Thursday, January 29, 2015

Module 3- Cartographic Design

This week I made a graphic depicting the public schools in Ward 7, Washington D.C. using ArcMap 10.2. Adding features to the map and utilizing multiple layers to display more than one map in the final graphic was pretty simple. The difficult part was employing the cartographic design principles. I had no idea how difficult it could be balancing colors and line sizes until I tried to do it this week. I could have spent an entire day adjusting colors to get the contrast, visual hierarchy, and figure-ground balanced right but I didn’t have that much time on my hands. I am very glad we are doing this using computer software rather than by hand because I am not sure I could draw and erase than many times.


As for the graphic itself, I struggled to find a way to place all of the items so it was appealing. I wanted to place the small map of Washington D.C. in the top left corner and the legend in the bottom left corner but overlapping features was not possible. I also do not like placing a title on the bottom of a graphic but it seemed like the best place for this particular project. I know cartographic design is one area where any practice will be beneficial.

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