June 2012 Entry: Sunrise Over Boreas

[arsheesh]

It's a very nice picture, but where's the map? It doesn't really convey any sort of information about spatial relationships or topology. There are no readily visible features on the planet.

True enough. I had originally set out to do a map similar to the ones LonewanderD and Vorropohaiah are working on, but as I began working on this and experimenting around with adding additional information to the map, I ended up thinking that in terms of composition, it just looked better as a simple planet piece. However, perhaps you are right Hai-Etlik, technically it isn't a map. Maybe I'll play around with it a bit more and see if I can come up with a more cartographic rendering of this piece.

Cheers,
-Arsheesh

[Lyandra]

Looks really great! I'm looking forward to seeing a more "mappy" version.^^

[arsheesh]

Well, after Hai-Etik's suggestive comments I went ahead and re-vamped this piece into something a bit more "map-like". However, I've hit a snag. You see I'm attempting to add graticule tick marks and numbers indicating the degree of latitude which will need to be curved along the interior of the... well I'm not quite sure what its called, but "sickle" shaped object. There are a couple of problems that I have here:

My Problems:

1. How can I, with minimal time expenditure, create a set of graticule tick marks that extend the full 180 degrees of the globe?
2. Once I have created these tick marks (and degrees of latitude), how can I place them along the curve of the sickle shape?

First off, I am working with GIMP and Inkscape, but am open to checking out other free programs if anyone knows of any that might help. With that said, does anyone know how to accomplish these two tasks given what I'm working with (or with the help of supplemental free programs)? In order to give you a better idea of what I'm asking, I'll elaborate on these two questions.

As to the first question, I know that I will need to create a set of graticule tick marks that extend the full length of the sickle (which is about 3,646px long). I would like to place all 180 tick marks. What I don't know how to do is how to create them in manner that is either accurate or relatively quick (I don't want to end up having to painstakingly create and position each graticule tick manually).

As to the second question, I may have discovered a way to do this in Inkscape: by creating a curved path along the sickle and then placing the graticule ticks etc along it. However, this assumes that the graticule ticks etc are already on a path (I don't know how to import a bitmap and then place it along a path). So this would limit me to creating the graticule ticks in Inkscape (which I'm open to if anyone knows how). Aside from that option, I really don't know how to accomplish this.

I hope someone out there who is more knowledgeable about these matters wouldn't mind offering me an assist, I could sure use it.

Cheers,
-Arsheesh

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[LonewandererD]

Aaaaaaaaaaaaand there goes my shot of winning this month's comp

-D-

[Sapiento]

That looks great!

typo: oribital period

[Lukc]

A fantastic entry, no two ways about it!

[Hai-Etlik]

On a desk globe, the physical bracket is called a meridian, which is of course a bit confusing as the latitude lines printed on the globe are also called that. Still it's probably the best name available for that graphical element.

In Inkscape try this: Draw a mark, switch to rotation mode, drag the rotation centre of the mark to the centre of the globe, then bring up the Transform dialog so you can rotate by precise steps. Rotate, duplicate, and repeat until you fill the meridian.

[vorropohaiah]

oooh... gorgeous colours on the 'graticule' much nicer than my sick green

[arsheesh]

oooh... gorgeous colours on the 'graticule' much nicer than my sick green

I don't think the green is sick at all, on the contrary its the natural choice for a sci-fi LCD. I probably would have gone with green as well, except that since the theme of this piece is "ice", I tried to keep the color pallet pretty cool, and a more "heather" colored LCD seemed more appropriate.

On a desk globe, the physical bracket is called a meridian, which is of course a bit confusing as the latitude lines printed on the globe are also called that. Still it's probably the best name available for that graphical element.

In Inkscape try this: Draw a mark, switch to rotation mode, drag the rotation centre of the mark to the centre of the globe, then bring up the Transform dialog so you can rotate by precise steps. Rotate, duplicate, and repeat until you fill the meridian.

Thanks for the tip Hai. I tried doing the draw-center-transform-copy-and-repeat method you suggested, and even made it half way through the process. However, when I panned out I noticed that the ticks seemed crammed together on one end of the meridian, and pretty widely spaced apart on the other end. I was baffled since I had thought that I had calculated the exact distance that each of them needed to be apart from each other. Then I realized that I had only made the calculations based upon one set of axis. Since my higher level math is a bit rusty, I may have to go back to the original plan of creating the meridian (on a single set of axis) and then trying to set it along the curved path of the meridian. We'll see if this works or not.

A fantastic entry, no two ways about it!

Thanks Luke!

Aaaaaaaaaaaaand there goes my shot of winning this month's comp

-D-

Well I certainly wouldn't go that far, I think your piece is very much still in the running. But thanks, I am rather happy with the way this turned out.

That looks great!

typo: oribital period

Thanks Sap!

Cheers,
-Arsheesh

[arsheesh]

And I think I'm calling this done.

The most tricky part of the whole map was creating and aligning those graticule ticks. In case anyone else ever tries this, the method I eventually used was to use the Measure Tool in GIMP to determine both the degree, and Horizontal and Vertical axis of the pixels, then, on a separate layer, paint a tiny reference dot there. I created a reference dot for each 10 degrees. Then, between the 90 degree - 80 degree section of the south east portion of the meridian, I used the same method to create reference points for each degree (i.e. 89, 88, 87 ect). Then I imported this into Inkscape and used the draw-center-transform-copy-and-repeat method Hai-Etik suggested to get first 10 degrees placed in the south-east section of the meridian (i.e. 90-80). Then I copied this entire section, pasted it in the next section and transformed it, and repeated this process. Once I was done, I imported the bitmap of this back into GIMP and aligned it to the Meridian. Phew, glad that's over!

Anyway, thanks for the help and constructive comments everyone.

Cheers,
-Arsheesh

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