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Computer Cartography - Week 4 Typography

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This week's map was all about labeling. I had to figure out How to label various features without over crowding the map and ensuring the labels made sense. I used ArcGIS to make the map and then I used Adobe Illustrator to make the labels. The whole time I had my textbook with me so I could reference how to label a map correctly. I made the map in ArcGIS and then exported it to Adobe Illustrator, only to find out that I had not zoomed in on Marathon enough. I made the change and then exported again. Then the labeling fun started. The first few labels were fine: the fit nicely over the area that they described. Then the keys got smaller, so I added leading lines to show what each label was labeling. Then the cities and the areas of interest were added. Those were points so I had to add leading lines. I only realized after everything was labeled and I had exported the map that I used the leading line incorrectly; I had the lines touching the points that the label described. I went
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Cartography: Week 3 Intro to Illustrator

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This week we started working with adobe illustrator to edit maps that were made in ArcGIS. We were making a map of Florida for a children's encyclopedia. The whole process wasn't too bad, I spent most of my time just working with the tools and figuring out where I needed to click. Things got much easier when I realized I could just select things from the layers window. I added a few educational pictures: the seal of Florida, the state bird and the state flower. Using Illustrator to make a final product was much easier then trying to finalize things in ArcGIS. I think the product came out looking much more polished than what I usually make in ArcGIS. It will take some time to get use to the tools, but so far I like the program. Here is the map that I made.
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Computer Cartography - Week 2 Map Evaluations

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This week we took a look at different maps through the lens of 20 principles for making maps. After looking at some poorly made maps, I realized many of those look somewhat like the maps I've made. I looked at two maps a good one and one that has some room for improvement. Here is the good map: This is a map of the Watershed Above the Manasquan Water Supply system Intake. This is a well made map because it easily expresses where the watershed is, where the farms are, and where water is taken in from. The symbols are easy to see and differentiate. The map has a nice layout with the smaller reference map above the legend and a very nice scale with some easy whole numbers to use. Overall this is a great map. Here is a map that has some room for improvement: This map shows the various ways you can travel in... London , I think? This is a large map. I’m sure if this was blown up and put on a wall it would be much easier to see. Overall I think there is a bunch of unnece
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Computer Cartography - Week 1 Introductions

Hey everyone, I'm Eddie Grammer. I am in Ocoee, Florida which is right next to Orlando, Florida. I have a Bachelors in Biology from UCF and I currently work in a research and development lab for Coke-a-Cola (not pictured in the map tour). I am a part time student now and I am loving it! There is way less stress this way, and I actually have time for hobbies like playing video games, going to theme parks, and visiting family who just so happen to live near a beach.  I enrolled in this program to make myself more employable. At UCF I had a few classes where they showed us what we could do with GIS technology and it was really interesting, so I figured "why not learn more about it?" In the end, I hope to get a position with the government and preferably doing something that involves the environment, but I am pretty open minded. I really enjoyed the Intro to GIS course last semester and I am looking forward to learning more! Here is a link to my Map Tour:  http://arcg.
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Transmission Lines and Finals!

This was a great couple weeks of flexing my GIS muscles! We were working on our final project where I had to investigate the impacts that a transmission line would have in a predetermined area. We were focused on avoiding schools, limiting exposure to environmentally sensitive areas, avoiding as many houses as possible, and figuring a rough estimate of cost. I used a 400 foot buffer on the proposed area for the line to see what lands and buildings might be impacted by the line. I tried my best to use as many tricks that I learned this semester, and I found out that I still have a long way to go. I tried my best to use ArcPy... I wound up just selecting the tools and using them the long way. In the couple weeks off I'm going to check out what codeacademy has to offer for python programming. I also tried using a model to do some of the more repetitive things, but I realized I wasn't quite sure what I wanted done. While it might have saved me some time to use one of those, I had
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Georeferencing

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This week was all about Georeferencing and using ArcScene. Georeferencing was really cool because you were basically drawing on the map. You trace the outline of a building or just trace a road and then: boom! you have made a new part of the map. I also learned how to edit an attribute table in ArcMap. These were some of my burning questions from the start. like if I was working as a database manager for a city and a new building was built, how exactly would I add it on? Now I know at least one way, and I am sure that there are more ways that I will learn about during some other classes. ArcScene was interesting but I found it hard for it to be informative on it's own. I could see using it in the future to make some sort of graphic aide for a presentation. Here are some of the maps I made this week:
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Geocoding and Models

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This week was all about geocoding and making models in ArcGIS. Patience was also a big part of this week's work. All in all the process was not too hard, just parts of the geocoding was tedious. All of those parts revolved around the address locator not locating an address. Having to look up the locations on another map and try your best to find that same spot on your own map took quite awhile for some of the locations. On the other hand, making a model took out a ton of the tedious parts of making a map. All the steps that I would normally do were right there in one window and after setting it all up it just took one click and everything was taken care of. I do like working out all of the steps to see my progress, but it was nice not to have to keep up with all of the intermediate data, as the model like to call it, that I usually make. In the long run the model made things more simple, however I still really like fiddling around with the map data and seeing the changes I am mak
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