GIS 4035 - Module 3 - Land Cover and Area Classification

Process Summary Details

Exercise 1:

For this exercise, in addition to documenting your technical procedures, make note of your thought process in deciding where you draw boundaries and how you identify features. Your interpretation of the photograph is much more important than which tools you use to draw the map. That said, (1) your technical steps are still important, and (2) you do not need to record your processes for each and every polygon you create. Try taking notes on at least one of each type of LULC, as well as on features that are especially note-worthy or difficult to identify.

NOTES:

1.      When drawing polygons around the features, I wanted to select areas that would be large enough to be legible in the exported JPEG file. I did my best to interpret areas based on shape, and size, shadow and pattern of surrounding features. Because the list of criteria is vast (even at level II) I did not spend a whole lot of time distinguishing between what may be a river, and what may be a canal.

2.      I created the LULC shapefile, imported it to the table of contents and began creating features.

3.      I began by using the draw tool to create a polygon around large bodies of water. I followed this up with drawing polygons around bare land masses on surrounded by water. I opened the attribute table, and added two columns according to the directions. With each new polygon drawn, I would assign the appropriate code as well as a code description.

4.      When the entire map was completed, I right clicked on my shapefile in the table of contents, and selected properties. Then, I modified the key to all my features and selected a color scheme. After creating a map legend, the Code as well as the Code_Dscr fields would become apparent.

5.      I added the essential map elements to my map, and changed a few characters to make the map legend a little more aesthetic. I saved the map, and exported the JPEG file like last time.

Q: List all of your LULC codes, Code_Descr, and a full description of what each is, what features are included in it, why you decided to classify it as such, etc.

A: The codes and code descriptions I used for the module are as follows:

11- Residential: Much of the map was marked as a single large feature shaded in yellow. Residential land was roughly recognized by the pattern of what seems to be houses, lots of small side streets and sparse vegetation that seems more aesthetically dispersed than natural.

12- Commercial Services: The polygons that fit this criteria were selected based on the proximity to a highway, and the size of parking lots. They seem to fall close to residential areas and are easily accessed from bigger roads.

122- School: There are only two polygons present under this category. They are shaded in orange, and both fall on the right side of the major road feature. The features were determined to be schools based on the size and shape of the building, and the parking lots. Also, the driveway designed for school buses is very easy to tell on an aerial photograph.

13- Industrial: The polygons that were placed under this criteria, had the look of industrial parks or construction areas from the top. It was generally the size as well as the appearance of the smaller features contained within, that lead to this classification.

15- Commercial/Industrial Mix: Only a single polygon falls under this category, and it is mostly due to the proximity to another large industrial feature.

41- Deciduous Forest Land: Determined by the color of the trees in largely overgrown areas. There are two features along the shore which seem to fit the category, as well as three more which are deeper inland.

43- Mixed Forest Land: Only a single feature falls into this category. Mostly due to the context, and its proximity to a lake where I would expect a mixed variation in trees and brush.

51- Streams and Canals: Used to define the body of water to the left side of the map, mostly due to its many offshoots which cut around the islands. The body of water is very large when compared to features like residential properties, but it was much more convenient and consistent to throw the entire area into the same category instead of splitting it up more specifically.

52- Lakes: There are two very small lakes, easily distinguished by shape, uniformity of color and by their proximity to tree cover all around them. They seem to be exceptionally small, and could have been interpreted to be ponds as well, but I would expect denser vegetation when mapping a pond.

621- Marsh: The marsh category was applied to everything on the map, that is located close to a body of water and has a difficult to distinguish type of vegetation. Most on the marshes marked fall on the left side of the map, along the large river. Some of them, also fall on the shore of the mainland.

Amadeusz Zajac

GIS4035

Remote Sensing and Photo Interpretation

9/5/2016

Module 2 Process Summary

Map 1

After opening the 7KGY10042_060.tif file in ArcMap, I never saw the window that would ask me if I want to build pyramids. I opened the image, and studied the aerial for exceptionally bright features. I selected a small white feature within the upper right-side quadrant of the photograph as my object of focus. It is an elongated rectangular building, among a cluster of similar looking buildings.

*I have decided to select small features for the first part of this lab, because I thought that the shade tones were most defined in smaller land marks.

I proceeded to draw a polygon around my feature with the drawing tool. I made the outline bright pink and left the inside of the feature hollow. Afterwards, I repeated the process four more times as directed and selected the following features to correspond to the brightness criteria:

Light: A T-shaped building along a major road in the upper right-side quadrant. (Close to the center of the map.)

Medium: A rectangular medium-grey feature in an empty lot, by a small woodland. Located within the upper right quadrant of the map.

Dark: A small, rectangular building feature in the upper-right quadrant of the map.

Very Dark: A small semi-rectangular body of water located off a road in the lower left side of the quadrant.

I converted my drawn outlines into a shapefile as the instruction suggested, and deleted the drawings from my aerial photograph all together. I began the editing session by right-clicking my “Tone” shapefile in the table of contents, and named all the features according to the appropriate tone. Afterwards, I exited the editing session.

I repeated the above steps to create five texture features based on the following criteria:

Very Fine: A body of water in the lower-left quadrant of the photograph.

Fine: A field in the bottom center of the map.

Mottled: A small field in the bottom left quadrant of the photograph.

Coarse: A patch of woodland in the left center of the photograph.

Very Coarse: A rectangular, semi-overgrown block located in the bottom-right of the map.

Afterwards, I simply added a few of the essential map elements to my work and exported as a JPEG file.

Map 2

For the second assignment, I searched for three features that could be recognized mainly by their shape and size. Afterwards, I marked them with a green point using the drawing tool and converted them to a set of features like I have in the previous exercise. The features selected were;

1.       A docking pier

2.       A swimming pool

3.       A parked truck

I created two more sets of features in the same fashion, according to the lab instructions. I have located three features that were recognizable primarily by the shape of their shadow, and marked them with blue points. The features were;

1.       A water tower

2.       A cluster of trees

3.       A directional road sign

(The last one is the least certain, due to its specific location in front of a building. But I feel that an argument can be made based on the shape of the shadow alone.)

Finally, I have located two features that could be identified based on their pattern. (Other features closely associated.) They were;

1.       A school (based on the size, shape as well as the driveway up front that seems to be designed for buses.)

2.       A residential neighborhood (Identified by many medium-sized buildings located next to one another in rows, and right along streets.)

Once all the features were labeled, I finalized the project by adding a few essential map elements and exporting it as a JPEG file.

Cartographic Skills - Final Project

Cartographic Skills - Module XII - Google Earth

The conversion of the Southern Florida map into a Google Maps friendly file can be dont with the KML tool on ArcMap. In this case, a dot map from a previous exercise (module 11) was used. shapefile as well as an entire mxd were converted and opened directly from the desktop in Google Maps.

The yellow pins symbolize marked locations that are included in a tour, which was included on google maps for the purpose of this lab.

Intro to GiS - Lab XIII

The image raster files that fit over the general basemap show the general location area of the UWF campus. The feature class containing raster files that show a feature set of buildings and roads was georeferenced in ArcMap to fit over the image files.

Two extra features were created in the process: The Gymnasium (in the Buildings layer) and Campus Lane (in the Roads layer).

The inset map shows a protected buffer around an eagles nest, which is located east of the campus.

Cartographic Skills - Module 11

This Dot map was created entirely in ArcMap. Each green dot represents 25,000 people and the results are displayed only in urban areas. The three shapefiles provided for this assignment included an outline of southern Florida along with county borders, water bodies within the boundary, and urban areas within the boundary. The labels for the cities were made and placed independently, and the locations were based off of already existing maps.

Cartographic Skills - Module 10

1.       After completing adding the legend and the essential map elements to the project, I began to work on the color scheme. I locked everything but the continents in the layers table, and selected the direct selection tool. I went into “select-same-fill color” in the main menu as directed and highlighted Asia.

2.       I clicked in “Recolor Artwork” at the top, and picked a Strong Red color. I colored the other continents in a similar fashion, by selecting them and using the “Eyedropper” tool to pick the same color as for Asia.

3.       Afterwards, I locked the continents in the Layer table, and unlocked the “US Immigration” layer. I changed the color scheme of the enlarged United States in the same fashion. I adjusted the legend in order to correspond with the new color scheme by clicking on each box and using the “eyedropper” tool on appropriate states.

4.       I unlocked the neatline, and selected it with the direct selection tool. I chose a light blue, in order to match a color theme of my map (I do not think it could be mistaken for an ocean.)

5.       I selected one of the flow lines (Asia) and selected “effects – stylize – inner glow” as directed. I picked an opacity of 20 and Blue of 144. Left the arrow red in color. Afterwards, I selected all the arrows and clicked ctrl-shift-E as directed to make them all match.

6.       I highlighted all the arrows with a direct selection tool. I added a standard shadow to the arrows as suggested in the directions. (effect-stylize-drop shadow-ok).

7.       I used the rectangle tool to draw an oval around the enlarged US, in order to make it clear that it is not a proportional element. I moved the oval down in the layer table so that it does not appear on top of any other feature.

8.       I decided to make my large United States three dimensional. After locking everything but the US in the layer table, I selected it and in the main menu, I clicked on “Effect – 3d – extrude & bevel.” I experimented with different positioning of the cube, and the extrude depth but decided to do something different. Because the large US map contains info crucial to understanding the information, I decided to leave it flat. Instead, I decided to make the surrounding continents appear 3d.

9.       I locked the US in the layer table, and unlocked all continents. After selecting them all with the direct selection tool, I followed the same instructions to access the extrude & bevel menu. I reduced the extrude depth to 20 pt, and rotated the cube. The continents looked great on the preview, but after Adobe Illustrator crashed 4 times in a row after loading the changes for five minutes on each occasion, I decided to use a different effect.

10.   A added a shadow to both of my legends and the oval neatline for the center US map.

11.   I selected the large neatline, and opened the gradient menu on the left side of the screen. I angled the gradient at -126 degrees, and left it in grayscale.

12.   I saved the map, and exited the Illustrator.