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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Union Station Quilt #3
|| 3/12/2008 || 2:44 pm || Comments Off on Union Station Quilt #3 || ||

: rendered at 18,000 X 12,000 : Union Station Quilt #3 .

I find it quite interesting being able to see the difference between spatial scales when comparing the two previous Union Station maps. Since this map uses .16 meters per pixel aerial photography and the previous two maps use imagery that was .3 meters per pixel, you can quite easily see how much less I am now showing of the area around Union Station. Specifically, this map only shows the U.S. Postal Museum, Union Station, the Thurgood Marshal Federal Building, and the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission.View the Google Map of Union Station in downtown Washington, DC.

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Scott Circle Quilt #2
|| 3/9/2008 || 9:10 pm || Comments Off on Scott Circle Quilt #2 || ||

: rendered at 18,000 X 12,000 :
Scott Circle Quilt #2 by Nikolas Schiller

View the Google Map of Scott Circle in downtown Washington, DC.

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Scott Circle Quilt
|| 3/8/2008 || 1:32 pm || Comments Off on Scott Circle Quilt || ||

: rendered at 18,000 X 12,000 :
Scott Circle Quilt by Nikolas Schiller

I am in the process of making hexagon quilt projection maps of all the major traffic circles in Washington, DC. I have most of the circles covered and intend on continuing this project as I acquire new imagery of Washington, DC. Of important note is that Dupont, Logan, Washington, and Scott circles all lie with the area that is censored in Google Maps. Also, this is one of the first maps that I’ve made in a few years that features National Geographic‘s headquarters. I will probably make a derivative map dedicated to National Geographic.

View the Google Map of Scott Circle in downtown Washington, DC.

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Washington + Dupont Circle Quilt
|| 3/2/2008 || 11:43 am || Comments Off on Washington + Dupont Circle Quilt || ||

: rendered at 18,000 X 12,000 :
Washington + Dupont Circle Quilt by Nikolas Schiller

I decided to switch things up a bit with today’s rendering. I have become very efficient with most of the processes used to create my maps, which both makes them standardized and sometimes a bit too similar to each other (while paradoxically being different geographies). This map and probably the next few maps are going to be slightly different.

In order to have the most recent maps of Logan Circle, Dupont Circle, and Washington Circle look similar to each other, I would take the first derivative tessellation and overlay it on top of the tessellation that I was constructing. By adjusting the transparency, I can overlay the circles directly on top of each other which makes the subsequent map look nearly identical.

Normally, I simply delete the original tessellation when I have the two lined up perfectly, however in today’s map I chose to not delete the other map. Instead, I adjusted the transparency of Dupont Circle to 51% to show both geographies at once. The result is something that I wasn’t expecting, but am quite pleased with the results. I can see myself using this process again. It’s like a double exposure…

View the Google Map of Washington Circle in the Foggy Bottom neighborhood of Washington, DC.

View the Google Map of Dupont Circle in Washington, DC.

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Half Mile O’ Maps
|| 6/5/2007 || 3:10 pm || Comments Off on Half Mile O’ Maps || ||

I haven’t posted anything in a few days because I’ve been working on backing up all the maps I made in 2006 (and the few I’ve made thus far in 2007). I mentioned before that I had over 50 maps to back up from 2006 and I’m proud to say that I have now caught up with the past and I’m 99% up to date!

A few years ago when I first started to back up my maps I created a special excel file to document each map’s respective CD number (currently at CD #356 ) as well as specific meta-data I thought was useful. Each map was backed up twice on two CDs and I would add the corresponding CD number to the excel file. When I started adding the quilt projection maps to the excel file I also began to include the dimensions of the map as well as the shape of the quilt. I recently started to back up on each CD the source aerial photography, the tessellation(s), the on-line imagery (what you see on this website), the 9,000 Xx 6,000 reduced .jpg (what you’d purchase from my on-line store), and the full-size TIFF (18,000 x 12,000 in size and usually between 400 to 600 megabytes each).

One of the nice aspects of using a spreadsheet to catalog my maps is that I am able to tally up various aspects of what I have backed up thus far. This morning I decided to see how large the quilt project would be if each map was printed out at 150 DPI and lined up end to end. The result was nearly a half mile of maps:

the 262 Quilts are 4,576,597 pixels wide
at 150 dots per inch (DPI) that equals:
4,576,597 / 150 = 30,511 inches
30,511in / 12in = 2,542 feet (a lil under a half mile)
(And that is just the quilt projection!!!)

I still need to go back add start adding the dimensions of the rest of the maps I’ve backed up. I wouldn’t doubt that I’m approaching almost a mile of maps…. or at least be close.

As for what’s next; I’m not sure at the moment. I waiting on correspondence from a few libraries concerning the use of their historic maps. I’m attempting to find out if they can be legally sampled for new maps. Moreover, if they can be sold as special editions or if they can only be used for educational purposes. I’ll find out soon enough.
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Downloaded Boulder, Colorado in honor of an old camp friend who came to visit me recently.

Home Quilt #2
|| 1/18/2006 || 2:15 pm || Comments Off on Home Quilt #2 || ||

: rendered at 18,000 X 12,000 :
Home Quilt No. 2 by Nikolas Schiller

I made an Octagon Quilt Projection map of the aera around my home in Washington, DC.

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Ivan Memory
|| 5/1/2005 || 5:39 am || Comments Off on Ivan Memory || ||

Using an aerial photograph from NOAA of Pensacola, Florida taken shortly after Hurricane Ivan, I’ve modified my old “memory” template to produce this rendering. Instead of keeping some background imagery, like in DC Memory, I’ve made this rendering to show only the two primatives used to make the rendering. The result is what I think to be the future of my next renderings (as in expect more renderings in the “memory” series). I really like the way the reflection of the source imagery makes the bridge over the water appear to be an oval. I can’t wait to get this map printed!

Details:

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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: