Final Project: Final Version

Population Diversity: Mapping the Biracial (black & white only) Population in the Southeastern United States

After multiple topic changes and hours of data research and map design in Adobe Illustrator I have finally produced a map I am very proud of and that I consider to be my very best work.  The larger map in my graphic is a choropleth map depicting the percentage of biracial (black & white only) population by county in the Southeastern United States.  The data is very straightforward and I found there to be a very interesting distribution of the data after I mapped it.   I originally wanted to do a choropleth/proportional symbol bivariate map, but it would not have been effective to do a proportional symbol map at the county level because the counties are so small at the scale I used that it would have looked like a cluttered mess.  It is for this reason I chose to do a separate proportional symbol map showing the number of biracial people (black & white only) per state. I really spent time on my map design and tried to ensure that I produced a balanced and clean product. I found the peer review to be very instrumental in the outcome of my project. One of my many goals with this project was to step outside of my comfort zone and incorporate more creative aspects into my design. I feel like I accomplished that goal.  I've posted my final map below and have included some supplemental websites. The links include the Census data source as well as interesting articles on the biracial population and race identification.

* http://factfinder2.census.gov/faces/tableservices/jsf/pages/productview.xhtml...

* http://factfinder2.census.gov/faces/tableservices/jsf/pages/productview.xhtml...

* http://healthland.time.com/2010/12/16/passing-as-black-how-biracial-americans...

* http://newsblogs.chicagotribune.com/race/2008/08/being-biracial.html

* http://www.mixedheritagecenter.org/index.php?option=com_content&task=view...

* http://newsone.com/489592/census-forces-choice-between-black-or-biracial/ 

 

Final Map: Draft 28

Final Project Draft

Weekly Blog 11: Bivariate Map

This is an example of a bivariate map I found from the Illinois Department of Children and Family Services(DCFS).  It may be a little difficult to see the details, but it is basically showing children with incarcerated parents.  The small circles are colored to correspond to race and represent children and youth in Illinois DCFS.  The larger pie charts show travel times to the prisons broken.  It takes some time to really interpret, but it is nonetheless interesting. 

 

 

Lab 10: Bivariate Map

This is a bivariate map I did on Illustrator that combines choropleth and proportional symbol. It simultaneously shows the percentage of children living in poverty by county in North Carolina and the number of overweight 2-4 year olds in those counties.  I was surprised by the counties that had lower poverty rates and higher numbers of overweight children.  I really enjoyed mapping two variables, although it was a bit challenging at times to find the data. I tried out a couple of different things on this map, such as, using a dark background. Overall, I'm very happy with the way this map turned out and really enjoyed using color. I'm leaning towards modifying my final project to include another variable so I can do a bivariate map.

Weekly Blog 10: Isoline Map

This week I selected a shaded relief map from Tom Patterson's website http://www.shadedrelief.com.  I picked this one because I'm in awe of the amount of detail and can only imagine how much time it took to create such a beautiful map of Denali National Park, Alaska.  It is an oblique view and it nicely illustrates the mountains, glaciers and rivers/streams.  I don't think I'm ready to tackle a similar project just yet, but I can certainly appreciate it!

 

Lab 9: Isoline Map

This is an isoline map of Smerg that I did on Adobe Illustrator.  It shows the concentrations of Smerg in parts per million in Virginia and makes it easy for someone to see where the most highly concentrated areas are so they can avoid them.  Stay out of the Richmond area if you can!  It was fun to do a map on make believe data and added to the creativity.

Final Project Proposal

For my final project I plan to create a proportional symbol map of total oil production from the Middle East and North Africa using data from 2011.  I chose Middle East and North African oil production as my topic for several reasons.  First, I really like proportional symbol maps and the oil production data, because it is unstandardized, lends itself nicely to a proportional symbol map.  Moreover, I wanted to map an area other than the United States and the Middle East and North Africa fits the bill.  Lastly, I saw a couple of proportional symbol maps depicting oil production, which I felt I could improve upon. 

The target audience for this map is the general public. I can imagine it in a newspaper or magazine article on the connection between oil production and gas prices.  My vision for this map is that it is very clean and modern and easy to interpret.  The scope of the map will be regional, specifically of the countries in the Middle East and North Africa.  The data will come from the U.S. Energy Information Administration from 2011.  I have listed the site for my data below.  The site does not explicitly state the accuracy, but as it is coming from the Department of Energy I feel it is accurate.  The dataset is not very complex or large though there are some very low values and also some very high values that I hope do not cause problems.  I plan to get the necessary basemap from ArcMap.  At this point I am not sure which projection would be best for my purposes, so I will work with Professor Hallden to figure it out.

With regards to a workable and realistic timeline to produce this map I have come up with three major steps.  The first step, organization, involves getting my data into excel to make the necessary calculations so that I can ultimately make my symbols the correct size.  Also included in the first step is figuring out an optimal basemap and having it ready for the next step. The second step, map design, will involve placing the appropriately sized symbols on the map.  I have not finalized my symbol, but I am leaning towards using a geometric symbol. That is not to say I have ruled out using a mimetic symbol.  The second step will be fairly time consuming and I plan to have both the first and second steps done by November 15th.  Step three, the fun part, entails adding the finishing touches—neatline, title, legend, deciding on a color scheme, etc. This is going to be the most time consuming.  I plan to have step three completed by the time I return from Thanksgiving Break.  That will ensure I have it completed for the critique.  I think my biggest challenges will be adjusting the symbol so that my symbol for my largest value isn’t gigantic.  Also I’m going to really push myself to be creative in my layout and other design elements, which is not the easiest for me to do.

I have posted below the images of similar maps I used for ideas.  I think I can create a better version of the first two.  Also I included a third image of a map using oil barrels as the proportional symbol.   I’m going to use the last one as inspiration and perhaps incorporate certain elements into my design.

Data Link:
http://www.eia.gov/cfapps/ipdbproject/iedindex3.cfm?tid=5&pid=5

7&aid=1&cid=AG,BA,EG,IR,IZ,IS,JO,KU,LE,LY,MO,MU,QA,SA,SU,SY,TS,TC,YM,&syid=2008&eyid=2011&unit=TBPD

 

 

Lab 8: Color Choropleth Map

Normal 0 false false false EN-US X-NONE X-NONE MicrosoftInternetExplorer4

This is an improved color version of the choropleth map I made for Lab 5.  I went with my natural breaks classification because I felt it did a better job representing the data.  Overall I'm very pleased with the outcome.  I used the colorbrewer web application to pick colors that would create a smooth progression for my five classes.  In the end I chose a multihued scheme and think it works nicely.  The biggest difference between my print version and my web optimized version is that in the print version it's a little difficult to differentiate the last two classes.  While it is possible, I can see how someone might have trouble.  The web optimized version is very clear though.  I think all of the other colors in my print version were very close to the web version which I expected because I used a scheme that was good for both the web and print.  I wouldn't make any modifications to my web optimized version.

Weekly Blog 9: Election Map

 

This 2012 election map, co-created by Google and CNN, shows the amount the campaigns spent in the "battle-ground states" during this election.  In addition to viewing campaign spending, users can view how much money each candidate raised per state and how many times each candidate visited these battleground states during the campaign.  What sets this map apart from other 2012 election maps is its post-election utility.  Other maps have immediate use because they show projections, or how pollsters think Americans will vote on Election Day; these projection-maps will have very little use once the election is over.  This map, however, will be very useful to analysts after the election, because they can use it to determine the relation, if any, between campaign spending, fundraising, candidate visits and the election outcome. The interactive feature is a very nice feature to have and explore.  In terms of color I think this map does a good job with color. The map designer used two blues and two reds one blue and one red were lighter to express states that were leaning democrat or republican verses ones that were thought to be solid democrat or republican.  The gray is neutral and represents the states that are still undecided. In my opinion the colors appear even and I cannot detect any color bias.  The red, blue and grey seems to be a standard political color scheme even though I saw some maps that used yellow in place of gray. 

http://www.cnn.com/election/2012/campaign-tracker/?hpt=po_r1

 

Weekly Blog 8: Dot Density Map

This is a dot density map of population for the area around Monticello. I found this map when I was doing an assignment for another class. I think this map does an excellent job of showing population density. The dots are very small and one can really see the pattern. It has a very smooth look to it. Also I like how the map has an inset of the state of Virgina and outlines the area being mapped so you can see it in context. 

http://www.tjpdc.org/mapping/singleMap.asp?mapID=8

Lab 7: Dot Density Map

Here is my dot density map I crafted in Illustrator depicting the births in West Virginia in 2000. So far this has been my least favorite map to do for two reasons. First, it was terribly time consuming and second it was hard for me to decide where to place my dots. I'm sure if I had more background and knowledge about West Virginia it would have been a little easier to know where to place the dots and let them coalesce.     

 

Weekly Blog 7: Proportional Symbol Map

This is a proportional symbol map from the February 2007 issue of National Geographic Magazine. They used a typical circle as the symbol, but what makes this map interesting is the data it’s mapping. It separately maps both male and female singles. I like that the map supplements the symbols with text that highlights that the largest single male population is located on the west coast while the largest single female population is located on the east coast. In general, there are more single women on the eastern half of the United States and more single men on the western half of the United States.

Lab 6: Proportional Symbol Map

For this map I used Adobe Illustrator to map the number of goat farms per county in Maryland for 2007. The data is based off the U.S. Department of Agricultures Census of Agriculture in 2007. It was neat to be able to design my own mimetic symbol. Overall, I think it turned out well.

Lab 5: Grayscale Choropleth Maps

Here is a series of choropleth maps I designed in Adobe Illustrator showing the percent of vacant housing units in the United States according to the 2011 American Community Survey by the U.S. Census Bureau. Both maps portray the same data only one is classified by natural breaks and the other is classified by equal interval. You can look at the map classed by natural breaks and quickly see the states with the greatest housing unit vacancies are on the east coast. The map seems to be more evenly distributed with each class having almost equal representation of states with exception of the last class. The map with an equal interval class scheme has more states in the lower classes and fewer states in the last 2 classes. When you look at the equal interval classed map you also notice that the greatest vacancies are located on the east coast. Overall the difference in class schemes doesn’t make a huge difference as it doesn’t leave any class without data. However, I prefer the map classed by natural breaks because I feel like it does a better job highlighting the differences.     

See the full gallery on Posterous

Weekly Blog 6: Choropleth Map

I found this set of maps that shows the distribution of dairy cattle, beef cattle, pigs and poultry in the European Union. I liked that instead of trying to map everything on one map they made a series of the same map where each map is dedicated to a specific type of livestock.  It allows the viewer to easily see that cattle production is more prevelant in The Netherlands and Belgium.  However, there are higher densities of pig farming in Denmark, Germany, The Netherlands, Belgium and Spain.

http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0377840111001775

Weekly Blog 5: Flickr Map

This is a children's puzzle map of the United States that I found on Flickr. I thought it was pretty cool.  It seems to do an okay job representing the sizes of countries and continents.  

Lab 4: Creating Boundary Files for Illustrator and Making a Map

For this map I used ArcGIS to get state and county boundary files for Virginia, Maryland and the District of Columbia which I then used in Illustrator to make a unique map. I liked being able to decide which font to use and where to place the labels etc., but it was sometimes frustrating to get things exactly the way I wanted. Also, I was able to experience first hand the issues that come with map making, for example, where to place the label for the District of Columbia. 

Weekly Blog 4: Typography

This is I map I found of the Mount Vernon campus of George Washington University. I found it to be very eye-catching and thought it used different fonts and typography very nicely. The title is a very bold and clean font that grabs your attention. The campus roads and buildings are labeled in a modern, sans serif font while the main roads leading onto campus are in all capital letters in a serif font.  

http://leagueathletics.com/FacilitiesPrint.asp?org=wawsl.org

 

Lab 3: Typography

For this weeks lab assignment the focus is on typography. I was given a National Park Service map of Harper's Ferry National Park in West Virginia and was tasked with replicating the text labels with the use of Illustrator. Evaluation of my map will be based on how closely I am able to mimic the National Park Service map. I certainly have a new appreciation for type and cartographers and the work they do. While this was not a technically difficult task it was very time consumming to get my map to match the one belonging to the National Park Service. Admittedly, my map is not an exact replica, but it's pretty darn close and I'm very proud of it.

Weekly Blog 3: Projection

http://maps.nationalgeographic.com/maps/print-collection/world-map-executive....

This National Geographic map showcases the Winkle Tripel projection. According to Wikipedia the Winkle Tripel projection is a modified azimuthal projection by Oswald Winkel that does its best to minimize area, direction and distance distortion. This is most easily seen near the poles. In recent years this projection has replaced the National Geographic's use of the Robinson projection for World Maps.

I picked this map because I really like looking at world maps and I thought this one had a nice look and good use of color. I also liked the four insets found in each of the cornors of the map. The top two insets use an Azimuthal Equidistant projection showing the North and South Polar Regions.  The bottom two insets use an Interrupted Goode Homolosine projection to show world vegetation and land use, and world population density.

Lab 2: Mollweide Graticule

Here I used Adobe Illustrator to create the graticule for a Mollweide projection.  My customer, a publishing house, is going to be using it for a series of books on the planets of our solar system. The Mollweide projection is a pseudo cylindrical equal-area projection that will work very nicely for their purposes.

Weekly Blog 2: World Map

http://www.metskers.com/22764/232851/Kids-Maps/Childrens-Illustrated-Map-of-t...

I picked this map because I loved how it was educational and whimsical. The illustrations are fun and I believe they entice children to take an interest in learning about geography and the world. 

Lab 1: Representations of the Earth

Weekly Blog 1: Map

This is a topographic map depicting a small part of the Minnesota Boundary Waters. I chose it because I took a week long canoe trip to the Boundary Waters and used a very similar topographic map to navigate our route. I like all the details and that it is in color.