GIS 6005 - Map Design and Typography
For the first week of the course Communicating GIS (GIS 6005) we were tasked with learning about map design, including the five map design principles, and typography, including the various fonts, colors and sizes suitable for various labeling purposes. This post will focus on the five design principles, which can be seen in the map below. The following are the design principles and how they were applied: 1. Visual Contrast – This map used a fairly bright orange color to represent the recreation centers which contrasted with the muted green color of Travis County. The use of a rich green color for the golf courses and bright blue for the waterways also added contrast. 2. Legibility – Firstly, the symbol for the recreation centers is a circle, which is easily noticed, distinguished and read by the map user. This map also contains labels for the streets. As the map is fairly small the labels needed to be small enough that they did not detract from the main features of the...