Lecture

Visual Variables in Cartography

Graph Chat

Chat with Graph Search

Ask any question about EPFL courses, lectures, exercises, research, news, etc. or try the example questions below.

DISCLAIMER: The Graph Chatbot is not programmed to provide explicit or categorical answers to your questions. Rather, it transforms your questions into API requests that are distributed across the various IT services officially administered by EPFL. Its purpose is solely to collect and recommend relevant references to content that you can explore to help you answer your questions.

Description

This lecture introduces the concept of visual variables in cartography, explaining their properties and the relationships they convey. It covers the graphical system, visual structures, and interactions between them, emphasizing simplicity for easy understanding. The lecture also discusses the importance of color in map design, detailing hue, saturation, and brightness. It explores how color perception influences map effectiveness and provides insights on combining hue and value for better perceptual thresholds.

In MOOC

Geographical Information Systems 2

The second part of the course deals with spatial analysis methods and georeferenced information representation techniques. In particular, you will learn how to:

Analyze the spatial properties of discrete variables, for example by quantifying spatial autocorrelation;
Work with continuous variables (sampling, interpolation and construction of isolines)
Use digital elevation models (DEMs) and their derivatives (slope, orientation, etc.);
Use geodata superposition techniques;
Produce cartographic docu

Official source

Quiz

Related concepts (32)

Color

Color (American English) or colour (Commonwealth English) is the visual perception based on the electromagnetic spectrum. Though color is not an inherent property of matter, color perception is related to an object's light absorption, reflection, emission spectra and interference. For most humans, color are perceived in the visible light spectrum with three types of cone cells (trichromacy). Other animals may have a different number of cone cell types or have eyes sensitive to different wavelength, such as bees that can distinguish ultraviolet, and thus have a different color sensitivity range.

Color theory

In the visual arts, color theory is the body of practical guidance for color mixing and the visual effects of a specific color combination. Color terminology based on the color wheel and its geometry separates colors into primary color, secondary color, and tertiary color. The understanding of color theory dates to antiquity. Aristotle (d. 322 BCE) and Claudius Ptolemy (d. 168 CE) already discussed which and how colors can be produced by mixing other colors. The influence of light on color was investigated and revealed further by al-Kindi (d.

Map

A map is a symbolic depiction emphasizing relationships between elements of some space, such as objects, regions, or themes. Many maps are static, fixed to paper or some other durable medium, while others are dynamic or interactive. Although most commonly used to depict geography, maps may represent any space, real or fictional, without regard to context or scale, such as in brain mapping, DNA mapping, or computer network topology mapping.

Graphical user interface

The graphical user interface, or GUI (ˌdʒi:juːˈaɪ or ˈɡu:i ), is a form of user interface that allows users to interact with electronic devices through graphical icons and audio indicators such as primary notation, instead of text-based UIs, typed command labels or text navigation. GUIs were introduced in reaction to the perceived steep learning curve of command-line interfaces (CLIs), which require commands to be typed on a computer keyboard. The actions in a GUI are usually performed through direct manipulation of the graphical elements.

Interaction design

Interaction design, often abbreviated as IxD, is "the practice of designing interactive digital products, environments, systems, and services." While interaction design has an interest in form (similar to other design fields), its main area of focus rests on behavior. Rather than analyzing how things are, interaction design synthesizes and imagines things as they could be. This element of interaction design is what characterizes IxD as a design field, as opposed to a science or engineering field.

Related lectures (33)

Graph Coloring II

Explores advanced graph coloring concepts, including planted coloring, rigidity threshold, and frozen variables in BP fixed points.

Visual Variables in Cartography

Covers visual variables in cartography, including interactions, laws of visual perception, and color coding.

Reading Cartographic Images MOOC: Exploring Humans' Space: An Introduction to Geographicity

Delves into the process of reading cartographic images and the impact of visual effects on map interpretation.

Thematic attributes and classification MOOC: Geographical Information Systems 2

Covers statistical thematic mapping, types of thematic maps, and discretization methods for representing and classifying dataset characteristics.

Visual Variables MOOC: Geographical Information Systems 2

Introduces visual variables in thematic maps and the semiology of graphics.

Related concepts (32)

Color

Color theory

Map

Graphical user interface

Interaction design