World Map
Reply With QuoteHey there. Hmm, this is a difficult one. A lot to unload.
The projection that is best completely depends on what you're trying to achieve. First off, what region is the map set in? The Tropics? Temperate zone? Polar regions? Certain projections like the azimuthal is usually great for the poles, not so much anywhere else. It also depends on whether the map is primarily north to south or east to west. This will factor in a fair deal. Furthermore it depends on how large the area is that is being charted. Is it 700 miles? 2000? A full world map 24000 miles across (if going off the earth's circumference)? This will play a large role as typically certain projections are best for shorter areas/distances but beyond that they start to fall apart.
There's a lot of particular reasons as to why you might pick one projection over another. A Mercator map will do great at the Equator but outside the tropics it will begin to warp something awful until further north and south, it distorts things beyond recognition. It is absolutely terrible for showing the true size of places and therefore keeping track of distances through use of a legend. It is however fantastic for navigation and that's why it was so widely used and known as the most common map including in schools despite it showing a greatly inaccurate view of the actual world. It also depends on if you want Equal Area, Equidistant, conformal, compromise etc. Basically there's an awful lot of information that goes into choosing the right projection. If it's for navigation, a Mercator is probably the best map to use but it won't show the real size of the places on the map.
And I'm afraid there is no way to project a map of a 3d space onto a 2d map without distortion. It's always going to be a compromise, no map will ever portray the area and distances completely accurately. It all just depends on what you want to get accurate and what you want to sacrifice to do so. If one thing is accurate, another thing is greatly distorted. A compromise map distorts everything to some degree and therefore nothing is 100% accurate but it gets closer to all round accuracy, never having to sacrifice any one area to any large degree. The Robinson Projection is a compromise map I believe and began being used instead of the Mercator. However it has since been replaced by the Winkel triple projection in some places.
Most fantasy maps just don't use an actual projection because they are complicated, cause distortion and make it difficult if not impossible to use an accurate legend to tell distances. There are apps that allow you to turn your map into different projections. I downloaded a free one in the past but never ended up using it myself and to be honest, I don't even remember what it was called so unfortunately I can't help there.
I'd suggest doing your own research if you really want an actual projection and then if there's any questions at all or things you're uncertain of, be sure to let me know and I'll try and help however I can. Be aware though, it can be quite the rabbit hole.
This is some good general advice taken from a site with more information on it. Not sure what the policy is on posting links so for now, I'll just leave this
" · To map tropical regions, use a cylindrical projection
· To map middle latitudes, use a conic projection
· To map a polar region, use an azimuthal projection"
Best of luck.
I think that Mollweide projection is still the best at the moment but its good to know about program which can turn map projections. Meaby someone know it?
