Map of London from memory. No reference books. No computer. Lots of rubbing out.
www.flickr.com/photos/yersinia/map/
(tiny confession - I couldn't remember whether there was a bridge at Chiswick. I dotted it in, and then filled the line when I'd confirmed)
Next time, I'll use a bigger sheet of paper and try to write smaller and neater. Then I might be able to fit things where they should go.
I started with the river, and tried to build it around there.
Inspired by the From memory group.
09 Ноябрь 2009, 17:25 dartar you should post this to the londonist group, they love stuff like this :)
10 Ноябрь 2009, 00:35 Yersinia I'm boringly literal-minded. I like some of the real fruitbat ones in the "From Memory" group, but I can't help myself wanting to get it right, and then being pissed because I've done too much wrong and it'd be too much effort to start over, and I can't get the relative positions of things to fit.When this is out of my head, I might try a central London one.
10 Ноябрь 2009, 03:15 Zigs1 Cool! I'd like one.
11 Ноябрь 2009, 01:40 ramson Spooky - my wife and I were saying that this would be an interesting thing to do at some point. I scrolled straight past the image (promise), so I can attempt it soon.
12 Ноябрь 2009, 01:06 Yersinia It's an interesting exercise!For me, my understanding of London stamms from the river, so that's why I started with that. Judicious framing, too - my knowledge to the east and west of this is considerably shakier.I should do one of somewhere I don't know well sometime - America for example. Or a town I used to know well but haven't visited for ages. Or maybe Dundee, which I've visited repeatedly, but am always with people who know it better, so that I don't have to make the effort to understand it.Or maybe branch out with anatomy or how some piece of machinery works or something.
12 Ноябрь 2009, 20:50 Zigs1 You could also make personalized maps, like a "London Map for Zigs1", for example... :O)
13 Ноябрь 2009, 13:59 estherase I dread to think what mine would be like. Might have to get Jon to have a go...
13 Ноябрь 2009, 15:39 Yersinia Yay!Then we can form an "experiment on your boyfriend" club. I don't know what a Zigs-specific map would incorporate! I think Zigs needs to make at least a preliminary sketch to explain...
14 Ноябрь 2009, 11:22 JudyGr I'm extremely impressed ( even if most of Newham is missing...). How long did this take you?
15 Ноябрь 2009, 05:21 Yersinia Newham's missing because I don't know it. It's all a bit vague N of the river, outwith the centre and the Isle of Dogs.What's more frustrating is that large chunks of SE London that I do know are missing, because I ran out of space and positioned things wrong.There's no detail in the centre, just because there's no space to do it.It took quite a long time - certainly over an hour, but I didn't time it.The only bit that is reasonably accurate is the river, partly because I did it first. From there on in, any errors tended to compound themselves, and make it impossible to fill in gaps correctly.
15 Ноябрь 2009, 14:39 JudyGr
It makes me think of those body maps, where
the most sensitive bits ((face, genitals,
fingers) are huge in comparison to everywhere
else.--
Seen in my recent comments. (?)
16 Ноябрь 2009, 06:23 Zigs1 Well, what would a Zigs-specific map incorporate, I wonder (if I only knew that myself...) - quiet places in the middle of chaos, where I could just disappear, and where nobody would notice my watching them and taking those brilliant photos I'm famous for... the smell of coffee would be a must!!! Caf
17 Ноябрь 2009, 02:40 Yersinia It wouldn't matter.But they are not very harmful experiments. I need to re-use the subject.
17 Ноябрь 2009, 03:52 John Linwood
I have always loved Paris ;)
Seriously though this is absolutely
delightful Yersina, such wonderful humour
(the high heeled dragons of Essex being a
case in point).
17 Ноябрь 2009, 21:11 Yersinia Paris!There's an idea. Paris would be funnier - I have less idea how it should look, so more scope for batshittery. New York, maybe, too.I think that I would be constrained by my literality in Cambridge.We did John O Groats to Land's End quite a few years back, and at that time I could have drawn an impressively accurate outline sketch of Great Britain. I don't think my current version would be either impressive or accurate. And I have no concept of the shape of Ireland.
18 Ноябрь 2009, 07:05 teddave well done yers. now im inspired to redo mine in the yr style. love the cramming of detail and the insistence to add it despite its reduction inthe usability of teh map. thats how mine would be, full of peckish detail and addenum galore. they all work, each and every one of them. . .
18 Ноябрь 2009, 16:25 Yersinia Heh!Usability was never a goal - just seeing what I could remember. But I ran out of patience and paper.I might add more notes sometime.I was also wondering about the Tube Map from memory - challenging as I'm not a great tube user, but could be quite quick, just a few coloured lines. Londoners always burble on about how great Beck's map is, but I wonder how well we know it?
18 Ноябрь 2009, 21:03 John Linwood another one is write down the directions for a journey you take regularly - then validate them. It is amazing how much you will forget and also how the distances near the start and finish of the journey will be made much larger than the ones in the middle.
19 Ноябрь 2009, 16:31 ramson The topic of people's sense of direction/geography came up at lunchtime today - not from me. But I did mention this map and also suggested a counties/cities map of the UK. They were talking about Beck's map on the radio this morning, it's slipped from my mind why now - I think they may have just rereleased it with some overground lines incorporated now.@ John, yes - I find it very scary that after driving a very familiar route I'm thinking 'hang on, I don't remember half that journey; was I asleep?!'
20 Ноябрь 2009, 05:55 Zigs1 I'm really glad to hear that, John and ramson, because I've seriously started to wonder about myself. I've been commuting the same stretch for ages now, mostly reading and writing, and sometimes, when I become aware of where I am, I could swear I've never seen what I see outside the train window, and I wonder if I''m travelling in the right direction...
20 Ноябрь 2009, 13:05 Yersinia Heh! I've had that occasionally, and used to be terribly bad at knowing where things were "on the ground" that I'd see from the train. Or I'd know that I would see them some time on the journey, but not where, even in "train time".I'm a bit better at that since becoming a GWL addict and having taken a few walks / rides around the southwestern area of London going out Surreywards from Waterloo. Still far from great, though.
20 Ноябрь 2009, 16:35 Yersinia Just did "Paris in 10 minutes".I might get addicted to this.
20 Ноябрь 2009, 22:37 Zigs1 Paris in ten minutes - that's quite a feat. Can we see it?
21 Ноябрь 2009, 18:05 Yersinia There's not much to see - 10 minutes worth of pencilled scribble. I decided to try to get away from my OCD detail freakishness by setting a 20 minute time limit with my kitchen timer.However, because I had a time limit I was scribbling quite fast, and when it bleeped with 10 minutes to go, I realised I'd already done enough to give a basic idea of my mental picture, and that the more I tried to put in the less accurate those details would be.So then I decided to do New York City in 10 minutes, but finished that to a similar level in 8.I will photograph them, even though they are quite boring, but I let MM have the camera today, so it'll have to wait till he's home.
22 Ноябрь 2009, 16:05 Yersinia www.flickr.com/photos/yersinia/2057735311/MM found doing the London one quite stressful, so decided to do a memory map of San Francisco instead. He had the same problems that I had of being frustrated not to be able to include everything accurately, but it bothered him even more. Obviously we have some of the same psychological issues.
23 Ноябрь 2009, 01:09 satguru I could fill in the main roads for you in many places, but you got the railways! I do the underground and most of England as well, glad to see it's not only me who does it!
23 Ноябрь 2009, 04:23 Josh193 This is done with a program called memory map, www.flickr.com/photos/josh193/2071254369/a days work as a courier in London from a GPS... , I did a search for London right after putting the comment on that and your maps the first thing that came up. Might have a go at draweing one you can see how much I get about the place. I like how you got the railways and not the roads, I could probably just get the main stations, and all the loading bays
23 Ноябрь 2009, 13:45 Yersinia Well, I cycle all around London, but the roads were too tricky, given the scale. With an appropriate scale, and if I hadn't already tried to put in other stuff, I could have a stab at roads in central and southern London, but not really outwith zone 1 North of the river.I think the railways were because I started with one line (maybe out of Charing Cross), and then tried to fill in some others, but they're not really right.
23 Ноябрь 2009, 15:52 Yersinia And maybe also because I have a photo from the top of Guy's Tower where the railway viaduct is very prominent, and that has made a strong impression on my visual memory:www.flickr.com/photos/yersinia/304364429/
24 Ноябрь 2009, 12:28 Tom Anderson Certainly larger in scope than mine:www.flickr.com/photos/twic/412386906/in/pool- 46079190@N00/What with the recent rash (er, two) of London maps from memory, i was thinking we should start a specific pool. And then i had an even better idea - we should get together, get the general public together, with a huge sheet of paper and some fineliners and collectively do a map from memory of the entire city. No external reference works, just a patchwork of people's own local knowledge, scaffolded on vague memories of the shape of the A-Z. Roads, stations, parks, shops, local secrets. Couriers and delivery drivers fill in the long-distance routes as a skeleton, ordinary people cover their home and work neighbourhoods. Cyclists detail the towpaths. Runners fill in the parks. We can put it in a lorry and take it to places that are still blank and get the locals to fill it in. The map becomes a mission, the cartographers missionaries. Not You Are Here but I Am Here.Sorry, been reading too much BLDGBLOG.-- tom
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