nice idea Ravi, and who doesn't enjoy a nice graph
Well someone had to do it
Maps of Middle Earth have been done to death so I thought I'd try something a little different (just for a change, lol!) and do an info-graphic of the journey. LOTR is a great one to pick as there are tonnes of stats on the web on distances from A to B and dates.
My objective is to cram as much information into the chart as I possibly can while keeping it relatively clear and allowing the reader to cross-reference data. So for example, in the chapter 'Flight to the Ford' you can see that Frodo had Sam, Merry, Pippin and Aragorn with him, he was travelling in an easterly direction for about 30 miles between the dates of August 3rd and September 29th.
Here's what I have so far:
a. Distance travelled from one location to the next
b. Dates
c. Key events (When Frodo puts on the ring, Frodo in danger, other key events)
d. Companions with Frodo during the journey
e. Chapters of the book which cover sectors of the journey
f. Relative number of pages in each chapter (the blue bar chart at the bottom) - not sure what it's for but it's a statistic!
g. Direction of travel (the little arrows).
Can you guys think of any other statistics that could be included that are readily available?
All the data is dummy stuff while I get the feel of it nailed down. It's probably going to be a lot longer and thinner. The trip down the Anduin may be a problem they coverered a vast amount of ground in one or two chapters and very quickly so there will be a huge spike in the graph there...
Cheers
Ravs
Last edited by ravells; 06-09-2010 at 08:19 AM.
nice idea Ravi, and who doesn't enjoy a nice graph
regs tilt
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The attempt at climbing the mountain pass (can't remember the name), and the subsequent change to instead go to Moria would be a good milestone as it significantly altered the journey.
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Awesome stuff. Look up Edward Tufte sometime - he's kind of my hero in this area. Here are a couple of links:
http://www.edwardtufte.com/tufte/
And this one is very similar to yours, showing Napolean's march. I think the width of the bars is strength in men while one axis is distance and another is time. Pretty cool stuff. You might try to emulate some of it so you could show the creation and breaking of the Fellowship in some way (I know you said Frodo's journey so you might be just focusing on that).
http://www.edwardtufte.com/tufte/posters#newposter
XKCD's version:
http://xkcd.com/657/
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wow... thats cool too
regs tilt
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Thanks guys, I think the information in this map / chart / graph / thingy is going to be slightly different from the 'Napoleon' style one Mearrin mentioned (@Mearrin - RobA introduced me to Tufte a few years back and I devoured the books- great stuff!). This one (now that I'm begining to get the shape of it) shows time and distance and how it relates to chapters in the books. I've finished the timeline (thanks to EowynChallenge.net which had all the dates, distances and critical events - I'll credit them in the map - amazing stuff and worth a read). Also helpful was the Tolkien Wiki and The Lord of the Rings Fanatic Site. So the idea is to combine as much as I can of the data on those sites into a small space.
Anyway, I've finished the time/distance line and am quite taken aback by how compressed in terms of time and space 'The Two Towers' and 'The Return of the King' are compared to the Fellowship. Also interesting (to me) is that I was expecting a huge spike in the gradient for the bit when the fellowship were travelling down the Anduin by boat but the gradient isn't too much differerent from walking.
I'm really getting into this one now just for the surprises. What the hell were they doing in Rivendell for so long? Bloody slackers.
It seems that you always have a new (and different) idea cooking. Keep the updates coming...
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There was the recovery time, for sure, but I always got the impression that time in Elven lands passed a little differently to those in them than to those outside...I think they might have said so explicitly. I don't know the dates but I expect they were in Lothlorian for a similarly extended time?
M