16 replies to this topic

[Derek Tonn]

Okay, I'm obviously not REALLY looking for any type of critique with this...but I thought it might be fun to share an example of an illustration I did back in elementary school, to see if I could encourage anyone else out there to be brave and share an example or two of designs they created as children.

The subject matter of that graphic is my grandparents farm, 25 years ago. I drew it a month or two after my 11th birthday. I still remember standing on a chair, looking out a window with my paper and colored pencils. I LOVE children's art, so if any of you all would like to post a scan or two of any map/illustration work you might have created as a child, I think that would make for an incredibly fun and interesting thread.

Derek

[rudy]

When I was 9 or so I had created my own atlas of Canada and world - separate maps for each of the provinces and maps of all the countries. I wish had held on to that but in the intervening years I took a huge detour through social work before I came back to cartography. I had always loved maps - it just never sunk in at the time that someone could actually do this for a living. Now, with children of my own I like to cherish their works of cartography, even though neither has expressed an interest in following in my footsteps.

Your art work looks great. Consider yourself fortunate that you've managed to hold on to it.

[MapMedia]

I am sorry Derek, but you posted it here, so I am going to critique it.

First off, I am not sure what happened to the foreground. Was the artists' attention pulled towards the grand stature and bright colors of the barns? I assume this was done during Nov/Dec, for lack of foliage, so you are either a Sagittarius or Capricorn. And OMG, no red tractor? What were you thinking?

Just kidding Derek. Its really nice. Posting that took 'nerves of steel' and I will try to meet the challenge if only I can dig something up and scan it before much time passes!

[Rafal]

Derek, I am looking at one of these pictures and I can see some similarities ;P :

http://www.mapformat...io/3Dcampus.htm

But I must say it's a great job you are doing. I have always loved such kind of cartography. I will have to try one day.

[Derek Tonn]

I am sorry Derek, but you posted it here, so I am going to critique it.

First off, I am not sure what happened to the foreground. Was the artists' attention pulled towards the grand stature and bright colors of the barns? I assume this was done during Nov/Dec, for lack of foliage, so you are either a Sagittarius or Capricorn. And OMG, no red tractor? What were you thinking?

Just kidding Derek. Its really nice. Posting that took 'nerves of steel' and I will try to meet the challenge if only I can dig something up and scan it before much time passes!

Yep, I could have drawn in that big red International tractor that I spent SO much time driving from ages 12-18 (my only job until I left for college) in the foreground....but it must have been parked behind the barn at the time. That's consistent with my current work though....in the sense of I only typically draw what I see since I am not nearly as good at drawing what I cannot see, at least without the aid of "artist's renderings".....LOL.

What is fun to reflect on though is how all those hundreds/thousands of hours of doodling as a child ended up contributing to my eventual career. I learned how to "see" the world around me in a certain way, then tried to train my hands to process those inputs into something that is HOPEFULLY usable and attractive. That's where I think it would be great fun to see some of the early drawings of others on this board as well....to see how those first early lines and sketches gave you your start.

[Jean-Louis]

if any of you all would like to post a scan or two of any map/illustration work you might have created as a child, I think that would make for an incredibly fun thread.

That is a very good illustration Derek. It works very well. There is just something about hand drawn sketches that cannot be replicated by even he most sophisticated digital wizardry.

My start in maps was at the same age. My friends and I built a great big wooden tank, organized ourselves into an army and went on to conquer our neighbourhood. It was the most fun summer of my life.

I was the one who made all the military maps to plan out our invasion routes. UnfortunateIy, I dont have any of these maps now. but I still got pictures of my tank. (That,s me in middle with the plastic German helmet).

My ambition was to be a Rommel not a Mercator.

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[Hans van der Maarel]

My ambition was to be a Rommel not a Mercator.

Quite authentic-looking German uniforms actually. Sounds like you had a great summer.

Incidentally, it appears all remaining artwork (and photos) from my childhood are held in a secure location, by my parents, "for future blackmailing purposes"...

[A. Fenix]

wish i had something in digital format to share...but all of my childhood sketches were lost long ago. thanks for posting this though, it's nice to get back to basics

[mike]

very cool. i still have some of my art from when i was a kid.

if anybody is interested, ESRI Press has a book called Children Map the World. It was featured two years ago at the ESRI User Conference.

[Polaris]

I may be a 'johnny come lately'

Here are a couple of my earliest maps.

My first maps were in 1989 using ArcInfo to determine optimum monitoring locations based on source locations, prevailing meteorology and dispersion modeling, and schools, population centers, etc. None of these maps are with me now.

The earliest shown here (1992, I would have been 31) depicts results of a saturation monitoring study for fine particulate in and around Ashland, KY - site of much heavy industry.

The wind rose shows results from 3 different meteorological stations we set up for the study (on the Ohio and big sandy rivers, and on a ridge. These were daily averages. The contours are particulate concentrations 'kriged' from the 30 odd monitoring sites. The maps were produced in Axum statistical graphics software - and were set up for basically, '1 click' daily updates. I did early versions of these maps in Lotus 123!

We had the filters analysed, and the biggest contribution to particulate pollution in that heavily industrialized area was from unpaved roads and domestic barrel trash burning. The industries had pretty good pollution control - at least for particulate.

The second, shows results from a verification test of a method to measure emissions from large, diffuse area sources (such as wastewater treatment plans, surface coal mines, refinery complexes, etc.) using open path FTIR measurements, tracer gas releases (SF6), on site meteorology, and dispersion modelling. The cool thing about these maps is that they could be and were generated 'on the fly' from real time monitoring data. The whole thing was set up using Surfer and their GS basic scripting language. It worked well. This was one of my first contracts after going into business on my own.

During that time, I was also doing a lot of field survey work to locate monitoring sites and to determine monitoring configurations for the diffuse sources. I had always loved maps, but this was my introduction to making them. It wasn't long after that I could no longer risk the urge to try doing it for a living.

I still do some air quality measurement related work, but no maps in that line at present. I'm the (contract) quality assurance manager for a third party independent verifcation testing organization (Southern Research Institute) - but my 'day job' is maps.

Eric

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 ahsland_mon.jpg   308.05K   82 downloads

[Jean-Louis]

Ah-ha I did find something!. In 2003 I did a map of an area. I recently found that I did a map of the same area 25 years before. I had forgotten about it. It was a map for a friend showing the location of Occult bookstores.
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[benbakelaar]

Where did you grow up that had not one, not two, but EIGHT occult bookstores?? University town maybe?

[Jean-Louis]

Where did you grow up that had not one, not two, but EIGHT occult bookstores?? University town maybe?

That is hilarious. It took someone your age to make me notice that. All I can say (to those who will understand) is that, like Man, this was the 1970's. The Age of Aquarius wasnt quite over and Jonestown (the 9/11 of cultdom) hadn't happened yet.
Peace and good Karma be upon you my young brother.

[Derek Tonn]

That is hilarious. It took someone your age to make me notice that. All I can say (to those who will understand) is that, like Man, this was the 1970's. The Age of Aquarius wasnt quite over and Jonestown (the 9/11 of cultdom) hadn't happened yet.
Peace and good Karma be upon you my young brother.

You know, I had the exact same thought as Ben when I read your previous post. I just figured that you must have grown up in New Orleans, Berkeley or Toronto. Of course, I was only an elementary school student back in the 1970s....so I missed out on most of that whole "Age of Aquarius" business. I did, however, get a COMPLETE baptism in the Rhinestone Cowboy, Dance Fever and disco a few years before entering junior high, thanks to my father.......

[DaveB]

I'm with you, Jean-Louis.

I think there were more independent bookstores of all kinds back then...

p.s. I don't think I have any surviving maps or artwork from my childhood.