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They're especially rough if you exaggerate their heights from typically 150 to 250 times as in a new series of globes from The Relief Globe Company of Boulder Creek, California. The company was founded last year by Alan Folmsbee to apply advances in computation and manufacturing technologies to the age-old process of making relief globes.
Made accurately to scale, the relief of oceans and mountains would be just a few thousandths of an inch on an 18 inch diameter globe. After all, the highest mountain only reaches 5.5 miles above sea level, and the deepest ocean trench is less than 7 miles. With the earth's diameter of nearly 8,000 miles, this would result in an entire relief range of less than 3 mils on such a globe. Exaggeration heightens the aesthetic experience and make it possible to visually and tactually study the enormous quantity of data reposing in these globes.
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Folmsbee starts the process by combining and massaging data from numerous publicly available sources. The burnished data are then used to produce a master model using stereolithography, and copies are made from this master using urethane molding techniques. The globes are subsequently hand-painted. At present, prices are US$1,000, or more since this is still largely a manual process. Prices could be substantially reduced, however, with more automation and higher volumes. Many different types of globes are available and so are globes of other planets.
Blind and visually-impaired individuals might find such study aids particularly useful, and the company has recently made a gift of one to the California School for the Blind. But the appeal and potential is likely much wider. Having such an object in a classroom would be inspirational for students to study geography, and potentially to lead to a truly higher level of understanding. It's the kind of thing that most kids would voluntarily spend hours looking at - and so would a lot of us older kids.
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 height exaggerated 40X. |
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For more info Contact:
The Relief Globe Company |
  The right photo shows a close-up of the North American plate. Click on either photo to enlarge. |