For centuries, man has tried to fully understand all the details of the earth. In fact, early man likely used their own form of mapping in order to tell one place from another, and as time went on that mapping became more advanced, eventually leading the discovery/naming of countries, cities, land masses, etc.

How they mapped, however, depended on the technology that was available. Early man likely used some simple method like steps or landmarks to judge where one place was in comparison to another as well as estimate its overall size. Later, mathematics and topographers were employed to keep these maps up to date, and in fact, mapping was considered a skill that could garner an individual a great deal of money.

Today, however, we can use aerial photography to provide us with aerial mapping so that not only can we see perfect details of the land and the landscape, but we can also have views adjusted to perfect scale so that sizes can be easily calculated and data can be extracted and analyzed. Mapping has become so advanced, that you can map a pebble’s exact location at any point in the world, and be correct with 99.99% accuracy.

Technorati Tags: aerial mapping, aerial photography, digital mapping, overhead maps