Designing across map use contexts | Concevoir pour tous les contextes d’utilisation des cartes
Presenter: Amy Griffin, University of New South Wales Canberra
Copresenters: Travis White, University of Kansas, Carolyn Fish, The Pennsylvania State University, Beate Tokio, PLATH Group, Haosheng Huang, University of Zürich, Claudia Robbi Sluter, Federal University of Paraná, João Vitor Meza Bravo, Federal University of Paraná, Sara I. Fabrikant, University of Zürich, Susanne Bleisch, FHNW University of Applied Sciences and Arts Northwestern Switzerland, Melissa Yamada, Federal University of Paraná, and Péricles Picanço, Federal University of Paraná
The explosion of map use in the past few decades as part of everyday activities, accelerated through the digital production and dissemination of maps and the availability of low-cost, location-aware devices, has made the job of cartographers and map display designers more challenging. Yet, how do these recent changes affect effective map design? Can we accurately predict which designs will work for a given context? We investigate the concepts of design transferability and context and their potential to help us create map design outcomes that are effective for varying map use situations. We then present a model for operationalizing map use context to support evaluating map design transferability and pose several open research questions that need to be answered to support operationalizing map use context. We seek feedback from practicing cartographers about this model.
Climate change, maps, and the media | Le changement climatique, les cartes et les médias
Presenter: Carolyn Fish, The Pennsylvania State University
Climate change is a multidimensional and complex issue which has significant and unpredictable impacts on the environment and society. The media is often tasked with communicating this issue and must balance the complexity of the science with accurate and understandable communication of facts. In an effort to attract readers, reduce complexity, and make the issue of climate change tangible and less abstract for their readers, the media often use maps to illustrate news stories of climate change. This study, through a series of interviews with cartographers, visualization experts, and graphic designers at top visual media organizations and government agency outreach programs, investigated best practices and new innovations for how to communicate climate change cartographically to the public. Results from this study illustrate methods of mapping climate change, the goals of a wide variety of media organizations in mapping this issue, and how journalists reduce complexity while still communicating the facts.
Cartographic Coding and the Implementation of the "Grammar of Graphics" | Le codage cartographique et la mise en œuvre d’une « grammaire graphique »
Presenter: Rex Cammack, University of Nebraska Omaha
Currently in the fields of cartography and data science, a majority of maps and graphics are designed by direct or indirect computer coding. The idea of direct coding can be surmised by coded examples of maps/graphics from JavaScript, D3, Leaflet, and R. Indirect coding of maps can be explained when design tools such as Illustrator, ArcGIS, SPSS, and SAS software are used to render maps and graphics. These examples show systems that have complex user interfaces to develop and implement the map production process. The balance between direct and indirect computer coding of maps and graphics has ebbed and flowed since the first computers. In this research, a cartographic framework will be used to understanding the data science conceptualization of the "Grammar of Graphics" (Wickham 2010). The research will investigate the shared origin of thought from Bertin (1983).
mR-V: Line Simplification for Raster Tiled Maps and Discrete Global Grids | mR-V : la simplification des lignes pour les cartes à pavés matriciels/raster
Presenter: Emmanuel Stefanakis, University of New Brunswick
This presentation introduces a new method to line simplification that applies well-known geo-processing tasks, such as polyline-to-raster and raster-to-polyline conversions. This method, named mR-V (mnemonic Rasterization followed by a Vectorization of the original linear feature; [1]), can prevent spatial inconsistencies with neighbouring objects in the embedded space without considering these objects in the simplification process. The method is compliant with the raster tiled maps at various zoom levels, being produced by earth browsers (e.g., Google Maps, Bing Maps, and OpenStreeMap), as well as the discrete global grid systems (DGGS).
[1] Stefanakis, E., 2016. mR-V: Line Simplification through Mnemonic Rasterization. Geomatica Journal, Vol. 70, No. 4, pp. 187-200.
Reflections on organizing the scientific program of ICC 2017, the International Cartographic Conference in Washington DC | Réflexions sur l’organisation du programme scientifique de l’ICC 2017
Presenter: Cynthia A. Brewer, The Pennsylvania State University
A large group of your favorite U.S. cartographers planned the ICC 2017 meeting in the United States for the International Cartographic Association (ICA). I chaired the scientific program (the oral and poster presentations) and lead an 80-member international scientific program committee through reviews and session planning. I'll talk about some of the challenges, such as developing a set of 40 themes covering the entire breadth of our discipline, groan about how to combine topics into sessions using overlapping ICA Commission recommendations, ponder the difficulty of using a conference management company for a one-off conference (ICC won't come back to the U.S. for likely 30 years), and cheer about the many things that went right. Cary Anderson at Penn State assisted me with program planning details. The meeting was at the beginning of July, so October NACIS will be a good distance from which to reflect on the experience.