this post was submitted on 16 Jul 2026
42 points (92.0% liked)

Map Enthusiasts

6289 readers
2 users here now

For the map enthused!

Rules:

founded 3 years ago
MODERATORS
 

Recently, I finally started a hobby I've been thinking about for a long time, i.e., designing my own map projections. This one has such a simple but clever idea that I wouldn't be surprised to hear it's an already known one.

Basically, longitude is scaled by the cosine of the corresponding latitude, like in the sinusoidal projection. But then latitude is scaled by its own sine to avoid those sharp poles (and to emphasize the areas near the equator), and a constant to make it a circle.

So, does anyone know a pre-existing name for this? Alternatively, feel free to suggest a new name for it.

top 17 comments
sorted by: hot top controversial new old
[–] squirrel@cake.kobel.fyi 18 points 3 weeks ago

Longy McLongearth

[–] huppakee@lemmy.world 13 points 3 weeks ago (2 children)

Do you do requests?

oblique cylindrical projection

polyhedral map projection

I believe we are in dire need of more oblique cylindrical and polyhedral projections. Too many maps are for when you want to go somewhere by plane/ship/car, but I don't have any of those so I couldn't care less how useful they are for navigation.

[–] edgemaster72@lemmy.world 3 points 3 weeks ago

I like how the top one looks like the Pacific Ocean just went "okay, these bits of land are cool, all the rest of you fuck off to the right half of this projection"

[–] Skua@kbin.earth 1 points 3 weeks ago

I'd quite like to see an oblique one that uses this great circle as the tangent line. It's the longest straight-line distance over land, and it'd be a straight line in the middle of the map if depicted like this

[–] thenextguy@sh.itjust.works 11 points 3 weeks ago
[–] AllNewTypeFace@leminal.space 10 points 3 weeks ago (2 children)
[–] Skyrmir@lemmy.world 9 points 3 weeks ago

At least NZ is actually on the map, even if it is just a smear at the edge.

[–] BarbecueCowboy@lemmy.dbzer0.com 8 points 3 weeks ago

Every year more of New Zealand falls off the great disc...

[–] edgemaster72@lemmy.world 8 points 3 weeks ago (1 children)

My proposed names:

  1. anti-Mercator or rotacreM
  2. Slendermap
[–] huppakee@lemmy.world 6 points 3 weeks ago (1 children)

I'd like a bit of rotacrem please

[–] heliotrope@retrofed.com 3 points 3 weeks ago

Sounds like the sort of thing a particularly cheap chemist would stock instead of Sudocrem.

[–] Texas_Hangover@lemmy.radio 5 points 3 weeks ago

I'd call it the Funhouse Mirror.

[–] reksas@sopuli.xyz 4 points 3 weeks ago

for sure its called longgg map

[–] mercano@lemmy.world 3 points 3 weeks ago

The turtle moves.

[–] Kolanaki@pawb.social 2 points 3 weeks ago

This is what my Civilzation maps look like when I use the "fractal" option for map generation.

[–] Skua@kbin.earth 2 points 3 weeks ago

I can't find any pre-existing projections that match this. Maybe double sinusoidal works as a name? It's fairly descriptive and uses the feature that no other projection seems to have. Although in keeping with most other projections, it should probably be the Surrealpartisan double sinusoidal, of course!

[–] Sergio@piefed.social 1 points 3 weeks ago

Stretchnut.