Science

Biggest Atlas in world yours for $100,000

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It takes two people to turn one of this enormous book's 128 pages 6 ft tall pages (Photo via the Altea Gallery)
Though yet to be made official, the Earth Platinum Atlas is set to break the official record for the world's largest Atlas - a record that has stood since 1660, held by the Klencke Atlas housed at the British Library (Photo via the Altea Gallery)
The 30 or so photographs contained inside must be one of the book's most compelling attractions. The largest have been created using Gigapan photography (Photo via the Altea Gallery)
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"My, Grandma - what a big atlas you have!" All the better to map the surface of the Earth to a frankly-ludicrous level of detail (this thing shows the location of shipwrecks), not to mention display beautiful photographs of world wonders across 6 ft (1.8 m) by 4.5 ft (1.4 m) double page spreads, my dear. This is the conversation that would almost certainly take place were Little Red Riding Hood's grandmother to blow her US$100,000 savings on the Earth Platinum Atlas - the largest Atlas in the world - published by Sydney-based Millennium House.

It takes two people to turn one of this enormous book's 128 pages 6 ft tall pages. According to Big Think, the 150-kg (330-lb) Earth Platinum Atlas was put together in just 4 years by an international team of 88 cartographers. That's slightly at odds with the information available from London's Altea Gallery where edition number 2 is up for sale. According to its information the Atlas is the result of 25 years of work. Either way, the project is a testament to Millennium House founder Gordon Cheers, who oversaw the project.

The 30 or so photographs contained inside must be one of the book's most compelling attractions. The largest have been created using Gigapan photography. A spread of the Shanghai skyline is comprised of 12,000 individual photos and is, according to the Altea Gallery, the largest photograph in the world.

Though yet to be made official, the Earth Platinum Atlas is set to break the official record for the world's largest Atlas - a record that has stood since 1660, held by the Klencke Atlas housed at the British Library.

Only 31 copies of the Earth Platinum Atlas have been put together, which is hardly surprising when one considers they have to be printed in Italy and bound in Hong Kong. It sounds as if some copies have been snapped up by customers in the Middle East.

Still, I'm not sure if my bookshelf is up to the job. Think I'll wait for the paperback.

Sources: Millennium House, Altea Gallery, Big Think

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4 comments
Alex Lekander
Google Earth and a projector in your living room. Done for a 50th of the price and a higher quality experience.
Paul van Dinther
What is missing is a closeup photo showing the image quality in print. At 600 dpi a quality print would need a native image with a resolution of 42500 pixels for a two page spread. Such detail in a printed image would be a wonder to behold.
I now need to Google to see if anyone actually sells high quality printed Gigapan images.
Mr Stiffy
This is actually quite good......
But it's like so much totally amazing stuff by really clever people - You can't get to see, do or experience it all - and then you die and it all rots to dust and the sun expands and the earth roasts and eventually - it all goes out, forever.
But then why just have ONE book.... why not 10, or 100, or 10,000 of them, or 10,000,000 of them.
I think it's about time the entire internet got published in large print.
gordon cheers
Alex, I haven’t seen the level of detail in Google mapping once projected on a wall. I can't imagine it would be anywhere near sharp enough to compare the detail that offset printing provides. I believe the same projection you talk about could be done with the Mona Lisa!!!Its not always about information, sometimes also about the experience. Besides if Google mapping becomes our only map source then, that's really scary.