Interactive Maps, Animated Maps, Dynamic Maps, Visualization,
Cartographic Animation, Multimedia
This home page contains material for the book:
Peterson, Michael P. (1995). Interactive
and Animated Cartography. Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice Hall.
Information available here includes:
Excerpts from Reviews of the Book
Some of the documents presented here are in PDF (Portable Document
Format) format and require Adobe Acrobat Reader to view and print.
The animations are generally in QuickTime format.
Comments on this home page can be made by contacting the author
of the book at: geolib@unomaha.edu
The book was reviewed in two separate publications:
Excerpts from Folkoff:
This book details the author's vision of the evolution of cartography taking into consideration developments in computer technology and software. Peterson argues persuasively that in the future mapping will integrate GIS, remote sensing, and computer graphic techniques with multimedia software and Internet information capabilities. The computer itself will become the principal medium for map compilation and display. Map reproducation will be specifically for the computer rather than such reproduction using a CRT as an intermediary between the virtual map and hardcopy. Maps will be compiled interactively by the reader and will include both traditional maps and tabular data as well as a reliance on video tape loops and animation processes. The use of animation processes will provide a new dimension for representing spatial information that, for some purposes, will be superior to current static maps. Map data will be stored in a variety of formats that can be compiled in many different ways depending on the preference of the map reader. Map compilation will no longer be a linear process guided by the rigid procedure leading to a single paper product. Instead the map reader will choose the information to be displayed and the method for displaying the final form from a menu of options. The final product will concentrate on the transmission of information to the reader rather than on the map itself. Nevertheless, Peterson is a realist and does not altogether discount the need for paper maps.
The book fulfills the author's objective of presenting a probable next stage in the development of cartogrpahy. He describes a wide range of disparate software and hardware that are currently used in geography, from desktop mapping systems to statistical packages, and shows their potential for use when integrated with cartography. His software examples are from both DOS and MAC systems befitting a vision of the future where boundaries between software types should be less restrictive. The strength of the presentation is the integration of a wide variety of software and hardward for cartographic applications. The book was published in 1995 and already there are elements of Peterson's vision that can be found on the Internet and in available software.
The book is well written and easy to read. As a textbook, its strength is that the book has a distinct objective and goal, explaining interactive and animated cartography. It offers the student a vision of the future. Many texts have an encyclopedic feel, presenting information on what is and what was. It is refreshing for an author to look to the future: a future which will indeed be the world of the student.
Excerpts from Barry:
In the last few years, the use of animation and interaction in the display of maps has begun to flourish. Electronic atlases and multimedia encyclopedias, some of which containing map animations depicting the changing fortunes of an historic battle or the spread of an epidemic, are beginning to compete with the traditional printed versions. GIS applications that allow users to interactively explore spatial data and create their own customized maps are springing up in public libraries and city halls. In this book, Michael Peterson reviews the concepts and tools that go into the development of dynamic maps and offers an enthusiastic glimpse of the potential opportunities of this New Cartography.
The author explains terminology and technical concepts clearly and with pertinent examples. Each chapter, except the last, contains an introduction, summary, and exercises. A variety of excellent illustrations reinforce the text. Overall, the author provides a solid foundation on an impressive breadth of topics.
The value of this book is certainly not limited to cartographers. Those wishing to use or create interactive and animated maps to enchance their teaching and research endeavors will likely find this volume to be a worthy introduction to this new and exciting technology.
Information on the book from Prentice-Hall.
Search for the book at Amazon.com,
an on-line book distributor (enter "Interactive and Animated
Cartography" in the Title area, then click on Search). This
is the fastest way to get the book. If you order through their
on-line service, you'll receive the book in 2-3 days.
Ordering the book through Prentice-Hall.
Problems occurred during the printing of certain illustrations for the book. The following shows how these pages should have been printed. These files are in Adobe Acrobat format and can be printed and inserted in the book. The Adobe Acrobat reader can be downloaded from the Acrobat home page.
Interactive and Animated Cartography has been
used by the author in five different courses. An incomplete manuscript
of the book was used during the Fall semester of 1993 in a course
entitled: GEOG 4050/8056 Computer
Mapping and Data Anaylsis.
The second course was taught at the University of Hawaii during
the Spring semester of 1995. The title of this course was: GEOG 476: Advanced Cartography.
Sample assignments for this course:
The third course was a graduate seminar that examined the growth
of Internet and its potential in cartography. A separate home
page was developed for the Cartography
on the Internet Seminar. It includes the syllabus, all assignments,
discussion topics, and student projects.
The fourth course was again the Computer Mapping and Data Analysis
course at the University of Nebraska at Omaha (Fall 1995). The
course concentrated on the use of Adobe Premiere in making cartographic
animations.
The book was also used in a Advanced Cartographic Methods graduate
seminar. The course concentrated on the use of the web for mapping.
The course home page includes
all of the assignments submitted by the students.
The textbook describes different types of cartographic animations.
A number of these animations are presented here in a QuickTime
format. Set the loop option in the QuickTime display program once
the animation begins! This will cause the animation to repeat
automatically.
Temporal animations (p. 49) show change over time. An example
of a temporal animation is the change in the use of irrigation
in Nebraska in the 33 year time span between 1954 and 1987.
In the 1950's, irrigation was mostly used in the western counties.
During the late 1960's and 1970's, irrigation was expanded in
the central part of the state.
The following three non-temporal cartographic animations are described
on pages 50-51.
The article entitled: Between
Reality and Abstraction: Non-Temporal Applications of Cartographic
Animation is available on-line and provides many other examples
of cartographic animations.
The development of the MacChoro program influenced the author's
conception of a more interactive and animated cartography, and
user-interface design. The program is referenced in the book in
several locations, both in discussions of map interaction and
map animation. The windows-oriented, icon-based interface of MacChoro
II v.2 is also described in Chapter 3.
Programming of this choropleth mapping program was begun in the
Fall of 1985. The first version of the program was released in
1986 and was the only mapping program available for the Macintosh
at that time. Animation was added to the program in 1989 with
the release of MacChoro II. MacChoro II v.2 implemented an icon-based
user interface.
Initially, the programming of MacChoro took place on a 512K "Big
Mac" with two 400 KB floppy drives and no hard-drive. In
1986, a Macintosh Plus with 1 MB of memory and a 20 MB hard drive
was purchased and this computer was used for programming up until
1990 when a Macintosh SE/30 (5 MB of memory and a 40 MB hard drive)
was used. The program is still limited to the display of black
and white maps and works best on Macintoshes with a 68000 to 68030
processor. 68040 Macintoshes (Quadras) can be used with the Ram
Cache switched-off. The program has not been recompiled for the
PowerPC processor.
Three versions of the program are made available here (but without
documentation).
A demo version of the program
includes instructions on how to view the sample animations (the
same animations as those presented above but can be viewed here
more interactively).
MacChoro II v.1 with data
and map files of the U.S.
MacChoro II v.2 (icon-based
interface) with data and map files of the U.S.
To obtain documentation, contact the author: geolib@cwis.unomaha.edu
The web has experienced dramatic growth since the publication
of the book. I included a few web links in Appendix C but the
most of the material in this appendix referred to the downloading
of files through FTP. These addresses will still work but are
best accessed through a web browser such as Netscape.
It is difficult to exaggerate the importance of the web to the
development of interactive and animated cartography. This is certainly
where cartography is headed. The growth in the number of interactive
map sites is an indication of this trend:
Xerox Parc Interactive World Maps (an early example)
CERN (Switzerland) World Maps (a little slow but worth the wait)
MapQuest Travel Maps (the web page has changed, you might have to register)
MapBlast Street Maps (makes similar street level maps)
Census Bureau Map Site (also street-level mapping based on their TIGER files)
An overall introduction to the Internet, the web, and maps on the web is presented in:
GeoWizard on the Internet This page was made for an open house presentation on how maps can be accessed and viewed through the Internet.
Multimedia Workshop This page was put together for a workshop on multimedia and GIS.
If you are planning on distributing interactive and animated maps through the web, it is important to learn HTML (Hypertext Markup Language, the scripting language that is used by all web pages). There are a number of on-line sources that provide all of the necessary information for web page development. Start off by creating a bio page with a picture of yourself. Information on HTML is available from these sources:
A Beginner's Guide to HTML
Guide to HTML Guides
Web Authoring Made Simple
HTML Editors
Image maps are the clickable images that you see on web pages.
They are images that have imbedded hyperlinks. For cartographic
applications, a link could be established from an area on the
map to a zoomed-in version of the map, to a picture, or other
data. The possiblities are really endless.
Not long ago, the image map was controlled by the server, i.e.,
the computer serving the image map determined where the user clicked
and then displayed the other file, as instructed. This is called
"server-side image mapping." There are so-called cgi
(common gateway interface) programs that still do server-side
imagemapping. The problem with this approach is that the server
has to respond to your request and this takes more time.
Image mapping is now done by the client - your computer - in what
is called "client-side image mapping". The example below
is html code that implements this approach:
The AREA SHAPE commands define a series of rectangles in the <MAP NAME="cliff"> section of the document. These areas have been defined on a GIF file called "LetterA.gif." Shapes can also be defined as "poly" and could then include more than four coordinates. The coordinates were obtained through Adobe Photoshop but other programs exist that will provide pixel positions. The "LetterA.gif" file and a text file containing this HTML code is available by clicking here.
There are a number of ways of creating animations for the web.
One of the simplest is to use animated GIFs. These are a series
of GIF files that are displayed sequentially, as in the animated
globe below:
A Macintosh program that assembles a series of GIF files to
create an animated GIF is available here.
See the GifBuilder
Home Page for the latest version of this program.
Other sources of information about animated GIFs:
Learn how to do Mouse-Over Mapping!
One of the most exciting possibilities of the web for cartography
is what I call "Mouse-Over Mapping." Similar to the
animated GIF in that a series of GIF files are loaded simultaneously,
this method only displays one of the GIF files at a time, depending
upon the position of the mouse. Hot spots are defined on the GIF
files that control which file is shown.
The method uses Java-applets that are imbedded within the HTML
code. James Swanson, a student in my advanced course, provides
an example of the method. If you would like to implement the procedure,
view the source of the file.
Learn how to do other forms of Animation for the Web!
There are a number of ways of creating animations for the
web. Page 132 of the book explains the major animation file formats
- Apple's QuickTime, MPEG, and Windows AVI. You'll find a number
of these animation files on the web, particularly in QuickTime
and MPEG. These formats and available conversions are described
in The Cross-Platform
Page: Movie/Animation Formats page.
I use Adobe
Premiere to make QuickTime animations (QuickTime
FAQ). Premiere is fairly straight-forward and incorporates
transition effects between the frames that make the animations
less 'jerky.'
There are a number of shareware programs for making QuickTime
animations that are described on these pages:
Shareware programs for MPEG and AVI movie creation are less common:
Macromedia Director and its Shockwave plug-in presents another possibility for the creation of animations:
Thank you for your interest in the book. I hope this home page
has provided some useful information.
If you would like to add a links to this page, please e-mail the
author at: geolib@unomaha.edu
