Map 5 Critique

Above is a map of the Upper Cormorant Lake shed in MN.  Unfortunately, from this map that cannot be determined due to the lack of any title.  The map does include a north arrow and a scale, but lacks and indication of where the data was obtained from.  The visual hierarchy of this map is skewed towards the legend, which takes away from the importance of the actual data.  Overall, the data is clear and text is legible.

source: http://rmbel.info/consulting/gis-mapping/

map 4 critique

Above is a map of the number of Physicians per 10,000 population by county in the year 2000.  One drawback of this maps is the lack of any scale or north arrow.  The map is very legible and clear, and has a good level of visual hierarchy.  However, it may have been best to make the background a different color than white because some of the data is also represented by the color.  However, the figure ground is still sufficient due to the distinct county lines that distinguish the map from the background.  It is also unclear what "Missouri = 22" means.

map 3 critique

Above is a map of the Texas River Basins and Major Bays.  One main drawback of this maps is the enormous number of colors used to represent the data.  It may have been better to provide some other method of distinction in addition to the use of colors.  This may include adding numbers to the areas, or even patterns/textures.  In addition, the map is heavier on the left where the keys reside.  Aside from that, clarity, legibility, and visual hierarchy are good.

source: http://www.tpwd.state.tx.us/landwater/land/maps/gis/map_downloads/map_gallery/hydro/

Map 2 critique

This map displays the annual direct (perpendicular to the land area) solar radiation received by a particular area in the United States.  This map makes great use of its color scheme, getting darker as you approach areas with higher levels of radiation and lighter as you approach areas of less direct solar radiation. This map is well balanced, and is very clear and legible.  The only aspect missing is a scale, but may not be necessary due to the data being map.  Visual hierarchy is also adequate and emphasis is placed on data.

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

Map 1 Critique

The above map represents the Percent Population with below Poverty Status (2009) in the City of Gainseville, Flordia.  One issue with this map is the color scheme.  Qualitative schemes, like the one used, are best suited to represent nominal or categorical data, not to imply magnitude differences between legend classes.  A sequential scheme with one or two hues would have been more effective at representing the data. Another issue with this map is that it lack any sort of scale.  Furthermore, the title to the map is not centered, and could be created larger in order to stand out more.

source: http://mch.peds.ufl.edu/gis_maps/gainesville.html

Bivariate Map

The purpose of this project was to map two variables on a single map.  In my project, I added a variable to my proportional symbol map using choropleth techniques to represent the total population in poverty.  This map compares the percent of each county population in poverty to the total general population of each county.  This comparison is important because it displays the poverty density of each county in Wisconsin.  Without the general population data, Menominee County would appear to have the greatest number of people in poverty, when in reality it is Milwaukee County.  Trends on this map show that there are larger numbers of people in poverty in the urban southeast edge of Wisconsin, but higher percent population in poverty in the lower populated, rural counties in the north. 

One struggle that I faced when creating this map was positioning the legends, map, and title so that one side of the map would be balanced with the other.

Colors were selected using Colorbrewer, and data was taken from the U.S census Bureau.

Proportional Symbol Map

The purpose of this activity was to introduce manual proportional symbol mapping with Microsoft Excel and Adobe Illustrator CS5.

Requirements 

- The map must contain at least 30 geographic units (countries, counties, cities, etc.)

 Data was collected from the U.S Census Bureau and then sorted from highest to lowest values.   By using the largest percentage value as the largest proportional symbol, I was then able to appropriately size the other percentages as fractions of the largest circle.  The major struggle of this assignment was manually sizing the symbols in Illustrator.  This was an easy task, but rather time consuming.  I chose to map poverty data in Wisconsin because I feel that it often gets overlooked.  People often believe that the majority of poverty exists only in third world countries or large cities, but this map shows that Poverty exists everywhere no matter where you live.   I chose to use percentages as my data because I feel gives a better visual representation of the data.  Counties such as Milwaukee County that have large populations sizes are naturally going to have larger numbers of people in poverty.  That value is meaningless unless you are able to compare that number to the total population size.


Discussion:  This map provides excellent visual hierarchy, clarity, legibility, and figure ground.  The only draw back would be that the use of percents instead of actual number of people resulted in a smaller range of circle sizes.  This results in a slight reduction in clarity, yet still reasonable.

choropleth map

The purpose of this assignment was to produce four maps in one illustrator document using two different methods of classification to map the total population, and percent population of people in North Carolina who claim American Ancestry.  The maps are as follows:

Map 1: Absolute number of persons reporting American ancestry; Quintile classification; 5 classes

Map 2: Absolute number of persons reporting American ancestry; Equal Interval classification; 5 classes

Map 3: Percentage of all persons reporting an ancestry that reported having American ancestry; Quintile classification; 5 classes

Map 4: Percentage of all persons reporting an ancestry that reported having American ancestry; Equal Interval classification; 5 classes

The only major struggle of this project was the tedious colorization of each individual county in North Carolina based on its data.  Because I did not know the location of each county, an online source acted as my aid.   The data used was provided in an excel sheet, and all that needed to be done was to sort the data based on the classification techniques.  Sub-classes were then assigned a color using colorbrewer online. 

One requirement of this project was to include a short paragraph (a few sentences) that mentions the ethics involved in selecting a classification scheme (choosing one that best visualizes the distribution of the phenomena being mapped). This paragraph is included in the map image, but is as follows: 

The type of data classification that is chosen can greatly alter the representation of the data. In this assignment, It can be see that the quintile method always makes the classifications appear equally represented, when the actual data could suggest otherwise. The Equal Interval Classification is different in that it uses actual data in the breaks rather than a data’s rank. Overall, it can be seen that data classification types can easily mislead a reader and inaccurately display the true data. It is also important to note that type of data can could also mislead a reader. For example, in this assignment, if deciding to use percentage data, one could make Ashe County appear to have a large number of people claiming american ancestry, where in reality it actually has one of the fewest number of people (as can be seen by map two). Different data types and data classifications can more accurately represent certain types of trends. In this assignment, Map 4 most accurately represents the trend being mapped because it shows which areas more commonly refer to themselves as of american descent. If map two were used, the trend would twisted to make the reader believe the majority of people who do refer to themselves as of american descent only live in Wake county, while in reality the majority of that counties’ population does not.

Discussion:  One flaw in the map is the visual hierarchy.  In order to maintain legibility, it was necessary to make the individual maps larger eliminating room for an appropriately sized title.  Ideally, the title should be slightly larger in order to stand out over other objects such as the legends.  However, the sacrifice in visual hierarchy resulted in a higher level of legibility, although it may have been possible to satisfy both aspects.

Hometown map

The Purpose of this project was to use ArcMap to obtain an aerial image of my hometown, arrange the image in ArcMap’s Layout View, and export the image as an Adobe Illustrator. This file was then used as the base map for the hometown reference map. Illustrator functions such as the pen, shape, and text tools were used to trace the aerial image.

Requirements for this map:

- Include an appropriate number of streets. Some degree of cartographic generalization will be necessary on your part, however.

- Include labels for all streets you include.

- Include all water bodies, parks, schools, commercial areas, and industrial areas (if applicable).

- Include a title and your name.

Discussion: 

One struggle that I had with this project was the scale of the map, and the amount of generalization to use.  I had to choose which objects on the map were most important because tracing every object would have been very time consuming, and could have resulted in an illegible map.  Some colors were chosen based on a colors association with a certain object such as green for parks or red for hospital.  This makes objects easy to distinguish even without a legend.   Objects chosen to be mapped were selected based off personal opinion of importance after living in the area the majority of my life.  Individual names of stores in the shopping and business zones were left out to conserve legibility.

Mount Simon Elevation

The purpose of this lab was to use a Garmin eTrex Legend H to collect data and then, using ArcGIS and Adobe Illustrator to create a map the represents that data.

Discussion:  In this project, I used the GPS' Tracking mode to collect data points every five seconds as I rode to the top of Mount Simon in Eau Claire Wisconsin.  One struggle that I had with the data collection was that data points were taken to quickly near the summit of mount simon.  This resulted in a cluster of data points that were hard to read.  It may have been best to zoom on just the area from Birch St. to the summit in order to provide more space between points and improve clarity. However, overall, the project was successful in displaying the change in Elevation as one gets closer to the summit.  Other requirements of the project included adding a basemap to the background using ArcGIS in addition to a legend and scale.  

Projections of South America

The purpose of this activity was to use ArcGIS software to produce a smallposter that illustrates the impact of using different map projections have on the size, shape, and orientation of South America.  

Requirements: 

1) Ten overlaid maps of South America, each depicting a different projection . Use hue (color) to make each map distinct.

2) A legend that lists each of the projections, includes information for projection type (conic, azimuthal, etc.), properties (equal area, equidistant, etc.), reference/central meridian, standard parallels, latitude of origin information, and the scale each projection is best used for mapping (world, continents, regions, medium scale, large scale, etc.)

 3) A meridian labeled “60˚ West” placed in its approximate location in the overlaid maps. 

4) Introductory paragraphs that describe what map projections are, issues inherent in mapping a 3-D world on a 2-D surface, explains what conformal, equidistant, and equal area projections are, explain why some projections are better for mapping certain areas or certain scales than other projections, and explain why researchers must consider projections when designing projects that involve geospatial data:

"Map projections differ in many ways, and each projection can greatly a effect the representation of the world

based on its particular method of transferring coordinates and locations from their real world places to a two dimensional piece of paper. Unfortunately, because the earth is a spherical  shape, it cannot be perfectly represented on a piece of paper without distorting some aspect. This means that cartographers must choose a map projection that best suits the data they are trying to communicate. In general, there are three types of projections each with several variations within its category. Conformal projections preserve shapes and angles because any two lines on the map follow the same angle as the corresponding lines on the earth. In contrast, on an equal-area projected map, preserve relationships among areas in real world places and their presentation on the map. Lastly, in an equidistant map, great circle distances are preserved which dissect the earth into two different parts. However, it is important to note that each map projection has its weaknesses, and can only be accurate to a certain extent. Some maps are better for mapping smaller areas, but distort larger areas. Other maps have greater distortion the further west and east you go. For example, a Mercator map is able to show true direction, and is good for navigation . However, the scale on a Mercator map gets larger

the further away from the equator you go. This means that land masses are greatly distorted near the top and bottom of the map, and is not a good world representation. As one can see, this is why cartographers must be selective when choosing a projection type."

Discussion: This map posed many challenges in order get the projections to overlap correctly.  However, once this was achieved, it was relatively easy to assign each projection a color and then create a description for each in the key.  Data was obtained by using ArcGIS to create different projections of South America.  The balance of this map tends to be heavier near the bottom, but is because it is the only location that it would fit do to the requirements of the legend in the project.  With accordance to visual hierarchy, the data of the map stands out most prominently with the title and legend behind it.  The map is also has a reasonable level of clarity and legibility, granted some quality was lost during the conversion to JPEG file.

Africa Reference map

The purpose of this activity was to increase familiarity with Adobe Illustrator CS6  and apply the five essentials of map design (figure-ground, legibility, clarity, balance, visual hierarchy) by producing a reference map of Africa that showcases typical map design elements (title, legend, scale, data information, graticule, neat line, labels,  etc.

Requirements:

 - Select 5 or 6 distinct hues (colors) to color the countries of Africa.

- Include labels for each of the countries, water bodies, and physical features listed on the next page.

Discussion:

This map was created using Adobe Illustrator CS6.   Data was obtained by using an online atlas to correctly label each of the African Countries.  Five hues were applied at random to help distinguish the border lines between Countries. Major mountain ranges and rivers were also labeled, but it was difficult to arrange them so that they would be legible while also making sure they were distinguishable from the country labels.  One fix to this dilemma was writing the names of certain rivers along the curvature of the river.  This provided easy distinction to what was being labeled.  Another challenge was attempting to place long country names inside very small countries.  This problem was solved by placing the label outside the country, and by adding  a line from the label to the country.  One issue with this map is that the natural feature labels do not span the entirety of the area that the features occupy.