Tom Patterson

Getting Real: Reflecting on the New Look of National Park Service Maps

To make more inviting and understandable maps for general audiences, the U.S. National Park Service has been experimenting with cartographically realistic map design. Using rasterized geodata and unconventional image processing techniques, cartographic realism draws inspiration from traditional cartographic art, modern graphic design, observations of nature, and aerial photograph maps. The aim is to combine the best characteristics of imagery and maps into a more intuitive hybrid product. Discussed techniques include aquafication, texture substitution, illuminated relief, and outside land muting.

Hal Shelton Revisited: Designing and Producing Natural-Color Maps with Satellite Land Cover Data

This paper examines natural-color maps by focusing on the painted map art of Hal Shelton, the person most closely associated with developing the genre during the mid twentieth century. Advocating greater use of natural-color maps by contemporary cartographers, we discuss the advantages of natural-color maps compared to physical maps made with hypsometric tints; why natural-color maps, although admired, have remained comparatively rare; and the inadequacies of using satellite images as substitutes for natural-color maps. Seeking digital solutions, the paper then introduces techniques for designing and producing natural-color maps that are economical and within the skill range of most cartographers. The techniques, which use Adobe Photoshop software and satellite land cover data, yield maps similar in appearance to those made by Shelton, but with improved digital accuracy. Full-color illustrations show examples of Shelton’s maps and those produced by digital techniques.

Flex Projector–Interactive Software for Designing World Map Projections

Flex Projector is a free, open-source, and cross-platform software application that allows cartographers to interactively design custom projections for small-scale world maps. It specializes in cylindrical, and pseudocylindrical projections, as well as polyconical projections with curved parallels. Giving meridians non-uniform spacing is an option for all classes of projections. The interface of Flex Projector enables cartographers to shape the projection graticule, and provides visual and numerical feedback to judge its distortion properties. The intended users of Flex Projector are those without specialized mathematical expertise, including practicing mapmakers and cartography students. The pages that follow discuss why the authors developed Flex Projector, give an overview of its features, and introduce two new map projections created by the authors with this new software: the A4 and the Natural Earth projection.

A View From On High: Heinrich Berann’s Panoramas and Landscape Visualization Techniques for the U.S. National Park Service

The late Heinrich Berann, from Austria, was generally regarded as the most accomplished panoramist of all time. During the decade before his retirement in 1994, Berann painted four panoramas for the U.S. National Park Service (NPS) that demonstrated his genius for landscape visualization. This paper examines the widely admired, but little understood, vocation of panorama making, with emphasis on Berann’s NPS pieces, concepts, and techniques. Explanation is offered about how the panorama for Denali National Park, Alaska, was planned, compiled, sketched, and painted—starting from a blank sheet of paper. Berann’s techniques for landscape manipulation are then analyzed, including his unorthodox habit of rotating mountains and widening valleys, and his unique interpretations of vertical exaggeration. His graphical special effects used for portraying realistic environments are reviewed. The paper finishes with illustrations that compare Berann’s panoramas to digitallygenerated landscapes.

Graphical design of world map projections

The design of new map projections has up until now required mathematical and cartographic expertise that has limited this activity to a small group of specialists. This article introduces the background mathematics for a software-based method that enables cartographers to easily design new small-scale world map projections. The software is usable even by those without mathematical expertise. A new projection is designed interactively in an iterative process that allows the designer to graphically and numerically assess the graticule, the representation of the continents, and the distortion properties of the new projection. The method has been implemented in Flex Projector, a free and open-source application enabling users to quickly create new map projections and modify existing projections. We also introduce new tools that help evaluate the distortion properties of projections, namely a configurable acceptance index to assess areal and angular distortion, a derived acceptance visualization, and interactive profiles through the distortion space of a projection. To illustrate the proposed method, a new projection, the Cropped Ginzburg VIII projection, is presented.

DEM Manipulation and 3-D Terrain Visualization: Techniques Used by the U.S. National Park Service

Manipulating digital elevation model (DEM) surfaces, like pliable modelling clay, enhances the appearance and legibility of 3-D topography on maps. The U.S. National Park Service (NPS) uses the familiar image-editing tools in Adobe Photoshop to manipulate raster DEM data. Exporting modified DEM data with the help of freeware and shareware utilities allows subsequent rendering of final 3-D scenes in Corel Bryce. Techniques to be discussed include topographic substitution – a method for reverse engineering present-day landscapes into the past or projecting them into the future; selective vertical exaggeration; resolution bumping – a technique developed specifically for improving the legibility of high-mountain landscapes; painting and filtering effects; and, borrowing from the traditional masters of landform depiction, creating 3-D scenes that emulate the panoramas of Heinrich Berann and the spherical over-the-horizon views of Richard Edes Harrison by warping the projection plane of DEMS. The unique challen...

A Polynomial Equation for the Natural Earth Projection

The Natural Earth projection is a new projection for representing the entire Earth on small-scale maps. It was designed in Flex Projector, a specialized software application that offers a graphical approach for the creation of new projections. The original Natural Earth projection defines the length and spacing of parallels in tabular form for every five degrees of increasing latitude. It is a pseudocylindrical projection, and is neither conformal nor equal-area. In the original definition, piece-wise cubic spline interpolation is used to project intermediate values that do not align with the five-degree grid. This paper introduces alternative polynomial equations that closely approximate the original projection. The polynomial equations are considerably simpler to compute and program, and require fewer parameters, which should facilitate the implementation of the Natural Earth projection in geospatial software. The polynomial expression also improves the smoothness of the rounded corners where the meridians meet the horizontal pole lines, a distinguishing trait of the Natural Earth projection that suggests to readers that the Earth is spherical in shape. Details on the least squares adjustment for obtaining the polynomial formulas are provided, including constraints for preserving the geometry of the graticule. This technique is applicable to similar projections that are defined by tabular parameters. For inverting the polynomial projection the Newton-Raphson root finding algorithm is suggested.

The Development and Rationale of Cross-blended Hypsometric Tints

Hypsometric tints have been a favored mapping technique for over 150 years.By the mid-twentieth century, hypsometric tints based on the work of JohnBartholomew, Jr., Eduard Imhof, and Karl Peucker became the de facto standardfor physical reference maps at small scales. More recently, the role and design ofhypsometric tints have come under scrutiny. One reason for this is the concern thatpeople misread elevation colors as climate or vegetation information. Cross-blendedhypsometric tints, introduced in 2009, are a partial solution to this problem. Theyuse variable lowland colors customized to match the differing natural environmentsof world regions, which merge into one another. In the short time since theirintroduction, cross-blended hypsometric tints have proved to be a popular choiceamong professional mapmakers. Most maps made with cross-blended hypsometrictints also contain shaded relief (terrain represented with modulated light andshadows).

Introducing Plan Oblique Relief

Plan oblique relief is a new digital technique for rendering three dimensional terrain on otherwise planimetric (conventional flat) maps. Landforms shown realistically in side view have an illustrative quality that appeals to readers. Inspired by the work of manual mapmakers of the past, the paper begins with a historical review that includes maps by Xaver Imfeld of Switzerland, Erwin Raisz of the United States, and Heinrich Berann of Austria. In the next, digital techniques section, the projections and rendering parameters needed to create plan oblique relief receive attention, as does Natural Scene Designer 5.0, the first commercial software to offer this functionality. The section on design takes a candid look at the advantages and disadvantages of plan oblique relief. The paper ends on a practical note by discussing two maps made by the authors that feature plan oblique relief, one a panorama and the other a physical map.

Designing 3D Landscapes

Humans naturally tend to visualise physical landscapes in profile based on our grounded lives on the Earth’s surface, rather than as flat maps. For example, when thinking of a landscape like the Alps, an image of craggy peaks silhouetted against the sky invariably comes to mind instead of a 2D map, which is viewed from a theoretical vantage point above the Earth’s surface. An obliquely viewed 3D landscape is a type of map that shows topography in partial profile. Thus, it is probably more understandable to users, especially those with limited map reading skills, and offers visualization advantages not available in traditional 2D mapping. Presenting maps in 3D allows thematic data with a height component to be presented in a format that more closely resembles natural conditions. Geologic stratigraphy, meteorological phenomena, and bathymetry, all can be more easily visualized in three dimensions.