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I would like to direct my readers’ attention to a new Substack publication by Pete Morris called Terra Cognita. Pete is a frequent GeoCurrents commentor and an insightful geographer. His introductory article in Terra Cognita is an excellent overview of the recent history of academic geography in the United States. And as can be seen […] The post Recommending Terra Cognita, a New Geographical Substack Publication appeared first on GeoCurrents.
Since the fall of Syria’s Assad Regime in December 2024, I have been wondering what would become of the Druze people and the areas in which they are the majority population. Particularly important is the Jabal al-Druze, or “Mountain of the Druze,” which is clearly visible on satellite images of southern Syria (see the two […] The post Could a Druze State Be Emerging in Southern Syria? If So, What Would It Encompass? appeared first on GeoCurrents.
The previous GeoCurrents post showed that the location of oil and natural gas deposits provides a partial explanation of the differences in the distribution of wealth and economic productivity across the country. But other factors must also be considered. Could language and ethnicity play a role? It has often been argued that the Persian, or […] The post Are “Non-Persian” Regions of Iran Poorer than Persian Regions? The Counter-Case of Mazandaran appeared first on GeoCurrents.
Learning the cardinal directions is an important but often neglected aspect of early geographical education. It is my impression that the understanding of cardinal directions, like most other aspects of geography, is in sharp decline. There are several reasons for this regression, but surely one of the most important is the abandonment of map navigation […] The post Teaching the Cardinal Directions to Young Students appeared first on GeoCurrents.
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Another November means another #30DayMapChallenge. Last year I was annoyed at the Gulf of Mexico renaming. This year it's personal! I live part time by the shores of Lake Ontario now. For some incompetent fool to give it some stupid name and for Apple and Google immediately obeying in advance, November is my tiny protest. These maps are nothing special so far, it doesn’t help that the first 3 days prompts are points, lines and polygons like every year. Maybe we can give that a rest for a year at least? Day 1: Points - The Great Lakes as a constellation-with the actual names of the lakes Day 2: Lines - The US/Canadian border line as it travels through Lake Ontario Day 3: Polygons - The name of this polygon is Lake Ontario! Hand drawn, ink on index card. Day 4: Clusters - plastics pollution. The data source is very generalized but for complicated technical reasons the map looks more specific than it should. Next week - the madness continues! *Pardon the brief editorializing but it really annoys me when I look at my weather app for the area and have to see that stupid name every time. Yes there are other weather apps that still show the lake with its correct name and I should switch but habits are hard to break.
Here is an animated map of wind speeds. It stacks up six months of global average wind speed and direction, and uses the flow renderer. The cumulative result is a sort of silky living web. You can click on the link above and reverse engineer it or you can watch this short how-to that walks …
Recently, I was very impressed by 10 Years, 10 Adventures, a collection of ten WebGL-powered animated travel maps featuring 3D terrain, animated elements and trip narration. So, for today's #30DayMapChallenge, I decided to try creating something similar: a 3D map of Cap d'Antibes, which I recently visited in the South of France. My interactive 3D Map of Cap d’Antibes lets you fly around the peninsula, discover some of its best-known landmarks and view the route of an incredible coastal walk. The map includes clickable points of interest, with three photographs I took on my vacation. You can also follow an animated walking route along the coastal Sentier de Tirepoil, watching the route gradually draw itself across the 3D terrain. The map was created using Three.js, with elevation data from Mapterhorn, a service providing terrain elevation data for creating 3D maps of the Earth's surface. The elevation data was downloaded as a GeoTIFF, a georeferenced image format which stores geographic information alongside the elevation values for each pixel. This data was then converted into a 3D terrain model. The walking route was plotted separately using geojson.io, an online tool for creating and editing GeoJSON geographic data. The resulting LineString was added to the 3D terrain and animated, with its height adjusted to follow the contours of the landscape. My map is not a patch on the maps in 10 Years, 10 Adventures, but I'm happy with the results so far. With a little vibe-coding help from ChatGPT, the map only took 3-4 hours to develop. I probably won't take the project much further, as I suspect the map isn't of much interest to anybody else. However, there are plenty of ways I could improve it, including adding more photographs and points of interest, incorporating additional walking routes, and perhaps even adding narration to turn it into a more complete virtual tour of the peninsula. Read the original article at Maps Mania. Enjoyed this post? Follow @mapsmania on Bluesky.
Last year, I created a new map projection, the Asymmetric Monstrosity, designed to make somewhat of an artistic and educational statement about projections in general. I also made a physical world map to demonstrate it. Of course, there is a huge difference between a projection and an individual map that uses that projection (a distinction … Continue reading Asymmetric Monstrosity: Home Edition →
