Author: John

This project, and blog post, were made in collaboration with Chris Cappelli. What a time to be alive. Humans have harnessed the laser. Without question the single greatest application of this profound new technology is its incorporation into consumer grade arts and crafts laser cutters. Naturally, geographers have a thing or two to add to … Continue reading From GIS to Glowforge: 3D Printed Terrain for Map Nerds

Over the past couple of years I’ve been so happy and honored to make sample maps of the Spilhaus World Ocean Map, to help spread the word about this wonderful perspective dreamed up by Athelstan Spilhaus and mathemagically interpreted by David Burrows and Bojan Šavrič (outstanding Esri colleagues) so it could be slung out to … Continue reading Spilhaus World Ocean Map: vector assets for designers

It’s that time of year (again, and again, and again) when geographers drop their Secchi Disks into pools of eggnog, bake north arrow-shaped gingerbread cookies, and sling surprisingly capable consumer-grade drones as prizes at office parties. We gather close and warm our hands next to our laptop fans, wishing each other rich topologies and complete metadata in … Continue reading Make this Papercraft Globe Please

Remember that feeling you got in your first remote sensing class when Dr. Grossa told you about the wavelengths of light and how blue scatters more easily than red which is why the sky is blue and sunsets are red and you just couldn’t wait to impress your friends and family with this specialized bit … Continue reading Riffing with Light and Shadow

Ah, the map that keeps on giving. I made the first version of this thing nine years ago now. Nine years? It shows hurricanes since 1851, in an atypical projection so that historical hurricanes coalesce into one big storm of storms. This map has served as a “stretch goal” for students taking the Cartography mooc, so … Continue reading How to Make this Map of Hurricanes Since 1851

I had the chance to join Ta Taneka and Wayne Lee-Archer from Esri Australia again to chat about mapping and making and sharing resources with the mapping community. I always have a lot of fun with these wonderful folks and it was an honor to be part of the conversation. You can find their podcast … Continue reading GIS Directions Podcast with Ta Taneka and Wayne Lee-Archer

Here is a map of the Shetland Islands, customized (YouTube link) from this map of Indonesia. Continue reading Shetland

Here is a map of the area around Indonesia. It sports a pretty dramatic vignette, a sculpted terrain, rippley water lines, a paper texture, and that crazy glassy overview map. For your carto-adventure edification, I’ve made a two-part video series showing how to make it. I’ll also list the steps beneath each video if you … Continue reading How to Make this Map of Indonesia

In the hyper-technical world of cartography one must often endure a no-holds-barred review session where a map is scrutinized against a time-tested checklist of must-haves. Title? Check.Scalebar? Check.Legend? Check.North arrow? Check. Only then is it an acceptable spatial document worthy of the masses… …except not really. A really great map can have any, or none, … Continue reading Put a North Arrow On It?

This is a presentation I recorded for the glorious North American Cartographic Information Society (NACIS). It’s my favorite carto conference and just jam packed with fascinating folks diving into the fun of map making. In this one, I get into the why and how of YouTube map-making videos. Plus I got to co-present with one … Continue reading Map-Making on YouTube? Cautionary tales, Context, and Encouragement