Brian's Blog

Own Your Map

2012-01-26T14:44:00.000-08:00

This is Week 2 lab assignment "Own Your Map"

                                                       Process Summary Description

1) Copied OwnYourMap.zip from the R:\ drive to S:\4043 Intro2GIS\Ownyourmap and extracted the files.
2) Started ArcMap opened the file OwnYourMap.mxd from its location on the S:\ drive.
    A map of Florida opens with the layers cities_feb04 and cntbnd appearing on the left side table of   contents.
3) Went to File on the menu bar, selected Page and Print Setup, and adusted to a landscape
    orientation and click Ok.
4) Clicked Insert, selected Neatline, and chose the double line style with a gap of 10.
5) Right clicked on the map, selected Properties, selected Size and Position tab and chose a size of
    10 by 7.5 inches, click Ok. Next I right click on the frame, clicked Align, align to margins, click Ok,
    Right click and align, align to center. Click OK. Right click one more time on the frame,select
   Align then Align to Vertical Center,then OK.
6) Click on Insert, then Title, and I typed a title of The Cities of Florida. Right click, the text box
    Select Properties, and I selected the Papyrus font with a size 24 and character spacing 3.
7) Next was to insert a legend. Click on Insert, Legend. Keep clicking Next until the wizard closes.
    Right click on the legend, select Properties, and select the Frame tab. I selected no border with
    a drop shadow with a color of sienna. Offset 10 in the X and 5 in the Y.
8) With the properties box still open, select the Legend tab, I unselected the checkbox Show, so the
     word "Legend" would not appear in my legend.
9) Adding a north arrow was next. Click Insert, North Arrow and I selected North 3, then click OK.
10) Click Insert again, select Scale Bar, and I selected scale bar 1, click Ok.
11) With all the inserts of legend, north arrow, scale bar, I would drag to the location on the map I
      Wanted them, and adjusted their sizes.
12) Click Insert and select, Text, and typed my name, date, and data source.
13) Saved the map, click on File, export, and exported as a jpeg to to S:\4043 Intro2GIS\Ownyourmap

GIS4043 Lab Assignment

2012-01-19T19:13:00.000-08:00

This was our first lab assignment for the Intro to GIS. Creating our first map.

Process for building World Population Map

Copied from R:\Intro2GIS\OverviewArcGIS.zip to my S:\ drive and unzipped the files to S:\OverviewArcGIS\. These were the 10 files needed to create the layers for the world population map. Five shape files for the world countries and five shape files for the cities.

Started ArcMap from the edesktop, and once ArcMap finished loading, I clicked on the Add Data button on the toolbar, selected add data from the drop down menu and browsed to my S:\ drive and found World_Countries.shp and click add.

Next selected Add Data again, and repeated the process as step 2, except selected Cities.shp and click add.

With World_Countries and Cities in my table of contents, I clicked on the small symbol under the Cities layer, and a symbol selector menu appeared. I selected a black square and adjusted to a size 2 for the symbol, then clicked OK.

Next, I right click on the World_Countries layer, selected properties and then selected the symbology tab. Clicked on quantities on the left column (Show) in the layer properties box, and select graduated colors. In the Fields box drop down menu choose POP2007, and changed the Classes to 7, meaning 7 different color groups for each population class. In the Color Ramp drop down, I selected the green to blue transition colors, then clicked OK.

Next I right clicked on the word Layers in the table of contents, select properties, then clicked on the Frame tab, and on the drop down menu under Background, select the blue color to change the background color. Then click OK.

Now from the menu bar, select View, then select Layout View. Also go to File on the menu bar, select Page and Print Setup, and select Landscape, then OK.

Also from the menu bar, select Insert, and click on North Arrow, and I selected the simple black arrow, and I placed it to the lower left of my world map just above Antarctica. On the same Insert, I clicked on Scale Bar, chose Scale Line 1, clicked Properties, the change the units to kilometers, dragging it to the lower left of the map. Click on Insert again, click Text to insert the title, World Population 2007, then Insert and again to add the legend, 1 column with World Countries and Cites in the legend.

Next, click File, Save As, and saved the map file as World_Map.mxd. The mxd extension, tells me that this is an ArcMap document. After saving, click on File, Export Map, and export it as a jpeg file.

Thematic Cartography Lab GIS 3015 Assignment 1

2012-01-17T12:15:00.000-08:00

This map is of the world shipping lanes and is a bit confusing on what is this map is trying to convey.
It is showing the travel time to major cities along with the shipping lanes. It does not show scale or legend, or the intent of the map. I find it vague and uninteresting.

I really liked this map, because instantly I was drawn into its message. It is showing the active volcanos of North America, with the 3d image of each location. Also shown is the elevation and scale. This was and extremely attractive map, simple to navigate and understand while giving the reader/viewer all the important information.

2012-01-09T17:32:00.000-08:00