Thematic Map

http://www.nrel.gov/gis/solar.html

This map is a thematic map, illustrating a very specific topic. This map illustrates the concentrated solar resource in the United States. This is done by using different colors and varying shades to demonstrate the intensity. This colors can be read using the provided legend to the right. The projection used for this map is Alber’s Equal Area conic projection. The shape is distorted but the area is true for each state. There are two standard parallels where no distortion occurs but shape and distance have minimal distortion in between these parallels.

Topographic Map

http://geography.about.com/od/understandmaps/a/map-types.htm

This map is a topographic map of Hawaii. It demonstrates the physical features for the big island of Hawaii. It illustrates the contours of the island, showing the differences in elevation. When the lines are closer together, the land is steeper and demonstrates a mountain or a valley. It also contains a scale to determine the distance between two points in this map. This is different from other maps because it only has one intended purpose: to demonstrate the elevation differences on the land. There are no boundaries beside the land boundaries, no labels besides the elevation labels and no colors to symbolize different things. 

Planimetric Map

http://www.texasfreeway.com/houston/historic/road_maps/houston_road_maps.shtml

This is an example of a planimetric map. This is a road map of the Gulf Freeway in Houston Texas. It takes a three dimensional map and draws it on a two dimensional surface. This map illustrates activity taking place in this area. This shows and labels the roads in the city of Houston and allows drivers to navigate through the city that maybe they have never visited before. This map probably uses a coordinates system and uses symbolism to differentiate between land and bodies of water as well as the roads. The red grid either demonstrates townships or latitude and longitudinal lines. Usually small scale maps and road maps are illustrated using the Lambert conformal conic projection.

Robinson Projection

http://www.lib.utexas.edu/maps/world.html

This map is a Robinson projection displaying the world and the standard parallels are at 38 degree north and 38 degree south, making it secant. The map is based on coordinates and not math, meaning it distorts all major components of a map, distance, area, shape, and scale, all to try to limit as many of the errors as possible. It shows the terrain and grading of the world and ocean floors through texturing and shading. Places like Greenland, and Antarctica ore lighter blue representing cold, icy terrain.  Lighter beige areas such as the Sahara in Africa represent dryer sandier geography. Green represents land grassy areas. The change elevation/grading can be seen with lines and shading that represents mountains, i.e. the Rocky Mountains in North America, and in the ocean to demonstrate the non-smooth texture. 

Mollweide Pseudocylindrical Projections

http://www.colorado.edu/geography/gcraft/notes/mapproj/mapproj.html

This projection is a Mollweide Equal-Area projection of the world. This map is for definition purposes to help introduce the types of map projections to those interested. It has simple labels of the meridians and the parallels at 30 degree intervals. IT uses the two shades to depict land and water. It is a cylindrical projection with straight parallels and arced parallels. It is typically used to show world maps. The meridians are equally spaced apart. The scale is true along the 40.44 degree north parallel and 40.44 S parallel which are the standard parallels. This projection shows equal area throughout the map. 

Azimuthal Equidistant Maps

http://www.colorado.edu/geography/gcraft/notes/mapproj/mapproj.html

This map displays a polar azimuthal projection. It is sometimes used for mapping routes for air travel. Measuring the distance from the center will be true distance. As you move away from the center, the distance increasingly distorts. All the point on the map is going in the true direction. The meridian lines are straight and the parallels are varying sized circles space out equally. This map is best used for displaying polar locations. This  map demonstrates the north pole. This map is for definition purposes to help introduce the concept of an Azimuthal map projection.
 

Behrmann cylindrical equal area

http://www.colorado.edu/geography/gcraft/notes/mapproj/mapproj.html

This map is a cylindrical normal projection with equal area.  This map is for definition purposes to help introduce the types of map projections to those interested. It uses 30 degree North as the parallels with no distortion. It has straight equally spaced meridians and unequally spaced parallels. True scale occurs along the central line, which in this case is the equator, and along two lines at equidistant from the equator. As you move farther and farther away from the central parallel, distortion increases.