39 Unconventional Maps That Break Away From Standard Geography

The map-loving subreddit has been around for quite some time now, celebrating its 11th birthday just last month. This online group continues to be one of the strongest and biggest cartography powerhouses on the platform that amazes thousands of people every day by sharing high-quality images of exciting and novel maps, plans, and geographic illustrations. And sure, it may seem that some of the visuals posted there are pretty nerdy, but that doesn’t make them any less fascinating.

The creator of this online group, Patrick McGranaghan, described himself in a previous interview as a "Denver-based techno-geek with a focus on all things geospatial and cartographic and a coding hobbyist with an emphasis in geospatial applications." He is a land surveyor and a member of #maptime Denver, Rocky Mountain Map Society, NACIS, PLSC, Charles Close Society, and Open Street Map Foundation, just to name a few. He decided to share his passion with the world and start the project in May 2011 while living in Taiwan, and he never looked back.

Patrick revealed that while the subreddit was pretty stable in the past, everything changed the morning when the devastating news about Ukraine and the unprovoked and unjustified attack happening there broke out. "The subreddit usually has between 2,000 and 4,000 users at a given moment on a normal day. That number spiked to a peak of over 20,000 users looking for current maps of the situation there," he told Bored Panda.

When it comes to the way people think about cartography these days, the founder of the subreddit believes it is changing. "The previous generation was accustomed to paper maps that they used to navigate. This required skills in orientation and awareness that are no longer necessary with digital maps on mobile devices. Whilst there are lots of articles that eulogize the loss of these skills, I don't think it's necessarily all bad," he explained.

Patrick pointed out that we’re seeing another shift in response to the digital age. "The digital generation has a heightened awareness of how maps can visualize data. The tools to make maps have been democratized. This has increased interest in finding new and clever ways to see spatial data."

The hottest trends in maps right now, according to him, are those that elucidate some sort of political understanding. "These can be maps of elections, voting districts, gerrymandering, political recognition, voting patterns, etc. Social media is engineered to spur controversy and this is most apparent in hot-button political topics. Politically themed content will garner more discussion, controversy, and comments than most other topics."

The founder of the sub revealed that he developed his burning passion for maps very early and feels extremely grateful to have an activity he loves doing every day. "My family traveled and moved around a lot. My dad taught me how to read maps and I would help him navigate. I used to flip through our Rand McNally atlas to pass hours traveling across the countryside," he told us.

"Maps are invitations to explore and visit new places. They give security in the knowledge that there's a way to get to your destination. If all else fails, a map will be your guide." This feeling that Patrick has carried in his mind throughout his life was what inspired him to create a strong and knowledgeable community where people can share their ideas and excitement about the subject.

"I've noticed, especially as I've gotten older, that you only have so much time on this planet and every day that is wasted is a day that you'll never get back. If you want to get out and explore the world you just have to do it," Patrick added. "Some adventures will cost time and resources, but the real question I ask myself is can I afford not to do some goal I have my heart set on."

He continued: "There are so many opportunities in this world that it may be hard to choose, but if you wait too long those opportunities will be gone forever."

The founder of the sub was kind enough to go in-depth about the wonderful world of maps and shared a few reasons people make them in the first place. "Sometimes for navigation, sometimes for showing statistical phenomena, and sometimes for fantasy," he said. "While artistic skill helps, it is not absolutely necessary. The important thing is to make it easy for users to glean useful information. Most maps should have a thesis or a story it is going to tell and this needs to be told through the map."

But for those devoted cartography fans who have an infinite number of creative ideas flowing in their minds and want to take their work to another level, he explained that a bit of work and skill is required to make their results look less "hasty and skeletal."

"It is not that they are bad," Partick said. "It's just that they don't know that they can make their maps so much better. I'm talking about things like fonts and information boxes, detail and vicinity maps, adding gradients to water features, thoughtful color choices, shadows behind place markers. The subtleties are what make maps exquisite."

"The best way to learn how to do these things is to look at lots of maps and see how other cartographers solve these problems. Imitate the masters. Read a few books on cartography and design. Some of the books that influenced me are Info We Trust by RJ Andrews, Cartography by Kenneth Field, and Things Maps Don't Tell Us by Armin Lobeck. If you can integrate the ideas in these books you'll be a league above the average amateur cartographer," he concluded.

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