GIS 6005 - Communicating GIS - Module 5

Brief discussion of your design choices for your selected visualization technique(s).

            I began by creating the pie chart. Because I wanted to include an additional data to accompany my insufficient sleep map, I decided to select a matching color scheme. The entirety graph shows a breakdown of all U.S. counties considered in this study, and the labels reveal how much of the population within these counties reports insufficient sleep. While this may not have been the best way to label this data (it may be confusing whether the label pertains to the general variable size, or a fraction of said variable), ultimately, I found this way to be the most detailed and informative.

            The comparative line chart was generated with data obtained from a single source site, (data.worldbank.org) which cites multiple sources (The UN Population Division, and U.S. Census Bureau) itself. I looked for the change of life expectancy over time in the United States, and decided to add several other countries from all over the word to give the viewer a contrast. The countries were selected randomly, but I did want to show a somewhat worldwide distribution.

Briefly discuss what strategies you used in finalizing your layout.

            The layout was generated on a 17x22 landscape-oriented canvas. I began by creating several guides at the top, bottom, left and right of my canvas, in order to give my elements an equal amount of space from the edges of the paper. I repeated this process, and used more guides to divide the canvas into four distinct parts. I centered my map exactly how I liked it, and added it to the upper left quarter of my layout. I created the second map layout from the first, and placed it in the lower left.  

            I created a number of neatlines, and placed them around my canvas. First, a large gray canvas across the whole page, then smaller, black rectangles over which all data will be placed. Staying consistent with the theme of the project, all of the charts were exported with a dark grey-black background. The data represented on each chart was colored to match its respective map, unless the data represented showed unrelated variables, in which case they were assigned various colors.

            I tried to keep the font consistently dark-red, except for the Sleep map, for which I made it purple to match its data. The overall title was placed on the upper right, and the graphs were distributed for the best possible fit. The left-over space was used to insert citations for external data.