Meed David Imus, the OCD cartographer behind one masterpiece of a map. It took him two years of daily labour to make his map of the USA, which has been officially named the greatest paper map of the year.
Imus’ map, “The Essential Geography of the United States” won the Best in Show award given out annually by the Cartography and Geographic Information Society. While it might look like an ordinary Rand McNally from afar, the 4×3 foot map makes that road atlas in your trunk look like a child’s rendering. Imus, a veteran cartographer who’s been in the game 35 years, fastidiously obsessed over every detail of the map’s design down to the thickness of each line, the colour and weight of the shading, and the placement of each letter. And while it was done on a computer, not by hand — that would’ve taken more like 600,000 hours — Imus’ vision of the US is as personal as it gets. The result? Well, see for yourself.
The image above from Slate shows a detail from Imus’ map on the left and the National Geographic map on the right. Imus’ map includes details which tell you more about what you’re looking at than your everyday map. The nuance lies in the choices Imus makes about what information to include, and what to leave out. You don’t usually see Wrigley Field on a map of the country do you? Google Maps will get us from point A to point B, but Imus’ map gives us a richer view of the world in between. [Slate]
oleary
Tuesday, January 3, 2012 at 9:29 AMHis is the one on the left? Here I was thinking the left was a crappy one, and the right was his.
So his awesome secret is to include less places? Wow.
Nicholas
Tuesday, January 3, 2012 at 9:52 AMI also thought this, and thought it was confirmed when you said that line about placing every single letter perfectly… whoops.
LucasF
Tuesday, January 3, 2012 at 3:17 PMI thought it was the left one straight away based on the inclusion of Wrigley Field and other points of interest and the removal of redundandt information like the writing located north of Chicago which says “North Chicago”….well duh!
MDG
Tuesday, January 3, 2012 at 3:32 PMDuh… N Chicago is on Both Maps,
So yourself aint too much of a cartographer….
The Map on the right is better…
If I want Wrigley Field I get a Chicago Guide.. (The national map really won’t get me to 1060 West Addison…. I need a local guide or GPS to get me there…)
So this Guy seems to have wasted 2 years making an inferior copy of existing maps…. To satisfy his artistic Pride.
Trevor
Tuesday, January 3, 2012 at 10:19 AMWTF greatest paper map in the world. I saw what a waste of time and it looks shit – where is the nerdy part? I see nothing nerdy about it either.
Thommo
Tuesday, January 3, 2012 at 11:00 AMI also think the one on the right is more legible and it also has more placenames. So winning map is fail.
Michael
Tuesday, January 3, 2012 at 12:54 PMSomeone is standing in a circle again…
amfomy
Tuesday, January 3, 2012 at 2:26 PMRead the link to truly appreciate the work. I hope he gets paid for such dedication though.
Dan
Wednesday, January 4, 2012 at 2:37 PMI have no real need of a map of the USA, but I do love maps.
You can buy them here https://imusgeographics.com/
Not sure if they ship international.
Ekrem the mapper
Thursday, January 19, 2012 at 12:38 AMPaper print maps VS googlemaps. Their function is different. Every person must have a poster map on the wall. As a cartographer I can say that it is a “beatiful map”, with most detailed information. I would like to have one to see the map print quality. there is an axpectation on the users that the boundaries will be coloured. But this green single colour makes the map easy to use. I will soon put this political map on http://www.pusulaharita.com and also map prints for sale on http://www.mapist.com.tr. Thanks to imusgeographics . I will soon write an article in Turkish in http://www.karayollariharitasi.org about this detailed road map.