Week 5: GIS Data Search

Attached are three maps that resulted from gathering data from various file sources for Charlotte County, FL. I learned quite a bit about downloading data from the internet, and, specifically from the comprehensive data clearinghouse offered for the state of Florida. I had some difficulty with certain types of downloads...and am still trying to get the hand of downloading tar.gz files. In Map 1, I focused on roadways, cities, hydrography, and public land boundaries. I also incorporated wetlands and mangrove areas. The hydrography-lines was especially difficult to consider because it incorporates MANY lines throughout the county and I couldn't determine a way to distinguish prominent water features as compared to highway drainage canals...so I faded the blue color to diminish its appearance in the map view. Also, all of the canals along the coast are outlined in the county boundary, and since there are so many, they end up creating large blackened zones. Fortunately, I could cover most of that with other layers.



Map two exams zones of ecological concern based on identified frequencies of endangered wetland and upland plant species. I worked for quite some time trying to identify color combinations that would look balanced. Finally, given the shape of the county, laying out the map was challenging for me (i.e. when expanded to full width, it was not "pleasingly" tall). As a remedy, I tried to construct the legend and add other map features to give a better balance to the map layout.



Map 3 examines three different data types: DRG, DOQQ, and DEM. In retrospect, I should have probably selected map quads that would fall more toward the center of the county (i.e. to make the final map more aesthetically pleasing). As a remedy, I placed the legend in the right hand side of the county so that area of the map would not look open and void.



I have ALOT more to learn about this, but I certainly recognize the value of the wealth of information that is accessible for GIS.

Week 4: Haiti Earthquake Maps

After reviewing a variety of maps specifically related to the Haiti Earthquake (and emergency response to the disaster), I must give credit to Sean Cupolo for finding what I believe to be the most readable and informative map document available for this work. Since I did not find any other map that measured up to this one, I will add my own input to Sean's already rather comprehensive assetment of this map and its inherent value.

This map is aesthetically pleasing, readable, and has smooth features (i.e. the arrows) that draw one's focus to the map as a whole. Subsequently, the eyes are drawn to the legends that provide a variety of information pertinent to the cause. The symbology used in legends and the color scheme of the map layers (especially the base layers) are effective and serve their purpose well.

When evaluating the various maps, I asked some of my students about their own opinion. The primary comment was that, "It's a nice map", and "It's busy (packed with information), but that is what you would want for a map that you would draw for this purpose (i.e. having lots of valuable information in a one page document)". I agreed with these assessments. I also looked quite a bit at the ESRI map and, while it is very rich in color, and certainly a "cutting edge" presentation, I don't find it to be particularly useful, especially for this purpose.

Sean, this is a great map, and I don't know if I would have found it myself!

Week 4: Map Projections

The three maps presented in this figure represent practice with selection of map projection types. Because the maps themselves would not effectively show the distinctions between these map projection types at this view magnification, the land surface area parameter was calculated for four selected counties (Escambia, Alachua - Home of the Fightin' Florida Gators AND Home of the Big Biscuit at Skeeters Family Restaurant, Miami-Dade, and Polk - best known for its recurring role on Forensic Files and COPS)(see Table insert in figure). It appears that the Universal Transverse Mercator Projection results in calculated county surface areas that differ more markedly from those calculated from the other projections. This assignment required the use of previously studied ArcView functions while challenging us with layout design considerations. Gooooooo Gators!

Week 3: GIS Cartography

For Week 3: GIS Cartography, three maps of Mexico are exhibited. The first map is a chloropleth map distinguishing population numbers for each state. A green scale was chosen with the pale shade characterizing less populated states and the darker shade charactering the more populated states.



The second map focuses on the central-southern states of Mexico. In this map, various features are presented: railroads, roadways, rivers. The urban areas are denoted in a dark red (polygon). The urban areas are labelled for added detail.



The third map is a raster dataset characterizing elevation patterns throughout the country. A color scheme (tan/brown to dark green) was selected to distinguish the tropical lowlands from the more arid high-elevation plateau.



This lab exercise was very helpful and it led me through a variety of steps with which I am becoming more conversant. :)

Week 2: 2007 World Population (by Country)

This is my map for the Week 2 assignment. Following the instructions provided in the assignment, I had the opportunity to find a variety of tools that are useful in developing and presenting an informative map. I was concerned because when I changed the page layout to landscape, the map layer (countries) seemd to be bounded by a large zone on the top and bottom of the map (world ocean). My concern was that in order to fit it into the map, I could not find a "crop" function...and so, instead, I highlighted the map figure and pulled it down to size to the the landscape layout. By doing this, don't I alter the dimensions of the map? (i.e. how do I lock the X and Y coordinates so they will scale proportionally?). The map still looks very similar to the output example in the exercise. ...and the journey continues... :)

Week 1: Planning a trip to San Diego and Identifying Potential Youth Center locations

The map for "Planning a trip to San Diego" is zoomed to focus on the Marriott Marina and Hotel and the San Diego Zoo (highlighted with blue circle dot symbols).

The map for "Potential Youth Center Locations" is presented. After changing the point symbols to 'size = 6', I believed that the color should be more prominent for these symbols (yellow seemed to be a more prominent color than the default). Further, it seemed that the building label features were difficult to read, so I changed the font to 9 pt (bold).

Brian's Intro to GIS blog

As I venture into the blogging age...I learn something new every day!