This year, the University is gaining national recognition once again, not for an athletic team, but for a team from the geography department’s InfoGraphics Lab. The group recently won awards for creating a CD-ROM version of the Atlas of Oregon, which is a comprehensive guide of the state’s economy, culture, history and natural resources.
The CD-ROM was recognized at the 2002 International Map Design Competition, hosted by the American Congress on Surveying and Mapping, or ACSM, earning both “Best in Show” and “Best in Category” awards. The awards will be presented on March 31 in Phoenix.
More than 70 experts from around the state contributed to the original Atlas of Oregon, published in 2001. The InfoGraphics team, run by director James Meacham and designer Erik Steiner, then decided to transfer the data onto a two-disc CD-ROM.
“Once the book atlas was compiled and designed, it was a matter of transforming the information from a print medium into a digital medium in a way that didn’t lose any of the value and ease, and which, at the same time, took advantage of certain extremely interesting and powerful aspects of the digital world to present the data in new ways,” Atlas text editor Tom Hager said in an e-mail interview.
Interesting features on the CD-ROM include an animation that allows the reader to observe geological change over time. On another page, readers can see Oregon’s trade levels grow and shrink throughout the state’s history, an effect that is impossible in the printed medium.
The Atlas has been hailed by many as a triumph.
Allen Carroll, chief cartographer of the National Geographic Society, whose Family Reference Atlas was defeated by the Atlas of Oregon in the competition, said the University’s entry was a “tour-de-force in cartography and design,” according to the University Press Web site.
Students are also benefiting from the Atlas.
“The book and the CD-ROM have more information in them than I could ever realistically hope to use,” said freshman Zak Bennet, who has used the Atlas. “The CD-ROM just makes it a lot easier to get to.”
The hard copy Atlas has already surpassed circulation expectations with sales of 10,000 and growing.
To purchase the Atlas of Oregon CD-ROM, which costs $49.95, visit the University Press Web site www.uopress.com.
Andrew Shipley is a freelance reporter for the Emerald.