[OSGeo-Discuss] Open Source Geospatial Atlas

[Mark Lucas]

Great idea, I was just thinking that we need to add something exciting and new that promotes OSGeo.  The OSGeo live disk certainly does that, but this would place more emphasis on data/art/style.  I know there is a large segment within OSGeo that would like to focus more on education and academia - documenting how some of these examples are put together could possibly focus on that.

Mark

On Jul 28, 2012, at 7:51 AM, "Michael P. Gerlek" <mpg at flaxen.com> wrote:

> Barry:
> 
> This is the coolest idea I've heard in a long time.
> 
> ESRI does a yearly coffee-table book for Arc-generated maps, the various satellite companies make calendars every year with their best hi-res shots... We should play the game too. 
> 
> Count me in, I'll volunteer to help.
> 
> .mpg
> 
> On Jul 28, 2012, at 4:33 AM, Barry Rowlingson <b.rowlingson at lancaster.ac.uk> wrote:
> 
>> Do you think an atlas of beautiful maps produced with open-source
>> technology (software and data) could be made? Here's what I was
>> thinking:
>> 
>> * Put out a proposal for beautiful cartography, stunning maps, and
>> insightful visualisations done with OpenSource applications and/or
>> Open Data.
>> 
>> * Collect map proposals as images on a flickr group:
>> http://www.flickr.com/groups/osgeomaps/
>> 
>> * Get enough, have a community vote/expert opinion for the best 50 or so.
>> 
>> * Get high-res or vector versions of the winners.
>> 
>> * Get authors to write a note for the book, explaining the software,
>> the techniques, and the impact of their work.
>> 
>> * Edit them into a glossy colour book, publish on a publish-on-demand
>> site (eg lulu.com).
>> 
>> * Give free copies to the authors of the top ten voted maps or maybe
>> all the ones included (I'll pay for these unless someone wants to
>> sponsor it).
>> 
>> * Release the PDF under an open license. Of course.
>> 
>> * Profit!! [By selling copies on lulu at a small premium for OSGeo]
>> 
>> I don't think the production effort is very much, I just wonder if
>> enough people are producing maps that will look good in A4 or larger
>> (we're all about the web these days, right?) and if publicity can be
>> sustained enough to get 50 nice maps. The timeline would be set so we
>> have lots of glossy copies of these sitting around for sale at FOSS4G
>> 2013.
>> 
>> Good idea? Or will we just get 45 maps which are stamen.com
>> watercolour backgrounds with some points pasted on? There is a
>> perception which I think we've all heard that Open Source GIS packages
>> can't do cartography, but with a little help from Inkscape I've seen
>> some great-looking maps on posters at conferences.
>> 
>> ESRI used to (still do?) produce an Arc/Info atlas (I have a vague
>> memory of something A3-size in our GIS research lab 20 years ago) of
>> maps - surely we can do something like that now. Obviously I'm
>> sticking my hand up to do the work for this, my concern is purely
>> whether we'd get enough entries. I'd like the bar to be quite high.
>> Most of the work is going to be done by the mappers themselves.
>> 
>> Shoot.
>> 
>> Barry
>> 
>> -- 
>> blog: http://geospaced.blogspot.com/
>> web: http://www.maths.lancs.ac.uk/~rowlings
>> web: http://www.rowlingson.com/
>> twitter: http://twitter.com/geospacedman
>> pics: http://www.flickr.com/photos/spacedman
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