Caught Mapping? What To Do Now.

"HammerheadFistpunch" (hammerheadfistpunch) 04/06/2015 at 17:30 • Filed to: Maps, neat, Archive

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Well you gone and made a map, you deviant cartographer you, and now its out of date...what do you do? "What's does out of date mean?" you ask. "Is that like the before apple maps got updated?"

I'm being facetious of course, no one uses Apple maps. The reality of the modern world, however is that traditional paper maps and their mathematically pure folding method have given way to highly accurate, and easily update-able software that can give you up to the minute information on road conditions, detours, new constructions and what people are willing to do for !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! .

It wasn't always this way though, cartography used to be hard work that required skilled craftsmanship, labor intensive printing and brutal field work using tools with cool names like Aneroid Altimeter. A word so ancient Chrome doesn't even know what it is!

Despite the challenges, people still made atlases and, believe it or not, actually reprinted them with the shocking frequency of, on average, 2 weeks! This video, published in 1940 with the aid of The Chevrolet Motor Vehicle Company gives you nearly 9 Thrilling™ minutes of what it was like to make and update maps in the days before YOLO. We take so much for granted.

deekster_caddy > HammerheadFistpunch 04/06/2015 at 17:43

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Even though I have, use and love the variety of mapping technology available to my smartphone (I primarily use Waze online and have Navigon for offline use), I still like to have a paper map onboard to look at. There's something about the bigger picture that I like to see.

HammerheadFistpunch > deekster_caddy 04/06/2015 at 17:45

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Atlases are the biz. I have 2 I'm my car 100% of the time in addition to the 2 GPS devices in there full time (in addition to my phone)

desertdog5051 > HammerheadFistpunch 04/06/2015 at 18:15

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As a map collector, I love those old printed maps. I have several hundred. The ones printed before the Interstate System or before 1930 show how hard it was to travel across the country and even across the state. I always carry a comprehensive Gazeteer in my truck.

Baeromez > HammerheadFistpunch 04/06/2015 at 22:37

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I make maps all the time. In fact I made one today and now I'm sunburned. You just walk around with a pole with a GPS antenna on it. Well, there's actually a lot more to it than that, but its WAY easier than just a few years ago. My dad was explaining how they did it before GPS, and man it is a walk in the park compared to those days.

The Compromiser > HammerheadFistpunch 04/07/2015 at 18:29

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I rmember a 2 hour comprehensive class on map care. Half an hour dedicated to how to fold a map for storage vs. use. Proper sizes and colours for grease pencil to get it to show up under red or blue light. Just map care...Nothing else.