Conformal Projections

Although these two map projections are both Conformal projections, they are different. The Gall Stereographic and the Mercator projections both display the Earth, however, their scales are off. The first noticeable difference that alerts the viewer is the size of the grids. The Gall map's parcels are much more consistent that the Mercator's parcels. Both map's parcels are smaller near the equator and larger at the poles, but the Mercator projection's change in sizes is much more drastic, resulting in Antartica looking larger than all the other conitnents combined, which is obviously false. These changes in parcel sizes make the measured distances from Washington, D.C. and Kabul, Afghanistan different.The Mercator and Gall maps are not intended to display measurements accurately. Instead, they are desinged to display shapes correctly. Because of this, distances displayed on the map are not precise beacuse of the distortions on the map.