Map Monday, Mercator Projection Correction?

The Mercator projection is the most common depiction of the Earth on a flat surface. With the exception of members of the flat earth society, most readers of this blog accept that the Earth is a sphere. The more precise among you might protest that it’s flattened at the poles and bulges at the equator (insert favorite joke about me here). Thus, the best fit among the regular geometric shapes is an oblate spheroid, which is created by rotating an ellipse along its shorter axis.

That’s all well and good for scientists, mathematicians, and others with access to powerful computers. But what about normal people?  Until holographic displays arrive, we’re stuck with a small flat screen for our map displays.

Back to the Mercator projection, which is a cylindrical representation created by Flemish cartographer Geradus Mercator in 1569. Beginning in the mid-nineteenth century his projection became the de facto standard for navigating the seas. It is also the most common two-dimensional map found in classrooms across the globe. As with any two-dimensional rendering of a three-dimensional object, Mercator’s projection introduces errors. At or near the equator, these distortions are relatively minor, but the closer you get to the poles the bigger the errors. The net effect is that objects near the top and bottom of the projection are stretched. Basically, Greenland, Canada, and Antarctica look much larger than they are relative to Africa and Brazil.

Corrected Version

Fortunately, a clever guy (Neilrkaye) created a corrected version of the Mercator projection. The light blue is a standard Mercator map, while the dark blue represents the corrected size of the country or feature. Pretty cool.

As always thanks for reading.

Armen

Note to pay the bills:  Are you interested in a James Bond-like thriller in a fantasy setting? Check out a summary of the series here or find links to purchase books here.