Tag Archives: city map

Boston Vicinity Map

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Boston Vicinity CityFlash Map

Boston Vicinity CityFlash Map for Rand McNally

Randal Birkey created this Boston Vicinity Map as a part of an entire new map product line for Rand McNally in 1989. This product series called CityFlash Maps was the first product line offered by Rand McNally and European partner Hallwag, produced completely digitally on desktop computers. Randal and his team used Apple Macintosh FX and CX computers running then current versions of Aldus Freehand and Adobe Illustrator.

The digital vector Postscript files were supplied to Rand McNally’s printer, and converted to 4-color process film (CMYK) and plates, then used for 4-color offset printing.

For each city, Randal and his team produced additional maps including street level detail maps including points of interest, public transportation maps, and shopping area maps.

5 US cities were completed as a part of the CityFlash product project: Chicago, New York, Boston, San Fransisco and Washington, D.C.

Atlantic City, New Jersey, Map Illustration

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Atlantic City, New Jersey - Map Illustration

Atlantic City, New Jersey - Map Illustration

This preliminary city map was illustrated in Adobe Illustrator by Randal Birkey and intended for use to sell advertising to the businesses in that city. It featured all the major casinos, and shopping spots as a means to attract additional businesses to advertise on the map. Each new business would have their building and location added in 3D to the map, to match the other buildings. A key to the advertisers and additional ad space was to be added to the outside edge of this map.

Detail Area of the Atlantic City Map

Detail Area of the Atlantic City Map

The style of this map is called an axonometric projection. To create this, the 2D base map is rotated off axis (North is in the upper right corner), which allows for the building to be projected in a 3D fashion, straight up vertically from the base. The advantage is that the base map is still to scale and can be used for relatively accurate distances.

The Gift Fair Atlanta Map Illustration

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The Atlanta Gift Fair - Map Illustration

The Atlanta Gift Fair - Map Illustration

The Gift Fair is a yearly trade event at the AmericasMart in Atlanta, Georgia featuring specialty gifts and wares from around the world.

The convention promoters required a map for show attenders to help orient them to the area, in a user-friendly aerial perspective view.

Randal Birkey was commissioned to produce this digital watercolor aerial forced-perspective map. The final file was delivered to the design agency and imported into standard digital page layout software for final print reproduction.

Bethesda Maryland Map

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Watercolor Map of Bethesda Maryland for Real Estate Developer

Watercolor Map of Bethesda Maryland for Real Estate Developer

The ad agency for a Maryland based real estate developer contacted Randal Birkey as the result of a web search. The agency required a map of the downtown area of Bethesda, Maryland, on which to locate many area amenities for a print brochure on a proposed new high-rise condominium project.

Randal created this digital watercolor map using aerial photography as a reference point. He used an Apple Macintosh computer running a software program called Painter (now a Corel product). Digital “Watercolor brushes” were controlled using a Wacom tablet connected to Randal’s computer. The final files were formatted and prepared in Adobe Photoshop, and delivered to the customer via email.