Tuesday, May 25, 2010
Tuesday, May 11, 2010
DEMs in ArcGIS
The area I chose was the front of Mount Wilson located not too far from Los Angeles County. The specific mountains I chose are located next to Altadena off the 210 freeway. When we visit my Uncle Raul during the weekend he takes us hiking around the mountainous area of Altadena and the mountains are extremely high which motivated me to research on them. The following is information based on my area:
RASTER INFORMATION:
Columns and Rows: 1735, 1088
Cellsize (X, Y): 0.00027777778, 0.00027777778
Uncompressed size: 7.80 MB
EXTENT:
Top: 34.3041666658
Left: -118.255555555
Right: -117.773611111
Bottom: 34.0019444435
SPATIAL REFERENCE:
Angular unit: Degree (0.017453292519943295)
Datum: D_North_American_1983
Thursday, May 6, 2010
Week 4 Lab
The ArcMap Tutorial was extremely useful. It was both easy and difficult to maneuver. With practice and experience, creating and developing maps can be a breeze. The difficult part is familiarizing yourself with the program, knowing its capabilities, and building your own map by manipulating its tools. This lab was extremely long but useful for future map making. The program is very useful and does a great job in presenting a physical visual of terrains.
Thorough my ArcMap experience, I can conclude that the program has extreme potential to allow visual mapping depending on which elements you would like to concentrate on. I am really impressed on the way it can transform data of different areas and be able to incorporate it into a visual map. This potential can benefit many sociologists and geographers who can input collective data into the ArcMap program and make a visual display of their information. This potential can benefit many of those in need of presentations.
However, ArcMap does have some pitfalls and flaws. The major pitfall is the ability to understand and use the program to your specific needs. It is extremely hard to get use to the program and learn to familiarize yourself with its abilities. The program offers many tools but becomes difficult for users because the program itself can become complicated and cause frustration. Even though it becomes a long experience, sometimes fixing a mistake takes long and delays your process. Some of its pitfalls come from its complications and difficulty to maneuver.
ArcMap is a great program that needs more time and editing. It needs to become an easier program but has a lot of potential for future use. Even though it can become frustrating, its finishing products can speak for themselves. The program is a necessity that can be used today in many fields of study.
Monday, April 19, 2010
The Las Vegas Strip - Hotel & Casinos
View The Las Vegas Strip in a larger map
The Neogeography mashup of the Las Vegas Strip provides some of my favorite famous Resort Casinos and Hotels. There is a brief description of each Casino, along with a visual and a video of the Casinos. The map begins from the McCarran International Airport and travels the surrounding are along Las Vegas Blvd., ending at the famous Dining Hotel, the Las Vegas Hilton. Each Casino has its unique architecture, surrounding area, and gambling setting.
NeoGeography has allowed the introduction and incorporation of visual mapping with analytical data gathered about a certain and specific location or space. The potential that neogeography presented has allowed visually mapping out certain locations regardless of how large the area can be. The exercise extends important geographic mapping, complementary to the GIS concept that can make the combining of elements easier and quicker by using an existing tool set such as Google Maps. Neogeography has the potential to allow sharing location information on a myriad of subjects such as urban planning. It is a great approach to allow information and communication on a public level.
My map provides my favorite Casinos and Hotels, however it does not list every single Casino along the Strip of Las Vegas and in the surrounding area. A pitfall of and consequence of my neogeography map is that some information or places might be secluded and left out. This creates a bias for someone who wants to search the area for different Casinos. The extraction a viewer might pull from my map may not be what the viewer is looking for, causing a pitfall.
Tuesday, April 6, 2010
Week 2 Lab Report
1. Beverly Hills Quadrangle.
2. Canoga Park, Van Nuys, Burbank, Topanga, Hollywood, Venice, and Inglewood.
3. 1966.
4. North American Datum of 1927 (Horizontal) and National Geodetic Vertical Datum of 1929.
5. Scale of 1:24,000
6. a) 1,200 meters b) 1.89 miles c) 2.64 inches d) 12.5 centimeters
7. 20 feet.
8. a)118.27'5" degrees/min/sec = 34.23 decimal degrees
and -118.48 degrees/min/sec = 34.44 decimal degrees
b)118.30' degrees/min/sec = 34.30 decimal degrees
and -118.55 degrees/min/sec = 34.550 decimal degrees
c)118.22'30" degrees/min/sec = 118.4083 decimal degrees
and 34.7'20" degrees/min/sec = 34.1305 decimal degrees
9. a) 560 feet = 170.688 meters. b) 154 feet = 47.244 meters c) 650 feet = 198.12 meters
10. Zone 11.
11. 34 degrees 00' and 118 degrees 30' / 361.5 kilometers.
12. 1 square kilometer.
13. Elevation measurements: available on Line Graph.
Elevation Profile:
1 = 400
2 = 600
3 = 600
4 = 520
5 = 500 [Ucla Campus - East]
6 = 460 [Ucla Campus - West]
7 = 400
8 = 340
9 = 300
10 = 240
11 = 190
12 = 160
14. Positive 14 degrees.
15. It flows from North to South.
Tuesday, March 30, 2010
United States Population
The following map, provided by MAPOFUSA.NET, illustrates the population density within the United States of America from data collected from the 2000 Census. The map provides an outline of the entire country and is divided by their respective states. Each state is divided into tiny broken shapes with different shades of red. The darker the red appears, the higher density of population located within its space. Vice versa, the lighter shade of red means the less population within its location. The distribution of population within the map is extremely dispersed to the East and West regions of the country. However, the middle area of the United States has the lightest shading, representing the least amount of population. On the East side of the map there are a myriad of dark-red clusters surrounded by lighter shades of red. On the East population is a lot more dispersed, unlike the West where the majority of population is located only within 3 to 4 states. I find it surprising that the Eastern Region of the United States has the highest population in a large number of states. I did not really know the distribution but it seems a lot more dense than I had imagined.
Geographical Map of the United States
The geographical map of North America provides an illustrated terrain of Canada, United States, and Mexico. The map portrays the general landforms and how each country is connected geographically. The United States has a broad mountainous region from the West expanding to the middle of the country. This can explain the interlinking of population dispersion within the country and why there is an extremely low density of population found in the mountains. In the Eastern region there is less mountainous terrain which can explain the reason behind higher population. This explains the less valleys in the East Coast. I find it surprising how much affect geographical terrain can have on the people living within the country. I did not know a large amount of land is a result of mountains and valleys, which gives the country a unique scenery.
img URL: [http://www.fgmorph.com/fg_5_2.php]
National Highway System [United States]
The following National Highway System Map of the United States, provided by Wikipedia, includes the Inter State Highways in the blue bold line that represents the transportation system for the United Sates. Interestingly, there are more highways and intersections on the Eastern region of the United States. Unfortunately, the West Side does not have many highways. California, however, seems to have the most highway activity with intersections in Los Angeles and Northern Caifornia. In the Mid West, highways are scarce because of the mountainous region and the difficulty of having Interstate Highways across mountains and valleys. I find this map very useful because my family enjoys traveling within the country. Major cities in the country are portrayed as "hotspots" with a blue dot, demonstrating highway intersections. This map does a great job in presenting the Interstate Highway connectivity within the United States.
img URL: [http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/f/f9/National_Highway_System.jpg/400px-National_Highway_System.jpg]
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