Maps and the Geospatial Revolution

Lesson 5 – Lecture 1

Anthony C. Robinson, Ph.D Lead Faculty for Online Geospatial Education John A. Dutton e-Education Institute Assistant Director, GeoVISTA Center Department of Geography The Pennsylvania State University

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Making Great Maps

• Cartography is the art and science of making maps

• Maps are always simplifications of reality

– Simplification is what makes maps helpful when we need to make a decision, explain patterns, or find a bucket of fried chicken

• Maps are designed by people (who have intentions)

so we have to map responsibly

Making Great Maps

From: Making Maps: A Visual Guide to Map Design for GIS by John Krygier and Denis Wood - makingmaps.owu.edu

Three Key Questions • Who wants a map?

– Is it 10 experts, or 20,000+ in a MOOC?

• Where will it be seen?

– On a small piece of paper, or in a web map?

• What is its purpose?

– To explain how my town has changed over time, or to help

someone plan a pub crawl?

• Each of these questions deserves a well-thought answer before mapmaking begins

Layout Design

• One of the first steps in mapmaking is to develop a balanced layout

• Map(s), title, legend, scale bar, source text, etc… all need to be positioned and sized relative to one another

• Goal is to shape this general layout design to match the answers to three design questions

Layout Design

From: Designing Better Maps: A Guide for GIS Users by Cynthia A. Brewer - http://tinyurl.com/kdo25ze

Layout Design

From: Designing Better Maps: A Guide for GIS Users by Cynthia A. Brewer - http://tinyurl.com/kdo25ze

Symbolization

• Simplifying reality requires Cartographers to use symbols to represent features

• Points, lines, and polygons can be graphically manipulated to explain data

• Symbolization can emphasize a visual connection to a real feature, or can be very abstract

Point Symbols

Proportional / Graduated Symbols

Multivariate Symbols

Maps and the Geospatial Revolution www.coursera.org/course/maps Twitter @MapRevolution Online Geospatial Education @ Penn State www.pennstategis.com

This content is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 3.0 Unported License