# Mapping Resources > How Do I ??? >  How make historical maps

## newer

hello ,

I want to make historical maps like this


 and upload  to  forum. 
How can I do  maps  like this?

I want to make historical maps  with free/freeware software like inkspape.

Where can I find (free) maps  like  this  of the photo and worked inputting historical data?

With inkscape  I've  worked  a few days.

I am begginer.  :Wink:

----------


## bartmoss

Welcome to the guild!

NASA has their Blue Marble textures, and there's shaded relief which has a good free texture too. These are basically satellite maps without clouds. You'd load a part into inkscape as one layer, then draw on top of it.

http://www.shadedrelief.com/

http://visibleearth.nasa.gov/view_rec.php?id=2429

http://earthobservatory.nasa.gov/Features/BlueMarble/

Do make sure that what you use is freely usable, you don't want to tangle with copyrights. NASA imagery is free (except their logo) as is everything else the US Gov't produces.

Happy mapping!

----------


## Midgardsormr

Most everything else. There are a few exceptions, but most government sites are pretty good about clearly marking items that are not in the public domain.

If you want to get those colors that indicate elevation, that's called hypsometric tinting, and it will likely require a height map in addition to the satellite imagery or shaded relief. It seems like there was a pretty good tutorial somewhere around here about creating a hypsometric gradient and applying it to a height map in the Gimp (which is free raster-editing software. It is to Photoshop as Inkscape is to Illustrator.) It's fairly likely that RobA was either the author or discoverer of that tutorial. You can get height map information from NASA also, but it might take a bit more work to find what you need and get it to line up with your imagery. 

Looking forward to seeing what you come up with!

----------


## newer

I found this map but I can not open it because I have memory problems 256ΜΒ.  :Shocked: 

A)Ocean with flat blue tint: http://www.nacis.org/data/NE2/NE2_WDB1.jpg (16.5MB) = http://www.shadedrelief.com/natural2.../download.html

Not satisfied with anything I saw.

And confused. I am a beginner.  :Question:

----------


## Hydeyulse

Its really great posts.

----------

