Community USForum Map - Rev #334

[vh]

well there are two ways to shrink it:

this is the official community map.

also, quick tutorial on how to downsize your high-res maps onto the community one:

1. your country map should be just a shape with no internal borders
2. magic-wand select
3. paste onto community map (in a new layer)
4. resize and reposition as necessary
5. deselect/whatever
6. magic wand to click it with tolerance 0
7. shrink border slightly to match it up with the border of your country if necessary
8. invert selection
9. delete everything
10. invert selection
11. delete everything
12. repaint with white with paintbucket
13. expand selection 2 pixels
14. paint the edge of the selection black with paintbucket to create the border
15. modify/remove any border section that connects to the main landmass if necessary.

2.

1)transform the area
2)shrink it
3)new layer
4)trace

[Hellpotatoe]

fine I shrunk it

He wanna less land, no less sea

[FiahOwl]

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[jman]

Can someone add my nation to the map because when I try to post the new map it doesn't show up...

[vh]

maybe you want to try uploading it to a site like imgdiode or imageshack.

[Darvince]

inb4 .bmp

[vh]

also i think there is a slight problem with this map, the projection we are using is non-ideal imo.
here is earth with equirectangular, the current projection we're using: http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/e/ea/Equirectangular-projection.jpg

greenland is about the size of brazil, it seems, but in irl, brazil is several times larger.

over 58% of this map has a distortion of 10% or more, i think 10% is an acceptable amount, but for over half the map to have a distortion larger than that is not exactly perfect. over 11% of the entire map is twice as large as it is irl; pretty much this and up is all distorted by twice, (also the south pole too) http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/80th_parallel_north
the top and bottom 10 pixels of the map are enlarged by more than 1000% due to this projection.

so i think it is a good idea to change the projection, since no major work has started on the map yet, this will be easy.

the below are some good ones:
Goode's homolosine
1) least area deformation
2) shapes stay the same shape

robinson
1) little area deformation
2) shapes remain relatively close

mollweide
1) equal area
2) shape deformation present

dymaxion
1) area and shapes remain close to same
2) however, it is split up into shapes

[Darvince]

ok
how about 8 mapps.
first is IDL to 90W horizontally and 90N to equator vertically, centered at 40N. second is 90W to PM horizontally and 90N to equator vertically, and so on.
or we find a program where you can paint on to 3 dimensional surfaces and just put everything directly on to the sphere.

[vh]

8 mapps is fine, but it might get a bit complicated. However, we could do this:

make 8 maps, or more/less

put them together into several official maps from different directions.

the problem we're facing is that we're trying to take two dimensional areas, imaginarily project them onto three dimensional spheres, (which is impossible), and then trying to turn those spheres, back into a two dimension representation (impossible to do perfectly).

We could find a program to paint onto 3 dimensional surfaces (google sketchup might work), but it might be very tedious to redraw everything.

[Bla]

I don't like the idea of having non-rectangular maps. Imo we should just accept the distortion. Robinson and Mollweide could maybe be an acceptable absolute emergency solution... But no matter what projection we use it won't be perfect, so it depends on what we value. I value the map being rectangular very high and I think the distortion is more acceptable than having a map filled with cuts.

Multiple maps is a bad idea imo, we can make local area maps however we want, but whether we fill a single map with cuts or make 8 seperate maps it ends up being a mess, and distortion will never go away unless we paint directly on a sphere. I'd prefer a single map.

[FiahOwl]

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[vh]

If we use something like mollewiede then how are we going to wrap it onto a sphere? Wasnt this program that converted equirectangular images to other types, anyways?

since when was the plan to make a map that would fit on a sphere? i thought the purpose of the map was to have something to base rp's and stuff off of

[vh]

I don't like the idea of having non-rectangular maps. Imo we should just accept the distortion. Robinson and Mollweide could maybe be an acceptable absolute emergency solution... But no matter what projection we use it won't be perfect, so it depends on what we value. I value the map being rectangular very high and I think the distortion is more acceptable than having a map filled with cuts.

Multiple maps is a bad idea imo, we can make local area maps however we want, but whether we fill a single map with cuts or make 8 seperate maps it ends up being a mess, and distortion will never go away unless we paint directly on a sphere. I'd prefer a single map.

i meant to make eight maps, and then from that, to create 2 maps, each focused on each side of the world for less distortion.

i would be fine with the distortion, except for the fact that then your nation isn't actually shaped like your nation. like a local area map of greenland looks nothing like greenland on the world map in most projections. If you put a greenland that looked like greenland where it is on the mercator, it would not be right.

[vh]

also what is the advantage of rectangular maps that they are advantegeous

[FiahOwl]

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[vh]

the primary goal of this map is not to wrap it on a sphere, we can make it in another projection, then convert it with your magic program (link?), and then wrap it on a sphere.

[Bla]

Agree that it'd be nice to have it rectangular so it could be wrapped around a sphere in Ubox.

Also imo rectangular maps are the easiest to "read", it looks nicest and utilizes the entire picture (which is also rectangular in any case). And it's very easy to wrap around because it stops in a vertical line so you can just copy the edge and move it to the other.

I don't see why it's such a big deal that it's distorted.

[vh]

no the big deal is not that it's distorted, the big deal is that the shape is not the same.

if you put a huge, equilateral triangle where greenland is irl, and then you look at the triangle in a mercator, or equidistant projection, the equilateral triangle is not a equilateral triangle. So if my nation has a shape 'f' irl, and then i put it on the equidistant map by just copying and pasting, it will be wrong, because it is not supposed to look like shape 'f', it is supposed to look distorted. If i put the nation as shape 'f' onto the map, it will look completely different irl, and if i draw a equilateral triangle on the equidistant map close to the poles, irl, it will not look like a equilateral triangle. I don't have a problem with the distortion, i have a problem with the non-ability to have the correct distortion.

[Darvince]

ok then how about we keep land away from the poles.

fiah and hellpotatoe must still desize their nationings.

[FiahOwl]

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[vh]

i don't have it, so we'll have to refind it if we are to use it.

[atomic7732]

I don't like the idea of having non-rectangular maps. Imo we should just accept the distortion. Robinson and Mollweide could maybe be an acceptable absolute emergency solution... But no matter what projection we use it won't be perfect, so it depends on what we value. I value the map being rectangular very high and I think the distortion is more acceptable than having a map filled with cuts. I'd prefer a single map.

also what is the advantage of rectangular maps that they are advantegeous

Latitude and longitude is consistent throughout the image and doesn't have to be calculated. (at least with equirectangular) That is something I plan on taking advantage of.

the primary goal of this map is not to wrap it on a sphere, we can make it in another projection, then convert it with your magic program (link?), and then wrap it on a sphere.

You and nue posted it on the forum around December IIRC

Pretty sure it was naru who posted it.

[vh]

Latitude and longitude is consistent throughout the image and doesn't have to be calculated. (at least with equirectangular) That is something I plan on taking advantage of.

it won't be very useful at all if the shapes of the nations aren't even right. I'd like to keep the nations as far from the poles as possible.

[atomic7732]

It'll be very useful because it's not hard to determine where something is located on the map.

[vh]

yes but that comes with the side effect that the world map and your local map disagree with each other.

[atomic7732]

Not very much, and if someone doesn't mind it they can be near the poles if they choose to do so.

[vh]

well how much depends on how precise you want to be. almost 60% of the world has a distortion of over 10%. I guess i'm fine with it then (the rectangular poojection).

although at the poles the distortion is infinity.

[FiahOwl]

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[Naru523]

no

[Darvince]

no