9/17/2008

Le cratère

I don't know if what you're about to read is correct, I have doubts too, but it seems too much to be a coincidence. I don't know why I'm writing this either; probably I just want to be told if it's right or wrong, if all of this is just in my mind... I need to know.

I was trying to get something from one of Rousseau's maps, aka the "other" map, the one with the side-view and the crater on it.
I have a theory, that combining various parts of Oahu you can create the Island as seen on Rousseau's Maps. If this theory is true, then the side-view map should represent a part of Oahu. Because the word "cratère" appears on the map, we can assume that the map represents a volcano.
Oahu has a lot of volcanoes, however I tried with just a couple of them, because on my second attempt I had positive results. These are the map and the volcano I'm talking about. The volcano is Koko Crater in the southeastern part of Oahu.

As you can see, there isn't a perfect match, but they are *very* similar.

If the outline of the crater doesn't match perfectly, it is, however, very similar to the one of the crater on the map. Moreover, the visible side of the volcano in the image, is the south one, meaning that we're facing north. In Rousseau's map, this situation is shown too.
Then I found a topographical map of the volcano and created a 3D model. After a couple of days of work, this is the model I obtained. It represent the volcano from a height of 200 ft to 1200 ft (61m to 366m) and is created with an accuracy of 40 ft (at least, I guess).

When I looked at the model from above, it appeared as in this image.

Then I compared this image with an image of the crater from the "main" Rousseau's map. I don't know if the whole Koko Crater matches the crater on the map (it doesn't seem, anyway), but I think that at least the edge (red) of the crater matches almost perfectly. And the most strange (or maybe, amazing) thing is that the orientation of the image of the 3D model has North as up, as in the actual "main" map. So it didn't need rotating.

A couple of problem would remain: what about the scale, giving the crater a height of 3000m? I think it doesn't states the crater height; as you can see, on the opposite side of the map, there's a "latitude" scale, and the latitude cannot be measured in a line perpendicular to the Earth. Sometimes, however, lines are shown as vertical because of perspective, because measures on lines converging at a vanishing point would be as shorter as approaching to the point. So probably 3000m is the lenght of the crater in a North-South direction (the height scale, the latitude scale and the North Arrow are all vertical lines). Another problem would be: why, then, there's nothing behind the crater on the map? The only possible answer that comes to my mind is: probably Rousseau just wanted to draw the crater only and not the rest of the Island...

The conclusion is that it would seem that the side-view map represents the crater on the south as seen from a 000 direction. However, I'm still a little confused... I need clarifications... Or some help... Because something that yesterday seemed being senseless, today it has sense... And it's too much strange... And confusing...

7 comments:

TheLostMap said...

I think the volcano you found is probably the volcano used in the large map. It makes a lot of sense, and actually answers a question I had about screen shots.

But I don't think this is where Rousseua's side map comes from, Although it could.

As far as the elevations on Rousseua's map are concerned, I think we are miss interpretting the numbers somehow. Use the tree's in the front as a scale. If the largest trees are about 60 feet high, than the elevation should roughly 250 feet high.

Also, there does not seem to be any trees on the south side of the Show's volcano (from screen shots)

This probably doesn't help, but like I said, I like the picture of the volcano.

Quasark said...

Mmh, I can see your point but, what I wanted to higlight is that we have matches both in images and in directions. That was the strange thing (let's face it, we never got some kind of matches from other maps from the show). Everything seems to get together as pieces in a puzzle. I started from a map and, using logic, I arrived to another map.

A question: what screenshots are you talking about? Are just assumptions that that was the crater/volcano or what? Because then I think I missed them o_O

The elevation "issue" is still a problem, in my opinion... And the "latitude" is strange in any case.

Anyway, thank you for not having shouted at me, considering what I said about that map just 5 days ago...

P.S.: do you have any screenshot of the third Rousseau's map? In Special (114) a part of that map is shown, but I don't have any other info about that... Do you?

TheLostMap said...

The comment about the lack of tree comes from a guess. In episode 02x07 "The other 48 days", Ana-Lucia and Mr. Echo come to a peninsula. It appeared to me that this area is the south face of the crater and has no trees.
I could very well be wrong, since your photo and the map do seem to agree well. Again, I would use the trees as a scale, and and 200 ft. volcano is not out of the question.
There are a few screen shots from from the Special episode which show the small islets southeast of the island. I will send those when I can.

TheLostMap said...

q,
These are the map screen shots I use from the Special episode. Hope they help.

http://img519.imageshack.us/img519/6746/1x14specialtriangleislews6.gif

http://img182.imageshack.us/img182/8675/1x14specialtriangleislemz5.gif

http://img179.imageshack.us/img179/1410/1x14specialtriangleislejh1.gif

http://img204.imageshack.us/img204/5424/specialepisode1x14topvilf0.png

Quasark said...

Wow! Thank you! They're exactly what I was looking for!
Thanks again!

Bye,
Q.

Quasark said...

Hey, Mike
Good news, I guess.
I watched the scene you described, actually in episode 206, Abandoned (in 207 that scene is very quick and it doesn't show a lot of background locations) and I found something that could prove you're right.
I found this screenshot at www.lostvirtualtour.com

http://www.lostvirtualtour.com/lost/screens/2x06Abandoned/abandoned29.jpg

It seems that the "mountain" in the background is actually Koko Crater!

I made these

http://img140.imageshack.us/img140/1521/craterekoru2.jpg

http://img140.imageshack.us/img140/2861/cratereko2el9.jpg

Probably it wasn't the exact point where the camera was, but as you can see, it's that!
According to the site, the tree were digitally added, and I think that those tree could be the ones we see on the sideview map! And, the orientation matches again!
I think we're definitely up to something... What do you think?

Q.

TheLostMap said...

Wow, you really seamed to nail that one. It really seams to agree. Great work.

Mike