This is one of the first maps I made on Adobe Illustrator. I’ve always been fascinated with the D.B. Cooper mystery. One day I was looking for a map of the search area and I couldn’t find anything good, so that spurred me to make this map.
I was going for a bulletin board look for this image. I wanted it to look a bit like something from a crazy conspiracy theorist like in the movies. The inset boxes are all a little kilter. It’s crowded with details and images
The base map consists of USGS topo maps stitched together. When I started making this map I was very new to Adobe Illustrator and digital mapping. Looking back on it now the stitching is a little rough.
Overall though, this was a great project to cut my teeth on. It took close to forty hours to make, but in that time I learned a lot about how to use Adobe Illustrator. After everything I’ve learned since making this map, I probably wouldn’t make any big changes if I started again from scratch.
The map delivers on it’s purpose: it gives context and background to the mysterious disappearance of D.B. Cooper.