I really like sketckup. Don’t get me wrong, it definitely has its trials and tribulations. I would get VERY frustrated at points trying to deal with the different aspects and dimensions of the program. I’d draw this fantastic line and then realize it was going through several dimensions. If I could develop the program better, I would add the ability to turn off certain dimensions. It would get so frustrating trying to place an object in a room and have it half in the earth, half above the floor. But beyond that it was so much fun designing a blueprint for a house and then raising the structure. It was really neat designing the outside of the house and I definitely played more with that because it was easier to see. If I did this again, I would draw the blueprint first, input the furniture, and then raise the walls. It is so difficult to place objects correctly and all that jazz. I got a bed in the bedroom. It took me an entire class period to put in the right position! Google Sketchup is a program where you can literally go crazy – designing and trying to work with the different dimensions. For now, I’m going to do the kmz file and upload it to my page and then later I will work on animating it and showing off the different viewpoints for final presenation on the website.

Overall I had a great experience with Google Sketchup and creating the KMZ file and using the Google Gadget to post it to the web. I think the training videos were definitely helpful and I went back to them several times to figure out details. Once I figured out I had to actually input the Google Gadget into the HTML script, that portion went easier!

The process to getting to animate was filled with lots of ups and downs and a ton of redo’s. I found that I act very quickly and don’t see my mistakes until I’m cutting along the neatline in GIMP and then I have to go back and touch up each of the maps in ArcGIS again and then save and then open them in GIMP. I definitely need to slow down a touch! But, I think each time the maps got a bit better and I figured out different tricks along the way.

I’m getting along much better with GIMP now. It used to be a pain with all of its different commands, but I’ve figured out several shortcuts. “Z” + click is a zoom and then shift + “C” is a shortcut to the clipper.

I also enjoyed working with the Ulead GIF animator. It was much simpler than I thought possible and once I worked through the mapping technicalities it was a cinch to load up each map and animate and then post them on the website. My next small project will to organize the maps better on the page. I don’t like having to scroll and watch 4 maps at the same time but I haven’t quite figured out how I want to organize it. I played a little bit with the tweening but didn’t think it was exactly what was needed for the web page – too much movement. I would like to create a photo slideshow of Maine for one of the pages though. Or a slow moving one for the front page.

One thing I really played around with was speed. I think .5 seconds ended up being a good choice – not too fast that you can’t see the changes but not so slow that you’re bored with the picture before the next one shows up.

Population Change 1900 to 1910

Population Change 1910 to 1920

Population Change 1920 to 1930

Population Change 1930 to 1940

Population Change 1940 to 1950

Population Change 1950 to 1960

Population Change 1960 to 1970

Population Change 1970 to 1980

Population Change 1980 to 1990

Population Change 1990 to 2000

Population Change 2000 to 2008

Once I finished all of those corrections, it was time to move on to the graduated symbol maps. I chose to reclassify the data (total numbers not percent change this time) into 7 groups. I started with the 1920-1930 grouping which had the largest distribution of data and classified the symbols from there. I made the dots as big as I could so that the viewer could easily see them and scaled them to each other so there was a difference between each value. Here are the results:

Population 1900 to 1910

Population 1910 to 1920

Population 1920 to 1930

Population 1930 to 1940

Population 1940 to 1950

Population 1950 to 1960

Population 1960 to 1970

Population 1980 to 1990

Population 1990 to 2000

Population 2000 to 2008

After I finished graduated symbol, it was time to move on to proportional symbol. I have 5 categories of circles that represent the 5 basic breakdowns of the data. Here are the results:

Population 1900 to 1910

Population 1910 to 1920

Population 1920 to 1930

Population 1930 to 1940

Population 1940 to 1950

Population 1960 to 1970

Population 1970 to 1980

Population 1980 to 1990

Population 1990 to 2000

Population 2000 to 2008

The final portion of these maps was to create dot density representations of the population. I chose each dot to represent 1000 people so that they were just beginning to coalesce on the map. Here are the final results!

Population 1900 to 1910

Population 1910 to 1920

Population 1930 to 1940

Population 1940 to 1950

Population 1950 to 1960

Population 1960 to 1970

Population 1970 to 1980

Population 1980 to 1990

Population 1990 to 2000

Population 2000 to 2008

Population Change in Maine 1900-1910

Population Change in Maine 1910-1920

Population Change in Maine 1920-1930

Population Change in Maine 1930-1940

Population Change in Maine 1940-1950

Population Change in Maine 1950-1960

Population Change in Maine 1960-1970

Population Change in Maine 1970-1980

Population Change in Maine 1980-1990

Population Change in Maine 1990-2000

Population Change in Maine 2000-2008

In comparing all the maps…well it’s difficult. Even though they all have the sameclassification scheme and number of classes (5), they are all different. One set of data will have a percent change of -15 as its lowest, but another will have -4. It’s difficult to compare all of this data together. However, I can see patterns in which counties were losing people over a period of time and which were gaining – that at least is consistent.

On the “superbly interesting” portion of the lab, we looked at 3 different types of maps for 2000-2008 population change data. I changed the number of classes to 6 and looked at a natural breaks map, a quantiles map, and an equal interval map. It is a bit easier to compare these maps because the population change numbers are all the same. I think that the quantile map shows the best distribution of data – all of the classes are used, unlike in the equal interval map. The natural breaks map is not as well distributed and pleasing to the eye. It would probably work, but I don’t think the data is conveyed as well.

Maine: 2000-2008 population change - Natural Breaks (6 classes)

Maine: 2000-2008 population change - Quantiles (6 classes)

Maine: 2000-2008 population change - Equal Interval (6 classes)

Alright so the ultimate goal of this lab was to create an overhead picture, that picture with the DRG overlaid on it, a 3D oblique view, and then a flyover animation. Plus 2 more pages to our web site. Not bad you say? Try it. I dare you.

The first part included downloading the 3DEM software (check it out @ http://freegeographytools.com/category/3dem). Then we had to go to the USGS website (http://seamless.usgs.gov/website/seamless/viewer.htm – make sure you allow pop ups or it won’t load correctly) and take the coordinates of our special topographic spot and find them on this map. I picked the Somes Sound in Maine because it is considered a fjard. This is a bit different from the Norwegian fjords. A fjard is a smaller drowned glacial embayment. It’s quite gorgeous even though the topographic maps don’t make it look as cool.

Somes Sound (and surround area), Maine - DEM image

Once I got the USGS data (located, modified, and downloaded) I opened it up in the 3DEM program where we were able to play around with it. First we mixed the colors a bit which was somewhat frustrating. It’s not like ArcGIS where you can choose 2 colors and it creates a range between them for you. You had to choose each elevated level of color, so I ended up changing the water color a bit but left the rest.

Somes Sound (and surrounding area), Maine - DRG overlay

The next step was to overlay the DRG image which we downloaded along with the DEM tiff data. The result was…interesting. Reminded me of when we go camping or the sort of maps you would find on a boat.

The next part was to create a 3D view of the area. That was sweet. Somehow I got a really good view of the Sound and then the mountains right next to it and then rotated it to get the same angle I would use for my flyover.

Somes Sound (and surrounding area), Maine - 3D scene

The final step was to create the flyover animation. This wasn’t too bad once I got the right altitude, angle of elevation, colors, direction, box size…ahh! Several hundred clicks later, I got an animation. I’m still not quite happy with it because I had a really good angle the first day I was working on it but I can’t get the same side a second time. I will probably attempt to play with it some more, but here’s what it looks like at the moment : http://www.personal.kent.edu/~mpetros1/3DGeoVis.html. I tried to upload the video here but it costs moolah. So you get to practice those old fashioned clicking skills.

Flyover done, I then created 2 new web pages accessible from my index page (http://www.personal.kent.edu/~mpetros1). They include all the images and the animation that I have posted here for your ultimate convenience!

My experience with the data server was mixed. It was difficult to really narrow down the place I wanted and to see what map was going to pop up without downloading everything first. And then today, I was going to change my place to Mount Katahdin because it looked really neat in Google Earth, but I couldn’t download the 2 files I needed. I went back to the Somes Sound which was fine, but grrr!

I liked using the 3DEM software but it was frustrating that you couldn’t pull up a previously saved area you had been working with. I could only pull up the original file. It was excellent practice with azimuth and degrees and all that jazz, for sure!

DEM: is just a digital elevation model (the first image here) and shows the terrain of a specified place
DRG: is a digital raster graphic which is the topographic map image of the place in the DEM from a server like USGS
Hillshading: is used to make the image look like the correct hill or crater that you are trying to show. Some of the images fellow classmates used looked like craters, so they adjusted the lighting so that it looked more like a mountain.

The first part of the lab wasn’t bad. We just added the US Counties file and figured out how to isolate our state (Maine). Then for “xtra-phun” we isolated 3 other states (Colorado, New York, and Alaska) and saved them as one layer file. Not bad!

NY, CO, AK – isolated state data

Then it was time to play with just our state. I chose to use the coordinate system: NAD 1983 Great Lakes and St. Lawrence Albers projection. I defined the central Meridian as -69.

Population (2008) per county in Maine

On to linking our data…this is where it got a bit tricky. For some reason, my column titles would join but not my data. Eventually, I just changed the name of the sheet within the spreadsheet and that fixed everything. Don’t ask how!

Once those were all joined, it was easy peasy from there. Easy but time consuming. We then cleaned up the attribute table and got rid of a lot of the extra columns, leaving the years and population and the FIPS information showing.

Our final part was to calculate the population change from the data we collected. This was tricky because you had to get the formula right in the field calculator or else all heck would break loose. I finally figured it out and got into a good rhythm and finished all of those year changes. Some numbers are negative, some positive, and most are pretty small since the population of Maine has not changed overly much nor is a very large number to start with.

Join Function: taking data from the web, transforming it into an Excel file, and then pulling that data into ArcGIS as a table and joining it to the data/base map present.

Monitor Fire:To be avoided at all costs. Caused by incorrect field calculator equations.

Calculate/Field Calculator: The bane of my existence. Also known as the placed where all calculations are made. We used it to figure out percent population change but it can also be used to sort by attributes and other functions.

World Population 2000 (Bonne Projection)

After that, we moved on to mapping data of a state. I chose Maine because that’s my project page and I figured I’d keep with the theme. This part was fairly easy, especially since our lab directions are super clear. That makes it helpful to get through a lot of this ArcGIS software! The hardest part was figuring out what other data attributes I wanted to map. I chose to look at the population of 1990 that was over 5000 in each of the census blocks. You’ll notice that nearly all of these blocks show up along the Interstate. The second attribute I chose was looking at the age group of 18 – 29 and seeing how many of these tracts had more than 250 people that met this criteria. I picked such a low number because the population of Maine, and of each of the census blocks, is very low.

Population over 250 for ages 18-29 in Maine

After all these maps were done and .jpd’ed, it was time to PLAY!

I played around on ArcMap for a bit and figured out how to show information when you “pause” the mouse over a feature. Start by right clicking on the attribute under the data layers section. Then click properties, choose the display tab, and mark the checkbox that says “show map tips”.  The second thing I figured out how to do was to animate the map. I just did a layer animation where it went chronoglically down my layers and flicked them on and off. I did this through the animation toolbar.

Population in 1990 over 5000 in Maine Census Blocs

Then I got to play around on the ESRI website. There’s 2 ways to say the name. The “older” version is by spelling out the letters (E-S-R-I). The new, “modern” way is to say it as one word (ez-ree). Either way is acceptable. Anyways, while playing around on the website and looking for some of the stuff I’ve found via Twitter links (see the new Twitter widget on the right!), I found a bunch of cool stuff on wildfire support and hazard mapping, nautical charts, and GIS in homeland security. But, my 2 favorites were the crime mapping with Twitter add-on! It’s so neat. They take a Geo API with Twitter and it builds in a geo-location to the tweets. Then it searches for anything with words like “burglary” and then maps it. So neat! Check it out at (http://blogs.esri.com/Info/blogs/arcgisexplorerblog/archive/2010/02/08/crime-mapping-with-the-arcgis-explorer-twitter-add-in.aspx).

The second thing I found was the link to ESRI’s API Mashup Challenge! (http://www.esri.com/news/releases/10_1qtr/mashup.html). I really want to enter and I am still learning more about it. There’s lots of money invovled as well as the potential to go far. Basically they just want you to create your own mashup, shoot a video of it, and then post it and send it to ESRI. Sweet stuff!

Initial impressions of ArcGIS – well I love the software. It is pretty challenging at time since there is so much that goes into it. The number of toolbars alone is astounding. However, I welcome the challenge and I love how we get to use a new aspect of it every time. That makes it worthwhile. I didn’t think what we did today was overly challenging. A lot of it is being able to follow directions and being logical!

Today we went back to our original files that we downloaded back in the first lab (the 1900-1990, 2000, and 2008) data and cleaned it up for excel. Cleaning up the 1900-1990 was pretty easy once I figured out I had to save the original file as a .txt file NOT an .rtf. Then I had to copy in my 2000 data and then I ended up going back to the Census site and clicked on each county for the year 2008 (most recent estimate) and copied in that data. Good thing I only have 16 counties…!

After I got all the data in Excel, there was some minor clean ups to do – deleting the total pop (not necessary), adding in letters, converting to text, yada yada. Fun stuff. Easily done. Now it’s all saved in multiple places and we’ll get to work importing it to ArcGIS.

Processing data for such mapping projects is ever so joyous as stated in the lab…

And if I had a really big project like mapping every county in the United States, I’d probably a) want to punch something very hard and b) would expect to get paid a lot more than minimum wage. It would be a pain in the butt especially since different states have more counties and information can be harder to find or copy. I’m just glad Maine and I are getting along so well!!

In other news…updates will be coming to the comestic side of the website – I’ll be fixing the background so that it’s not as distracting to the rest of the info. Coming soon!

I’ve worked a lot on cosmetically enhancing the page for pleasurable viewing. I want people to look at it often! I figured out how to have a background sort of like Twitter by adding in tables for the text. It’s not exactly what I was thinking of but it’s getting closer. I like the tables because it allows me to have my colorful background still. The black and white was neat but just didn’t pop.

I did a lot of experimentation with color and I think I’ve settled on the perfect green for my page (I can say the HSVRGB code in my sleep I’ve written it so many times). I also played with picture size and formatted the pictures on the main page so they have a slight border which allows me to disregard the table formatting.

One of the biggest challenges has been the table formatting. It’s like a seesaw – you pull one way and the other side shoots up and so on. That has been the most frustrating of all. I spent at least an hour or two getting the perfect balance on the index page. But I quickly learned how to copy and paste so I didn’t have to do it again. I have mixed feelings about this whole Kompozer thing. I like it because it makes it easy to change things like font but difficult to change things like the speed of my banner. I often switch back and forth between writing my own code and doing other things in Kompozer. A healthy balance works!

I’ve done some photo editing to make new icons for my map mashup on Maine. They turned out pretty neat. I have a fort, moose, museum symbol, tent, and Poland Springs water bottle label. It took me awhile to figure out how to upload all the different files but if you click F5 enough times it eventually works….

Mostly I’ve been playing with a lot of formatting, organizing things on the page, switching tabs around, adding tables and color, and generally just cleaning up the page and the code that goes with it. I also added a small bio page on me which I’d eventually like to add my resume to. Job offers anyone?!

Definitely still looking at various other “personal” web sites to get ideas on how to organize. My favorite professor website is Scott Sheridan’s (http://sheridan.geog.kent.edu). I love how his is so cleanly set up and I would like to incorporate some of my developing photography skills of my own to my mix!

Overall, I’m enjoying this designing way too much and can’t wait to start incorporating the cartography part of the class to it.