magine a globe made of glass. Overlay pieces of silver in the shape of
the landmasses. Now imagine a light at the globe’s center, casting
land-shaped shadows in all directions. The cartographer’s job, roughly
and poetically, is to gather those shadows and transform them into a
reasonable portrait of the planet. This first, crucial step in
mapmaking is called the projection. Projections fall into three basic
categories: planar, conic, and cylindrical.Picking the right projection is crucial for achieving the map’s objective.
© 1998 National Geographic Society. All rights reserved.