GEO 381/550 Cartographic Design (UB Spring 2002)

Lectures: Tuesday and Thursday: 8:00am - 9:20 am                             Fillmore 322
Laboratories: Monday: 10am -12pm or Thursday: 4:00pm -6:00 pm   GIAL
Course Website: http://www.geog.buffalo.edu/~tjoyana/Teaching/381_550/geo381_550.html
Lab Website: http://www.geog.buffalo.edu/~junyan/teaching/CartoDes/

Examples of a Cartographic Design Project

Instructor: Tonny J. Oyana
403 Wilkeson Quad  # 408
Telephone 645-2722 X44
E-mail: tjoyana@geog.buffalo.edu
Office Hours: Tuesday and Thursday 10am - 11:00am
 

                                        Teaching Assistant: Jun Yan
                                        403 Wilkeson Quad  # 408
                                        Telephone 645-2722 X44
                                        E-mail:  junyan@acsu.buffalo.edu
                                        Office Hours: Tuesday and Thursday 2- 3:00pm

Course Description
Geog 381/550 "Cartographic Design" is an advanced-level undergraduate, to graduate-level course that provides an overview of cartographic design  with a concentration on the theories, concepts and approaches within the general context of the emerging field of Geographical Information Sciences (GISci). Cartography is an essential art, science and tool for organizing, depicting and analyzing geographical information. Lectures and laboratory exercises will focus on theoretical and practical issues associated with traditional paper maps, map design and compilation process, map content and design for the Web, data quality and map generalization, thematic mapping and multi-media mapping.  This class provides students with a working knowledge of commercial software commonly used for graphic-based applications such as ArcGIS, Microsoft Excel, Microsoft FrontPage and Microsoft Visio. Students are expected to utilize their hands on experience gained from the lab exercises to further enhance their proficiency in this key graphic application software.

How to Succeed in this Course:

Students are expected to spend a minimum of 2 hours per hour of course studying and working on course related material outside of each lecture. Since this is a 3-credit course you should be spending about 9 hours a week outside of class in study. The planning of this course is based on methods and strategies that promote active learning among students and it is therefore expected of students to complete assigned readings, lab exercises, presentations, and one-to-two minute papers. Falling behind these expectations will seriously impair your ability from obtaining a passing grade in this course. Treat this course as you would treat a job and you will succeed.

Related courses: Cartographic and Geographic Visualization, Intro to GISci, Intro to GIS, and Remote Sensing offered in the Department of Geography.
Course prerequisites: Geo 120 (or instructor permission).

Useful Links

1. GeoVista Center (Leader- Geovisualization in USA)

2. Thematic Cartography and Visualization 

3. Geospatial Information

4. GIS Software and Data

Some Examples:

1. Collections of Maps and Diagrams 

Required Text and Readings
Cartography: Thematic Map Design, Fifth Edition, 1999 by Borden D. Dent, Dubuque, Iowa: William C. Brown. Copies of the text are available at the UB North Campus University Book Store.

Reading summaries: The learning approach here is to use small group discussions. The central aim of using small group discussions is to promote group learning, speaking, and critical thinking. This approach encourages students to work in teams, read research articles, practice oral communication skills, and more importantly, improve on their writing skills. A research article is assigned to a small group during the first session of this course. Each group is tasked with reviewing, critiquing, preparing a presentation to the class, and writing one group critique at least one-to-two pages in length. Following the article presentation, all the students who are not members of the presenting group are required to submit at least a one-page critique review of the assigned articles. The individual summaries are due at the beginning of the next lecture after this presentation. A grade is assigned to each summary. No make-up's or late summaries are accepted (see due dates on schedule page). Please follow these guidelines to review the assigned research articles:

1. Provide full citation, Title, Author(s), Journal/volume/page number.

2. Describe the main points, as well as the problem and conclusion.

3. Remember to critically evaluate the article pointing out the strengths and weaknesses.

4. Tips: How well are the objectives of the paper stated, and how well are they then followed throughout the article? Does the author provide appropriate references to justify the arguments made? Is the approach logical? Are the results interpreted reasonably? Are the conclusions valid? Does the abstract capture the main aspects of this article?

5. Your article must be typed using a 12-point (typeface) Arial or Times Roman font with at least 1.5-line spacing. Each paragraph must be properly indented.

Permission to use previous course materials from Emil Boasson, as well as  John B. Krygier's is greatly appreciated.

Overview of Laboratory Exercises 
The individual laboratory exercises in Geography 381/550 build step by step into a final course project. It is vital that students attend class on days that the exercises are assigned, as the instructor will lead students through the steps necessary to complete the exercise. It is also vital to complete the exercises on time, as new exercises often depend on completion of the previous exercise. There is a progressive building of knowledge and skills from the first lab and last lab. Much of your grade on individual exercises is determined by completing the exercise on time. Remember, the real key to learning map design lies in working with other people, getting feedback, and discussing specific problems as a group. Past experience demonstrates that this sort of dialog does not happen unless students attend the full lab period. Each student will keep a dated log for the course, containing documentation of all work pertaining to the lab project. This "Lab Log" will contain comments on problems and solutions you run into while working on lab exercises, information on useful resources (such as WWW sites), and any work you are asked to complete in particular exercises (for example, some exercises ask you to define terms, or review a WWW site). Your Lab Log will be formatted in HTML and placed on the WWW at the end of the semester, along with your completed course project.

Required Computer Skills
Students in Geography 381/550 need to acquire basic competence in the Windows operating system, Excel spreadsheet, ArcGIS software, and HTML. This course will provide basic instruction in all of these software applications, but students will be expected to take initiative to learn additional details about the software and to solve problems as they arise. Students should expect to spend time outside of scheduled hours to complete the course project. 
Grading Rubrics: A total of 100 percent may be earned. Your participation and effort in class will be noted in the final compilation of grades. No extra work will be accepted for extra credit. Adjustments of course grades may be made depending on general performance and statistics. For undergraduates, their labs will contribute 1 credit. And for graduate students their labs will contribute 35% of the final grade -- the breakdown described below constitutes 65% of your final grade. The percentage breakdown is as follows:

Plus-Minus grading is used in this course. The percentage of the total number of points and the corresponding letter grades are shown below:

No incompletes will be offered. All exercises must be handed in to receive a passing grade, regardless of how many points have been taken off for tardiness. Late assignments and labs will be penalized at the rate of 10% per day.

Course Outline and Schedule (Last updated - January 27, 2002)

Week 1

Tues. January 22: Course Description

Thurs. January 24: State of cartography, visualization and geographical information systems (GIS).

Week 2

Tues. January 29: Evolution of Cartographic Design

Review research article: Representation and its Relationship with Cartographic Visualization. By:
David Fairbairn, Gennady Andrienko, Natalia Andrienko, Gerd Buziek and Jason Dykes - Cartography and Geography Information Science vol. 28, no. 1 January 2001

Presentation of Research Article by Fairbairn et al. 2001 by Group 1

Group Presentation Report Due

Thur. January 31: Theoretical Basis for Cartographic Design

Review research article: The scope and conceptual content of analytical cartography: An Introduction. By: Harold Moellering - Cartography and Geographic Information Science vol. 27, no. 3 July 2000

Presentation of Research Article by Moellering 2000 by Group II 

Group Presentation Report Due

Individual Summary Due

Week 3

Tues. February 5: Perception and cognition

Individual summary Due 

Thur. February 7:  Quantitative techniques: processing geographic data

Week 4

Tues. February 12: Graphical methods for data representation in cartography

Thur. February 14:  Map Symbology and Generalization

Week 5

Tues. February 19: Typography (Lettering)

Thur. February 21: Line Symbols

Week 6

Tues. February 26: Map Design Process 

Designing Effective Bivariate Symbols: The Influence of Perceptual Grouping Processes By: Elisabeth S. Nelson - Cartography and Geographic Information Science VOLUME 27, No. 4 October 2000

Presentation of research article by Nelson 2000 by Group III. 

Group Presentation Report Due

Thur. February 28: Data Quality and Standards

Week 7

Tues. March 5: Map Elements and Production

Individual summary due  

Thursday. March 7: Color Design and Tools.

Week 8

Tues. March 12: Map Symbolization and Choropleth Maps

Thur. March 14: Mid-Term Examinations 

Week 9

Tues. March 19: Map Projections

Thur. March 21: Map Scale

Spring Break - Mon. Mar 25 - Fri. Mar 29

Week 10

Tues. April 2: Dot maps, Cartograms and proportional symbol map

Thur. April 4: Web Cartography

Review research article: Improving the Quality of Mass Produced Maps. By: Jeff Simley - Cartography and Geographic Information Science vol. 28, no.2, April 2001

Presentation of research article by Simley 2001 by Group IV

Group Presentation Report Due

Week 11

Tues. April 9: Explore possible course projects and review Labs

Individual summary due

Review research article: Symbolization of Map Projection Distortion: A Review.  By: Karen A. Mulcahy and Keith C. Clarke - Cartography and Geographic Information Science Vol. 28, no. 3, July 2001

Presentation of research article by Mulcahy and Clarke 2001 by Group V

Group Presentation Report Due

Thur. April 11: Multimedia mapping

Review research article: Walker, T., Cartwright, W. and Miller, S. 2000. An Investigation Into the Methodologies of Producing a Web-based Multimedia Atlas of Victoria, Cartography, Vol. 29, No. 2, pp. 51 - 64. 

Presentation of research article by Walker et al. 2000 by Group VI

Group Presentation Report Due

Select time for your presentation!

Week 12

Tues. April 16: Multimedia mapping

Individual summary due

Thur. April 18: The Future of Cartographic Design: Current Research Direction.

Review research article: Gangemi, A. R. and Young, F. R. (2001) Multimedia Mapping: A Special Purpose Pilot Project, Cartography, Vol. 30, No. 1. 

Individual summary due

Week 13

Tues. April 23:  Student Presentations of Lab Projects

Thur. April 25:  Student Presentations of Lab Projects

Week 14

Tues. April 30: Course Project Ready (Webpage/ folder) 

Thur. May 2:  Course Write-up Due

Friday. May 3:  Provisional Results - Coursework posted

Back to Course Page