-Jones, The Writer’s Map is a collection of essays and maps that explore the relationship between maps and stories; the essays are written both by the creators of those stories—Cressida Cowell, Lev Grossman, Frances Hardinge, David Mitchell and Philip Pullman make appearances—and by the mapmakers who were inspired by those stories, such as Roland Chambers, Daniel Reeve and others. It also draws an important connection between travel and adventure stories of the past and modern fantasy, and explains why “here be dragons” is as much an attractant as it is a warning. Read my review.

The Writer’s Map is published by Thames and Hudson in the U.K. and by the University of Chicago Press in North America, from which I received a review copy.

Previously: More from (and on) The Writer’s Map; David Mitchell on Starting with a Map; Essays on Literary Maps: Treasure Island, Moominland and the Marauder’s Map.

2018 Holiday Gift Guide

Published on by Jonathan Crowe

Every year at about this time I post a gift guide that lists some of the noteworthy books about maps that have been published this year. If you have a map-obsessed person in your life and would like to give them something map-related—or you are a map-obsessed person and would your broad hints to have a link—this guide may give you some ideas.

A total of 17 books are included in this year’s guide, loosely organized by theme. The focus is on books that are visual and of interest to the general reader;3 this does not even try to be a complete list of what’s been published this year. For that, check out the Map Books of 2018 page, which may suggest other gift ideas to you.

Here be map books …

Creative Cartography: Making Art with Discarded Maps

Published on by Jonathan Crowe
Keren Shi, “The Magic Place.” Watercolour and cutting on maps. ASU Library.

Creative Cartography: Since 2014, students of Ellen Meissinger’s Art on Paper class at Arizona State University have taken discarded maps from ASU Library’s Map and Geospatial Hub and put them to use as raw material for art projects. Every year since then those projects have been the subject of an exhibition hosted by the Map and Geospatial Hub: this year’s exhibition, Place and Space, opened on 7 November and runs until the 26th. (That’s next Monday. Get a move on.) [WMS]

Fake Britain: A Map of Fictional Locations

Published on by Jonathan Crowe
Matt Brown, Londonist

Londonist’s Fake Britain map: “We’ve put together a map of fictional locations from film, TV, literature and other sources. Take a look around this alternative nation and see how many places you recognise. From Judge Dredd to Vanity Fair, it’s all here.

“The vast majority of entries are well defined geographically. Some—such as Beanotown and Blackadder’s Dunny on the Wold—are a little more nebulous, but we’ve added them for fun. Hogwarts is an unmappable location (unless it’s a Marauder’s Map you’re looking at), but we’ve had a go anyway.”

They’re looking for additions and corrections to the map: this is a work in progress. [Scarfolk]

California Wildfire Roundup

Published on by Jonathan Crowe
San Francisco Chronicle (screenshot)

The San Francisco Chronicle’s 2018 California Fire Tracker is an interactive map of ongoing and contained wildfires—notably, at this moment, the Camp and Woolsey fires. It includes fire perimeter and air quality data. (Note: it’s glitchy on desktop Safari.)

Two Esri maps: a general wildfire map and a map of smoke from wildfires [Maps Mania]. Add to that a map of field damage reports in the area hit by the Camp Fire [Maps Mania].

NASA/JPL-Caltech

The Jet Propulsion Laboratory has produced a map of the damage from the Camp Fire based on satellite radar images. NASA Earth Observatory has maps and animations showing the impact of the Camp Fire on air quality and satellite images of the Woolsey Fire burn scar.

NOAA

The New York Times has a map tracking air quality in California. Smoke from the fires has reached the east coast: an outcome predicted by atmospheric models (see above map).

This interactive map from NBC News that superimposes the Camp Fire on any location to help people outside California get a sense of how big these fires are. [Maps Mania]

How America Mapped Its Meals

Published on by Jonathan Crowe

A Fine and Fertile Country: How America Mapped Its Meals, an exhibition at the Harvard Map Collection, runs through 1 March 2019. “Harvard’s maps of American agriculture, ranging from the colonial period to current GIS data, demonstrate how food production has been a matter of concern ever since the first colonists arrived. The history of finding and farming food in the United States is a story of culture and convenience, capitalism and cattle drives. Academic arguments aside, once you see what the maps will show you, you might never look at apples and potatoes the same way.” No online version yet.

Antarctica at Eight-Metre Resolution

Published on by Jonathan Crowe

The Reference Elevation Model of Antarctica (map poster)

The Reference Elevation Model of Antarctica is a terrain map of nearly the entire continent at eight-metre resolution, assembled from observations from polar-orbiting satellites (mostly in 2015 and 2016). Version 1 covers 98 percent of Antarctica, and observations are ongoing. Notably, each grid point is timestamped, which will allow researchers to track changes over time (useful when your continent is melting). Raw data is available for download, as are map posters; the data is also available via web apps. [Geographical]