EXERCISE 3 – Plot Me Beautiful

Environmental Resources 372:362
Intermediate Environmental Geomatics

One of the primary uses of maps are as communication devices. You produce them to convey information or messages. However, this means that if you aren't designing them appropriately for their users that they can be worthless, no matter how much time you out into them.

You have already learned some of the CRAFT of map production. Today we'll talk some about the ART of producing quality maps including layout and design, and how to get them printed out around here.

Cartography is the art and science of map production. In this one exercise I can only clue you in to some of the design processes that can take a lifetime to master. The following ideas can serve as a rough guide for you to consider:

R. Arnheim, "The Perception of Maps,"
American Cartographer 3 (1976): 5-10

• Make it interesting. As the map designer it is your job to make the map interesting enough, visually, to draw in viewers so that they will then receive the information contained within the map. This can include an appropriate use of color or unusual symbology. Violate convention, challenge the viewer, break a rule!

• Make it elegant. A well designed composition will exhibit some of the same qualities as a fine photograph or an exquisitely designed landscape. It should be balanced (space, detail, contrast, color, texture, etc.), have an appropriate focus of attention, and integrate its elements as a seamless singular object. Beauty shouldn't be that much to ask, should it?
• Provide background. Map users generally need some extra background information to make the most of the maps. This usually means you should consider including information like:

• Know your Audience. Provide an appropriate type and degree of information for the people who will be using your map. If you are designing a map of campus for visitors to use on a walking tour, don't include manhole covers and fireplugs.
• Make the message clear. Lots of color and insets can make the map so interesting that its message is no longer communicated. Make sure that the map includes all of the specific items of information needed (data labels, titles) and that they are clearly displayed in such as way as to be useful. Font size and color selection can be important at this point. Don’t let a zany map ruin an important message. After all…

Good map composition is harder than it sounds. You'll find out really quickly that you are always juggling interest and information to find an appropriate balance. Certainly, you'll find that fitting large amounts of information onto a single map can be very difficult. But being creative and flexible, with a willingness to experiment with layouts, will position you to create some elegant and stunning map products.

Printing is often almost as hard as digitizing. Printers can be moody. Their settings can change on a regular basis. They can work one day and not the next. Color, black and white, pen plotters, inkjets, lasers. Doesn't matter. Printing can be funny that way. But don't give up. If it doesn't work one way, rotate it, change the filename, send it from a different computer. Try something different. Don't give up.

Adding Multiple Copies of the Same Layer: In a new map, Add the States shapefile. Make all of the states a very light gray with NO outline. Add the States shapefile. Use the Layer Properties to show ONLY New Jersey, and make it dark gray. Then add the States, define it to include NY, NJ, PA, and DE, and draw the outlines of the states as dark, 2pt lines with NO shading for the states.

Customizing Your Legends: Random numbers are for losers and scientists. Draw the map of the states by population in a 7 class natural breaks monochromatic scheme. Now, go back and edit the legend labels so that they read more sensibly without altering the classes significantly.

Use The Legend to Make Your Point: Shade the map in a way that makes NJ seem like a populous state. Shade it in a way that minimizes the population. In both cases use only the population and no area normalization. The trick is to be subtle – avoid creating a single class of ALL states with populations under 20,000,000. Make sure the name of the legend is a good one, too. We are basically asking you to try to "lie with maps."

Customize the Color Ramp: Using the state population map, edit the legend so that the color ramp is something really unique like Purple to Cherry Cola.

Copy Repetitive Legends: Add the 2002 Land Cover theme for Watershed Management Area 8 (\databank\njdep2\lulc\w08lu02). Color it so that TYPE02 developed areas are red, water is blue, forest is green, and agriculture is beige. Remove everything else. Now, Add WMA9 and WMA10. For each theme, "Import" the legend from WMA8. Go to the Layout and alter the legend so that only one WMA is shown, and it reads for all 3. (If the machine gets laggy after this, turn off one or two layers to improve performance)

Provide Context: Switch to the Layout view and go to the properties for the Data Frame. Use the "Grids" tab to create a New Graticule system with both grid and labels. You can guess your way through the settings. But beware, this is often TOO much information.

Let Transparency Be Your Friend: Add WMA 8, again. Leave the old one in full color. Map the new one for its percent impervious surface, where dark gray is a higher degree of Imperviousness. Now, change the symbology so that the imperviousness determines the transparency. Could you do anything to make this look more effective?

Use a Meaningful Background: Strip down to just the WMA8 land cover. Add the USGS 250k DEM (\databank\usgs2\dem\250k\dem\nedem250k), but move it to the bottom. Change its legend so that high areas are dark and low areas are light. (Can you make it so that the scale emphasizes the areas from 0-500m?) Use the Layer Properties Display tab to make the land cover 50% transparent.

Use Internet Data: Why just use CRSSA data when you can get really unreliable stuff from "out there"? Go to ArcCatalog and add an IMS Server for http://gisdata.usgs.net. Start a new ArcMap document and add the Map Service:USGS_EDC_Elev_NED. The power is that this data mixes with CRSSA's. On top of the internet data, add the NJDOT Sussex County roads (\\databank\njdot\data_91\). Add \databank\njdep2\admin\stmun, but use the definition query to isolate out just Sparta Twp. Want to explore? Try looking at data at http://www.geographynetwork.com. More New Jersey-centric data can be found at http://njgeodata4.state.nj.us and http://njgin.aclink.org.

By next Monday, February 18th:

a. Create a 2-page black and white "handout" ( 8.5" by 11") describing a broad range of environmental conditions in the New Jersey municipality of your choice using any data available (probably mostly stuff from databank). Be sure to look at http://www.crssa.rutgers.edu/projects/databank for information about the data you can find on databank. Chances are that this will involve plenty of symbols and shades, and other tricks to make black and white work for you. Remember, the black and white printer is ljup. (There isn't much analysis, so you may need to show off more than you are used to just to prove you have done some real work this week).

b. Create a color map (8.5" by 11") of the NJ Pinelands that I could use as an "atlas". An atlas is usually pretty detailed so it can be used in the field at different sites. This means that it should have a variety of information that helps me understand lots of different features, but you can certainly choose the features. It could be a road atlas, a biophysical atlas, a recreation atlas, or some other theme that we can't dream up. You'll find plenty of useful data in the databank, but it will vary from department to department. You might want to start, however, with the NJDEP data, particularly the physiographic region boundary.

c. Create a map (8.5" by 11") built around internet-served data. This means you should use data from an internet server (e.g. the USGS or www.geographynetwork.com) as the foundation for your map. BUT, you should probably add some data from local resources AND the map layout should be your own. Like the previous parts of the assignment, you should be working hard to make this data look better than you found it. And you might impress us more if you found data that we didn't tell you about.

And remember, always give credit when using other people's data.

WARNING: These maps may be displayed in class. Do yourself proud.