Interactive Map of Middle-Earth in Polish.
Jan
Is it possible to change the labels of that map to Polish language ?
It really matters to me, as i love Lord Of The Rings, and i'd like to
get to know all this world, with
all the details. I live in poland, im able to help as much as i can to
add those labels in my language - if thats possible.
It would help me a lot to get to know the world of Tolkien, and follow
the exact path in which Bilbo and Frodo, made it to their
destinations.
Kind Regards, Jan.
Kris Kowal
> Is it possible to change the labels of that map to Polish language ?
> It really matters to me, as i love Lord Of The Rings, and i'd like to
> get to know all this world, with
> all the details. I live in poland, im able to help as much as i can to
> add those labels in my language - if thats possible.
= Step 1 =
I would love to collaborate on as many translations as people are
interested in making. Just add a column to this spreadsheet:
https://spreadsheets.google.com/ccc?key=0An5phhxDkYDPdEkweHFFWjR4bTlzd3Nxb282UmJQVVE&hl=en
The leftmost column indicates the priority of each label, so we would
need labels for all priority 1 locations before I would be willing to
publish a new language layer.
Translations are the first step. It would be best for as many place
names to be copied from the official Polish translations of the story
and the maps. These are the conventions for indicating where you get
a name from:
* Separate alternate names with " / "
* <S as a suffix if the name was constructed from the meaning of the
Sindarin name.
* <E as a suffix if the name was constructed from the meaning of the
English name.
* (Parentheses) around names that are translations from other columns,
intended for translation notes but not for the label on the map. For
example (West Tower) is the English translation of Annúminas, but
since the place is known to English-speakers by name and not by
meaning, the English label is Annúminas.
* An Asterisk* indicates that a name or a translation is not literally
attested in the published books or maps.
Eventually, all the names will also be placed on the etymology
spreadsheet, one row per name, indexed by the place's canonical name.
https://spreadsheets.google.com/ccc?key=0An5phhxDkYDPdG05Qk9oTU1FVlhEWlNqTkMwbjBPUmc&hl=en
If you have additional notes about translations, either attested or
constructed, make a row on that spreadsheet. That data will appear in
the top-right notes box for the place.
If you do not create a row in the spreadsheet, my automation will
generate them from the data in the locations spreadsheet, so don't
worry about being thorough.
= Step 2 =
Someone, bearing in mind that I haven't found a way to get paid for
this work so it's prioritized accordingly, needs to make graphics for
every place. I don't promise to do this myself, and certainly not in a
timely fashion, so it'd be good to find a decent calligrapher to help
with this part, or take up the task yourself. Also, bear in mind, I'm
an amateur calligrapher, so I have no place to be picky about the
quality of the drawing.
a.) Create a "reference" for drawing each label.
The English and Elvish layers are presently constructed from
uniformly-sized rectilinear text, which makes them usable both on the
map and in other places. It was also easier than contouring every
label to the geography, and makes them resilient against changes to
the geography. It has the disadvantage of not always fitting the
geography and occasionally overlapping other labels.
To go with this strategy, print out label-grid-romans.svg
http://github.com/kriskowal/3rin.gs and use it as a guide, taping it
to a table in bright ambient light, or to a window with light behind
it. You can calligraph between the dark bars, with ascenders
stretching into the black space above and descenders in the black
space below.
Alternately, you can create a reference graphic for the geography
behind each label, drawing with the curvature around or along the
geography artistically. I plan to do this for the English in a future
revision, but it will probably take a lot more time.
b.) Draw each label. A page of English labels looks like this:
http://3rin.gs/sources/labels/latin/12.jpg
c.) Scan each page of labels. Photocopiers sometimes have a scan
feature, which emails or sends to a network share.
d.) Crop and Transparency: Use The Gimp editor to rotate and crop each
label. Use the "Color to Alpha" transform to remove the white
background color, which also makes the labels translucent. Double the
opacity of the image by copying it over itself. Save each label with
a file name like "ennorath-pl.png"; the suffix indicates the language
and alphabet. "L" for latin letters and "T" for the Tengwar.
e.) Placing the Labels: We'll talk more if you get here, and this is a
point where I'd probably be happy to take over. This involves
downloading the project on a Linux machine so you can build some of
the intermediate files, or getting them from me. We'd need to add a
"labels-polish.svg" to the project, by copying one of the other
language graphics. This graphic would have 8 label layers, each
corresponding to a label size so they can be faded in portion to their
relevance at each zoom level. This is pretty easy though; you'd use a
low-resolution rendering of the map, and any other reference graphics
you might have access to, and place, rotate, and scale each label to
fit the map.
f.) Render. This usually takes about 20 hours on my 2GB of RAM and two
core processor, generates 10GB of intermediate files, and produces 1GB
of tiles for the online map.
The whole process, dedicating nights and weekends, would take a single
person about three months, I estimate. Maybe you can start a club and
get it done a few weekends :-)
---------------
> It would help me a lot to get to know the world of Tolkien, and follow
> the exact path in which Bilbo and Frodo, made it to their
> destinations.
I plan to make a layer that shows the paths of the characters, with
browsable waypoints. I plan to first finish the Elvish and English
layers before doing other languages and features though. I've got
about a dozen fixes in both languages, and another hundred labels to
do, and maybe even some higher detail geography for select regions
like Minas Tirith, Isengard, and the Lonely Mountain.
Kris Kowal
Jan Michalowicz
I dont clearly understand the table, but ill give it some more time later on!
I will contact my friends, and let them know, so more Lord Of The Rings fans
from Poland, would colaborate, making the progress faster.
Big Thanks once again for sharing this with all of us - fans around the world !
Jan.
Jan Michalowicz
It is outstanding !, im completely lost in using the google docs, and i would be very grateful if you could
just create the polish bit in it, and my and couple of my other LOTR fanatics, will slowly start filling it it.
Ill try my best to help you with the work, understanding it all better as the time goes by, but just now ill try to do my best !
Thanks ! :)
Kris Kowal
> im completely lost in using the google docs, and i
> would be very grateful if you could
> just create the polish bit in it, and my and couple of my other LOTR
> fanatics, will slowly start filling it it.
For the sake of thoroughness, I met with Jan on the Google Doc, which
I happened to have open, and created the column. If all goes well,
work begins on the next Polish Saturday morning.
Kris