The Daily Render

A Digital Scrapbook for the Past, Present, and Future

Harvard Quilt #3
|| 2/25/2009 || 1:42 pm || Comments Off on Harvard Quilt #3 || ||

: rendered at 18,000 X 12,000 :
Harvard Quilt Number 3 by Nikolas R. Schiller

The other day I decided to snoop around on some of my old hard drives and discovered that I had quite a bit of imagery that I never used to create a map. Yesterday I decided to use some of this imagery to make today’s map. It features .3 meter per pixel imagery that was taken in 2002 of the area around Harvard University.

What is interesting about this imagery is that its really not .3 meters per pixel, but closer to .6 meters per pixel. I found this out when I was post-processing this map and discovered that when the imagery is viewed at its full resolution it becomes quite blurry. At first I thought that I had screwed up and over-projected the map, but when I reopened the source imagery I discovered that it was blurry to begin with. Had I known this, I would have only rendered the map at 9,000 x 6,000 (one half the current size) because this downsampling would make the map less blurry.

Anyways, I haven’t been as active on the mapping front because I’ve made just about every major city in America. I still intend on publishing an atlas featuring all of these maps, but I have yet to find an interested publisher and am wary about going down the self-publishing route. I would, however, love to start mapping cities in Europe. Please contact me if you can obtain public domain imagery of any European city.

View the Google Map of Harvard University in Cambridge, Massachusetts

: detail :
A location somewhere within the map

Do you see the heart within a heart?

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Boston Common Quilt, revisited
|| 4/26/2008 || 11:09 pm || Comments Off on Boston Common Quilt, revisited || ||

The other week I published two maps of Boston Common on this website. Since then, I’ve had numerous visits to my website from people searching for the Boston Common quilts.

Since I am not a quilter, I did not know that there was already type of patchwork called Boston Common. The real irony is that last week I tried making almost the exact type of geographic quilt design but gave up because it was taking too long to make.

From a visual standpoint, the layout of the Boston Common patchwork design looks very similar to my square quilt projection. I wonder what other quilt design styles I’ve accidentally copied? I’ll find out in due time.

North End Quilt #2
|| 4/25/2008 || 8:26 am || Comments Off on North End Quilt #2 || ||

: rendered at 18,000 X 12,000 :
North End Quilt Quilt #2

Using this portion of North End Quilt, I constructed this derivative Hexagon Quilt Projection map of the area around North End neighborhood of Boston, Massachusetts.

After rendering the map, while I was processing it for on-line publication on this website, I noticed that the source tessellation was off by one pixel and subsequently, this map has a slight defect to it. This is not the first time this has happened, but it makes me disappointed because the map is not perfect like the rest.

View the Google Map of North End neighborhood in Boston.

: detail :

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North End Quilt
|| 4/22/2008 || 12:28 pm || Comments Off on North End Quilt || ||

: rendered at 18,000 X 12,000 :
North End Quilt

Continuing my series of maps of downtown Boston, Massachusetts, today’s map features the North End neighborhood. Settled in the 1630’s, it’s the oldest continuously inhabited portion of the city of Boston.

View the Google Map of North End neighborhood in Boston.

: detail :

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Boston Financial District Quilt
|| 4/20/2008 || 8:11 pm || Comments Off on Boston Financial District Quilt || ||

: rendered at 12,000 X 8,000 :
Boston Commons Quilt #2

Continuing my series of maps of Boston, Massachusetts, today’s map features Boston’s Financial District. Using the same Quilt / Lenz hybrid that I first employed in Rochester Quilt #2, I placed a magnifying sphere over the center of the map. This magnified geography in the center of the map features Boston’s Government Center, Faneiul Hall, and the nearby Faneuil Hall Marketplace. As your eye moves away from the center the rest of Boston’s Financial District is revealed.

View the Google Map of Boston’s Financial District.

: detail :

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Boston Common Quilt #2
|| 4/18/2008 || 1:29 pm || Comments Off on Boston Common Quilt #2 || ||

: rendered at 18,000 X 12,000 :
Boston Commons Quilt #2

Using this portion of yesterday’s map, I constructed this derivative Diamond Quilt Projection map of the area around Boston Common and the Massachusetts State House.

View the Google Map of Boston Common in Boston, Massachusetts.

: detail of the Parkman Bandstand :

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Boston Common Quilt
|| 4/17/2008 || 6:59 pm || Comments Off on Boston Common Quilt || ||

: rendered at 18,000 X 12,000 :
Boston Commons Quilt

I’ve had a couple geographers contact me asking if I was attending the AAG’s annual meeting in Boston. My answer has been that I’m too busy on various projects to attend. As a former employee and someone who helped facilitate two annual meetings (Denver & Chicago), I realized that the next meeting I plan on attending will be as either an exhibitor or if the trip is paid for by an employer. I would like to give another presentation again or organize a panel discussion, but, as with most things in life, I’m in no hurry.

Since I have not made any maps of downtown Boston since August of 2005, I decided to download the city, in lieu of going to the city. Pleasantly, I was able to download the city at two different spatial scales and from two different years: 2004 & 2005. So far the imagery looks a lot better than the patchwork design that was previously placed into the public domain. Eight different tessellations later, the entire downtown area will be remapped in the next week. Today’s map features the area around Boston Common, which is the oldest public park in America (created in 1634), and the Massachusetts State House. I chose an Octagon Quilt Projection because I liked the way the center creates a compass rose. Up next will be a derivative of today’s map.

View the Google Map of Boston Common in Boston, Massachusetts.

View the rest of the details:

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A Digital Scrapbook for the Past, Present, and Future.

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Nikolas Schiller is a second-class American citizen living in America's last colony, Washington, DC. This blog is my on-line repository of what I have created or found on-line since May of 2004. If you have any questions or comments, please contact: