German situation maps on this site

[Abicht]

Sounds like Jason is about to post the maps available any time now... so watch this site. Out of the 5500ish maps I have about 450 total ready to go, and am working on 1943 Ost maps for the next batch. Those should be available by month for order. Thanks for everyones patience!

[Jason Petho]

This is so exciting!!!!

Thank you!!

Take care and good luck
Jason Petho

[Kiehl]

I for one am absolutely amazed at the quality of the teaser map, and am absolutely, positively standing on my desk gnawing on my fingers imagining the North African theatre maps.

I'd give my right eye! You guys are true historians ... bravo!

[Abicht]

Things are getting very close now, and I just sent Jason all the Jan 1943 maps (106 total) for posting as well. (now working on Feb 43..and so on) The teaser was good, and most maps are like that, but some were in poor shape, for example, the battle of Kiev 1941 maps looked like they were pulled from a fire as they are very darkened and burnt looking yet still quite readable. Just remember what I was working with is old, but still very readable. ALL maps have been and will be scanned in at 600DPI (also why it take so long to do all this). Again.. the only place to get these maps in digital form and in bulk, (and very cheap compared to official NARA researchers who can charge up to 20.00US per map!) is right here!

All good things to those who wait and this is no small undertaking for Jason or I!

[Sledgehammer]

Perhaps this goes without saying, but I wonder if you are planning to include with the downloadable map(s) the citable reference as to its source.

[Abicht]

If all goes right today is the day! Jason and I have worked very hard on this project so we hope to get honest feedback on it all.

Also in response to the origination question, All maps came from NARA and are US public record. So once we obtain them they are for our use. In so far as citing them in any book or publication they should be refered back to NARA, but we will also be watermarking all maps. It will be possible to get higher res scans for books without the watermark if needed by contacting us.

[Abicht]

They have arrived! Please go to the main Feldgrau.com page and on the right hand side under getting started you will see the first intallation of maps.

[Snefens]

Any plans on other payment options. Like Visa?

[Abicht]

Jason is running the payment options, but you can set up a Paypal account with a credit card. That is how I pay for things on Paypal which comes off my visa.

[Snefens]

Oh I know. I just have a general aversion against it for some reason.

I might bite the bullet, 'cause I sure am interested in some of those maps.

[Abicht]

I wish we could do it more than one way, but this is our best option right now. I know I am the one scanning these in too, but most of them are really nice quality, and well worth it.

[Jason Pipes]

I think we can take Visa direct if you can't use PayPal, but PayPal itself can take Visa (if that makes any sense).

Contact me for additional payment options if you are interested in the map cds!

[Kiehl]

Just waiting on the verification of my PayPal account ... Egypt maps here I come!

[Jason Pipes]

As someone who buys these maps I can tell you your prices are dirt cheap. Dirt cheap. For instance, there is a 1_100k 1st October Stalingrad situation map for sale currently at USD1,350. In truth situation maps rarely got onto the market for the obvious reasons. Even tactically marked originals command a high premium.

This is a really amazing statement, I have my finger on the general pulse of the WWII market but I had no idea these particular original maps were in such high demand! I have 12 original period WWII situation maps from the 5th Mountain Division done by hand at the front while stationed outside of Leningrad. I got them with a photo colloection for about $150 total along with about 500 or so original photos from the same unit.

Dr Glantz was earlier doing this with his Atlas series, selling them at US$50 (in 2003). So, the Kursk atlas with78 maps was US$45. This was for poor quality reproductions giving a net result like a bad fax. It was heart breaking to see it because the originals are striking as evidenced by the Leibstandarte map booklets.

I recall his series and was very excited when I first hear about them and even more disappointed when I got my hands on one of the books. Frankly they were a noble attempt but in practice horrible and next to worthless. I couldn't even read some of the maps!

You are proposing to sell the crown jewels. Digital copies may be inifinitely duplicatable and therefore close to zero in cost but as almost none of this is in the public domain, the scarcity gives them a high value.

Pricing these map sets is something that Matt and I have discussed at great length and we've gone to great pains to try and make them affordable to the masses. We aren't trying to get rich here but do of course need to help cover all the many costs associated with scanning them and offering them for sale. I think we've found a happen medium in that, for example, we can offer 156 operational maps from Finland for the entire war 1941-1944 for $110! That is a stunning value when you consider the amount of work needed to get those maps and how rare they really are. Many of these maps have never been seen by researchers in the past 50 years.

I have for many years wanted to find a researcher to pay to do this duplication. That someone is effectively doing this for free is truly noble, fantastic for those of not able to get to the archives, great for us amatuer historians and I would think scholarship in general. However, I for one would not complain if there was a bit more capitalism in the project and you made a decent turn.

Thanks for this vote of support! We really appreciate it and hope this new project goes really, really well.

[YXK]

Just received my maps. Great job, guys! Excellent quality of scanning, plus they are all in color!

However, I have few things that I want to mention:

1. I've ordered battle of Kiev 1943 - got battle of Kiev 1941!!!
2. If you could provide some timeframe for the maps. For example, battle of Kiev 1941 covers just encirclement, nothing on the intial attacks in July and early August.
3. Battle of Sevastopol - not very clear maps not because of scanning, but because Germans did them in this way originally. If you could warn about such issues in the future.

Overall, you are doing excellent job, only if you could fix these minor issues. Thanks!