• EXERCISE 3 – Plot Me Beautiful

    Environmental Resources 372:362
    Intermediate Environmental Geomatics

    Due Monday, February 16

    Maps are essentially 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.

    Map Design 101

    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:

    "Just as some realistically painted cows are full of life while others are deadly mechanical records, so some faithful maps are alive while others leave us untouched."
    R. Arnheim, "The Perception of Maps,"
    American Cartographer 3 (1976): 5-10

    Dave's First Rule of Map Design

    "Always break the rules."

    Dave's Second Rule of Map Design

    "Cheaters never win."

    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.

    Dave's First Rule of Printing

    "Expect printing problems at all times." 

    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.

    Dave's Second Rule of Printing

    "The printer will break on the weekend before the assignment/project is due."

    Stupid Map Tricks

    Adding Multiple Copies of the Same Layer: This is useful if we want to emphasize one part of a layer, but still provide context using other aspects. For example, if we’re interested in New Jersey, but we want to show it in the context of the region and the US we could use this trick.

    1. In a new map, add the states shapefile (…ClassWork\avdata\usa). Make all of the states a very light gray with NO outline.
    2. Add the states shapefile again. Use the Layer Properties to show ONLY New Jersey, and make it dark gray.
    3. Then add the states for the third time, 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 2003 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. Alternatively, pick breaks that are near the natural breaks and change the data classes.

    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: ArcMap provides a lot of color options, but sometimes we need something different. Using the state population map, edit the color ramp so it’s something really unique like Purple to Cherry Cola. To change the color ramp, right-click on the color ramp in the Symbology tab and select Properties. You can also edit each class individually in the TOC after you’ve applied the color ramp.

    Copy Repetitive Legends: If we have the same data for different areas in individual layers, we can use the same color scheme for each area without having to manually set the colors for each layer. This is a huge time-saver and ensures that your map colors are uniform!

    1. Open a new ArcMap document and add the 2002 Land Cover theme for Watershed Management Area 8 (\\ad-rsc\data\databank\njdep2\lulc\02_update\w08lu02).
    2. Change the symbology so that TYPE02 developed areas are red, water is blue, forest is green, and agriculture is beige. Remove everything else and deselect all other values. Click OK.
    3. Add WMA9 (…njdep2\lulc\02_update\w09lu02) and WMA10 (w10lu02). In the Symbology tab of each layer’s Properties, "Import" the legend from WMA8. Now all the WMA should share the same color scheme and legend.
    4. Go to the Layout, add a legend, and alter it so that only one WMA is shown in the legend. (If the machine gets slow after this, turn off one or two layers to improve performance.) Because all of the layers share the same color scheme and categories, we can use only one layer in the legend to prevent repetitiveness.

    Provide Context: We can add a graticule (coordinate system grid) to our map to give some location context. This is especially useful if your map shows a small area. But beware, this is often TOO much information.

    1. In the Layout view, go to the Properties for the Data Frame.
    2. Use the Grids tab to create a New Graticule with both a grid and labels. You can guess your way through the settings. Note that you can change the tic and grid intervals to make the context more or less detailed. To remove a grid, deactivate it in the Grids tab of the Properties window.
      3.

    Let Transparency Be Your Friend: Transparency can be used to emphasize certain aspects or to show two overlapping datasets at the same time. This is especially useful for showing a qualitative spatial relationship.

    1. Remove the land use layers for WMAs 9 and 10. Add land cover data for WMA 8 (w08lu02) 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. If you aren’t sure which field to use, check the metadata in ArcCatalog. Lastly, format the labels so that the percentages are whole numbers. (Hint: look for Format Labels in the Symbology tab).
      2.
    2. Now, change the symbology so that the imperviousness determines the transparency. To do this, in the Symbology tab select Features | Single Symbol. Change the symbol to white, then click the Advanced button and select Transparency.
      3.

    Use a Meaningful Background: Often an aerial photo or digital elevation model (DEM) provide a useful (and pretty!) background for your map. But, once again, beware a ‘cluttered’ map, particularly when using imagery as background.

    1. Add the USGS 250k DEM (\\ad-rsc\data\databank\usgs2\dem\250k\dem\nedem250k), but move it to the bottom of the TOC.
    2. Change its legend so that high areas are dark and low areas are light. Make the land use layer 50% transparent (look in Layer Properties | Display)
      3.
    3. Now change the symbology so that the scale emphasizes the areas from 0-500m. (Hint: Use Classified symbology and exclude data that are >500.) This wouldn’t be a good color scheme for a map of the entire state, but it makes a nice background for WMA 8.

    Use Internet Data: Why just use CRSSA data when you can get really unreliable stuff from "out there"? Obviously, not everything is unreliable, but be sure you’re getting the data from a known source that provides metadata detailing accuracy and methodology.

    1. Go to ArcCatalog and add an IMS Server for http://gisdata.usgs.net. To do this, go to GIS Servers and double-click Add ArcIMS Server in the ArcCatalog TOC.
    2. Start a new ArcMap document (after saving your work from the previous steps) and add the Map Service:USGS_EDC_Elev_NED, which shows the national elevation dataset for the US. Click the Add Data button, select GIS Servers from the drop-down menu and find USGS_EDC_Elev_NED within gisdata.usgs.net. Click Add. The power is that this data can be mixed with CRSSA's.
      Connect to USGS Data Server
      3.
    3. On top of the internet data, add the most recent NJDOT roadway network (\\ad-rsc\data\databank\njdot\RoadwayNetwork_data_08\Roads_2008.mdb or .shp). Add \databank\njdep2\admin\stmun, but use the definition query to isolate out just Sparta Twp so that it’s hollow with a 2 pt border.
      4.
    4. Want to explore? Try looking at data (in a web browser, not ArcCatalog) at www.geographynetwork.com. More New Jersey-centric data can be found at https://njgin.state.nj.us/ and http://njgin.aclink.org. If you download data, save it to your personal folder in the intgeo/StudentWork directory.

    Share Your Data in Google Earth: Google Earth provides a great new way to share data and make it interactive. ArcGIS now includes an entire toolbox for Google Earth, allowing us to export our GIS data and display it in GE (or Google Maps if you have a website). Also, you can share data in GE without having to add background layers such as roads, administrative boundaries, or water bodies.

    1. Open your WMA8 land cover mxd file, and then open ArcToolbox. Make sure that your map looks exactly like you want it to, including layer names and labels in the TOC. Turn off the DEM layer. Rename your data frame from plain old ‘Layer’ to ‘Water Management Area 8’. Save your map.
      2.
    2. In ArcToolbox, go to Conversion Tools | To KML | Map to KML. Select your mxd as the map document, ‘Water Management Area 8’ as the data frame, call the output file ‘WMA8 02 LU.kmz’, and put 300000 as the map output scale. Under Data Content Properties, check ‘Convert Vector to Raster’. In the future when you’re working with other data, choose the map output scale based on the scale that you want the data to be viewed at (look for the scale toolbar in ArcMap).
      Convert to KMZ
      3.
    3. Click OK. In Google Earth, go to File | Open and select the kmz file you just created. Ta da! You can turn on the legend and edit the transparency of the layer(s) by right-clicking and selecting Properties.
      Viewing GIS Data in Google Earth
      4.

    Dave's Third Rule of Map Design

    "Tricks can’t hide bad taste"
    or
    "Even the prettiest bandage won’t help your broken leg."     

    Assignment 3
    WARNING: These maps may be displayed in class. Do yourself proud.

    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 1-page 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. It could be a road atlas, a biophysical atlas, a recreation atlas, or any other theme that you can dream up. It should include a variety of information about many different features. 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.

    d. Create a Google Earth kml file showing your data layers from question c. Your kml file should only include a few layers that are interesting to navigate. Don’t include layers such as roads and water bodies, since these are already in GE—we’re primarily interested in the ‘new’ data that can’t be found in Google Earth. Turn in the location of your kml file, including its name (for example, \\ad-rsc\data\teach\intgeo\studentwork\YourNetID\MyEx3KMLFile.kml)

    And remember, always give credit when using other people's data. The assignment is due on Monday, February 16, at the beginning of lab.