Ebook Maps

[Gidde]

Fantastic Job! That will be MUCH easier to see on a reader/phone

[töff]

I'd love to see that map on a phone ... hmm, who do I know who has an iPhone?
Seriously, phone screens are so small, I doubt the map will be legible.
If I were designing the map for legibility on a phone, I'd cut it into sections and add a wide-scale overview map (a simplified version of the map shown above).

[DoubleSupercool]

Thanks for all the tips guys. I have just finished a very nice map for a mates books and converted it all to vector for scaling etc, but it has become apparent that the *ahem* "not really great" resolution of various eBook formats is going to be an issue and I am going to have to do a revised, MUCH simplified version. To be honest, I was a bit taken aback at how pathetic the resolution is. I would be very interested to see how Apple's entry into the educational textbook market will shake things up with their Retina display. A lot of other computer/monitor companies are moving towards that as well.

It seems to me that most people don't mind reading books on their iPad despite the supposed benefits of eInk.

[ravells]

Just had look at Toffs maps on my kindle. His is definitely the clearer although it looks like it's just font size which is the main issue.

[töff]

Just had look at Toffs maps on my kindle. His is definitely the clearer although it looks like it's just font size which is the main issue.

"Main" issue, yes, I'll agree, but I'll extend the comment thus: a map symbol is in essence the same thing as a word -- an optical mark meant to be "read." Map symbols that get too small to be read are as much of a problem as words too small to be read. On the sample map above, it was largely a matter of font size. But that's just for that map. It's usually not as simple a matter as just making the font size larger. One of the tricks that comes in handy, if you can use it -- and I did, on that sample map -- is to abandon scale* and redistribute features to fit better across the available space, so packing more stuff onto the map, or at least not having to delete anything because there's no room.

Opinion: are the elevation marks too light on Kindle or Nook? They look great on an LED screen but on an e-ink screen the gamma seems to be different and the slopes & hills are kinda faded out, to my eye.

* (In my defense, there was almost no scale data in the book itself, and the original map was not to scale either.)

[Gidde]

I'd love to see that map on a phone ... hmm, who do I know who has an iPhone?
Seriously, phone screens are so small, I doubt the map will be legible.
If I were designing the map for legibility on a phone, I'd cut it into sections and add a wide-scale overview map (a simplified version of the map shown above).

Little late on my response here, but really there's no need to modify it for the phone if it's already done for the reader. I imagine most people who read on their phone are just as used to zooming and panning around an image on it as I am, and as long as it's not actually sized for the phone (which would be horrible. it's just too small), one can zoom and pan and see everything just fine.