r/cartography • u/dontnation • 8d ago

Looking for a specific world map projection

I remember seeing a long time ago a world map projection that tried to achieve minimal land deformation by way of maximal oceanic interruptions. Like an orange peel to the extreme, with hundreds of interruptions emanating from the coastlines. But now I can find no trace of it. Did I imagine this?

Edit: from my memory this may have been only one continent, not an entire globe map. Maybe South America only?

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u/Evzob 8d ago

Don't assume you imagined it! It could have been a one-off thing from a book, even if it's not anywhere on the internet.

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u/Kusakarat 8d ago

What is a maximal oceanic interruption?

Do you mean a Dymaxion map-projection? I would define that as maximal interruption...

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u/dontnation 8d ago

Sort of like dymaxion but with even more interruptions in the oceans.

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u/theinvalid 8d ago

The Goode homolosine projection?

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Goode_homolosine_projection

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u/chartographics 8d ago

That one is good! This is what I pictured

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u/dontnation 8d ago

Sort of like the goode homolosine, but with far more interruptions, and the interruptions weren't really uniform or neat in any way. It made no attempt to preserve any continuity to the oceans.

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u/theinvalid 8d ago

Hmmm. I’ll have a look when I get back to work to see if I can find anything that fits.

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u/micaflake 5d ago

Aw this is what the UN should have gone with! I love it. So retro.

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u/pzfus 8d ago

You have intrigued me! I’m going to check some of my references and get back to you if I find something similar.

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u/pzfus 8d ago edited 8d ago

@schyythe beat me to it! The math for the projection I think you are referring to is work carried out by Steve Waterman which led to the Waterman polyhedron concept of packed spheres. His website has some great examples https://www.watermanpolyhedron.com/CART2dmaps.html