Today’s MapBrief post is a keeper! As a design savvy individual I’m all for the little trick that he’s played in making his post match (almost) the exact length of the BLM layer-picker that he happens to be soundly deriding. Paralysis of Choice: Why Map Portals Don’t Work, Part II.
For a quick but hardy laugh (and some jelly bean map colors!), check out Montana For Badasses? The USA According to Search Assist.
Finally, for a more involved but well-worth it read, see Introducing Park Tiles, the National Park Service’s Basemap wherein cartographer-extraordinaire Mamata Akella describes the design of the new tiles and, most interestingly, the tools used to create them.
#1 by LeighH on February 7, 2013 - 2:35 pm
I’m curious about the NPS’s decision to work with Inkscape. I’ve always thought of it as only for people who use Linux, or who can’t afford Adobe Illustrator – because Illustrator is the gold standard, and Inkscape is, at best, a work in progress. But the fact that they’re using Photoshop seems to rule out both scenarios.
#2 by Mamata on February 7, 2013 - 3:29 pm
Hi Leigh,
At NPMap (www.nps.gov/npmap) we’ve been experimenting with a lot of open source tools. We do all the web mapping for the NPS, the folks in Harpers Ferry do all the print mapping. At Harpers Ferry they are big users of the Adobe suite.
We’ve also been following how MapBox has been building their basemaps using a totally open source stack. Because we’re interested in doing the same thing, we’ve opted to use tools like Inkscape when possible.
I also have a background using ArcGIS for Cartography and never had any formal training with the Adobe suite. Inkscape has actually been really easy for me to pick up and to create things like simple icons.
All of the NPS pictogram symbols are designed at Harpers Ferry using the Adobe suite. On Park Tiles and other applications, we’ve been experimenting with Inkscape for simple features like highway shields and other icons.
Hope this helps!
mamata
#3 by LeighH on February 7, 2013 - 10:30 pm
Mamata,
As a person who has fought long and hard to understand and appreciate the power of Adobe Illustrator, I sometimes get a big head about it. I really ought to spend more time getting familiar with Inkscape, since I do so much of my work in Linux, but too often I am impatient, and run back to Illustrator. Thank you for your patience and your explanation.
L
#4 by Gretchen on February 8, 2013 - 12:18 pm
@Mamata Thanks for your reply! Great to hear more about your process and reasoning.