Communicating GIS Lab 1

For our first map in the class I had some difficulty getting back into the ArcMAP mindset. It was nice getting to go through the program and relearn how to do things. Slowly, but surely I was able to pull my memories together to come up with my finished product.

For this product we focused on the 5 map design principles:
Visual Contrast- For the background of Travis county I used one of the standard land feature colors of light green. By leaving the background of the map data frame white a good contrast is created making the data easy to see. Since the white background is representing a space without data it is an acceptable color. Legibility- The text in the document is all in the same font of Times New Roman. The familiar font and size of the text allows the users to easily understand what the text is saying. The symbols and features on the map are also represented with realistic colors so that the map portion is easily readable. Figure-Ground Organization- The white background and colored county and features helps the user distinguish between relevant information and areas with no data that are not important to the map. Hierarchical Organization- For this element the main map data is displayed in the very center of the document along with a thick border (neatline). The rest of the information on the document has a thin border and is relatively smaller than the main map portion. This shows the user the importance of the main map data frame. Balance- The size, color, and layering of the symbology on the map data balances all of the information as to not overwhelm the user with specific data. The balance shows that all of the data on the map frame is important and even balances well within the entire document.