Curved vs Straight Route Lines, and How Long to Pause

Should a route line on your map be straight or curved? And how long should the map stop so viewers can read it? This guide answers both, with the settings to use in the map animation maker.

TL;DR

Short version: Use a curved line for flights and long jumps, because it looks like travel through the air and does not hide the land under it. Use the real road, rail or sea line for trips on the ground or on water. Use a straight line for short links between two close places, and for diagrams. In Animaps, air legs have a Curvature slider from 0% (straight) up, and lines you draw by hand have a Curved corners switch. For reading, hold the view about 1 second for each short label, and never less than 2 seconds at the end of a move.

Here are the two shapes one after the other: a curve for a flight, then a line that follows the land.

Quick links:

This guide covers:

Three Kinds of Route Lines

Curved lines

A curved line bows up between two places. Viewers read it as a flight, because planes do not follow roads. It also has a practical benefit: when two lines go between nearby places, curves keep them apart, so they do not sit on top of each other.

Use it for: flights, long jumps between continents, links between many places from one centre (a "hub" map), and story links such as "she moved from here to here".

Straight lines

A straight line is the shortest drawing between two points. It looks precise and neutral.

Use it for: short links in a city, diagrams, distance lines ("12 km"), and maps for lessons where the line stands for a link, not a trip.

Real-path lines

A line that follows the real road, railway or sea lane tells the viewer: this is how it was done. It is the honest choice for road trips, train journeys and ferries.

Use it for: road trips, rail journeys, cruises and ferries, delivery routes, and any trip where the path itself is the story.

The Settings in Animaps

Route: the travel mode decides the shape

A Route has a mode for the whole route:

Each leg can have its own style: colour, width, pattern (solid, dashed, dotted or fade) and curvature.

Draw: lines by hand

Draw places lines, arrows, circles and polygons where you click. A line through three points or more has corners. Turn on Curved corners to round them into one smooth curve that still passes through every point. With only two points, the Curvature slider bows the line instead (on the flat map).

How Long to Pause: Reading Time

A map moves, and viewers read. If the map moves on before they finish reading, they miss the point. Some simple rules:

In Animaps, add a Pause step where the camera should hold still. The Pause keeps everything on screen while the viewer reads.

Worked Example: Lisbon to Rome, by Air and Sea

A 30 second clip, with timings:

Change one thing at a time when you test: first the line shapes, then the timings.

Prompts You Can Copy

Show London on a light map, draw straight lines from London to Paris, Brussels and Amsterdam with the distance on each, and pause for 3 seconds.

Show a flight hub map from Dubai to New York, London, Sydney and Tokyo, with curved lines, then pause on the whole view for 4 seconds.

Common Mistakes

To see curved lines from one centre, open this hub map and change the cities.

FAQ

How do I make a curved route line? Use a Route in Air mode and raise the Curvature of the leg, or draw a Line by hand and turn on Curved corners.

How do I make a straight line? Set the Curvature of an air leg to 0%, or draw a Line by hand with Curved corners off.

Can a route follow real roads? Yes. Use Car mode. Bike and Walk modes follow cycle paths and footpaths.

Can a sea route avoid land? Yes. Sea mode goes around the coast, not across it.

How long should a map pause last? About 1 second per short label, 2 to 3 seconds for a sentence, and 3 to 4 seconds on the final view.

For a full travel walk-through, read 10 ways travel bloggers use animated maps.

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