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Cartography

Map Projection References

Map Projections: A Working Manual

by John P. Snyder, 1987

USGS Professional Paper 1395

Definitive technical introduction and coverage of standard map projections, with formulas and derivations. John Parr Snyder was a chemical engineer who was interested in map projections in his spare time. The formulas in this book are used in other map projection texts.

Figure 1: One of the diagrams in Map Projections: A Working Manual.

An Album of Map Projections

by John P. Snyder and Philip M. Voxland, 1989

USGS Professional Paper 1453

Maps and Tissot Indicatrix plots of diverse map projections.


EPSG Codes

by International Association of
Oil and Gas Producers (IOGP), 2019

IOGP Publication 373-7-2

The official list of EPSG map projection codes. Each standard map projection is assigned a European Petroleum Survey Group (EPSG) code to clearly define the projection, referring to the mathematical formulas of Map Projections: A Working Manual (see above).

When using a standard map projection in your work, assign the projection an EPSG number, and carefully follow the instructions for using that projection so that your work can be compatible with other projects that use EPSG codes.

The EPSG registry was started by Jean-Patrick Girbig (of France), and has become the de facto registry of standard map projections. The EPSG organization has since disbanded, but the EPSG name has been retained due to the widespread use of the registry, now an international standard supported by IOGP.


Gallery of Map Projections

Drawings illustrating a wide variety of map projections. A helpful resource when you need to find a different projection for your project. Does not show Tissot indicatrices, but illustrates many map projections you may not otherwise find out about, which you can then research.

Figure 2:  Hill Eucylic projection. [Anderson]

General Cartographic
Transformation Package
(GCTP)

by U.S. Geological Survey (USGS), 1998

GCTP

C-language programming source code for converting UTM coordinates to other map projections. UTM is a complex lossy projection scheme developed for World War II, now used to reduce the size of Internet data sets. If your projection is not supported in GCTP, convert from UTM to one of the projections that GCTP supports, then find or develop formulas to convert from that projection to your projection.


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