Geography Reference
In-Depth Information
scanned, and the graphics toolboxes used to add
text, symbols, shade areas and other annotation to
create a map (see Green
et al
. 1990; Green and
Calvert 1998). For the most part, it was the
simplicity and availability of this basic software,
either at a low cost or bundled with a computer,
that encouraged people to make use of them for
mapping tasks. The power of the early CAD
packages running under DOS, e.g. Auto-CAD,
also provided a useful way for cartographers to
produce maps (see, e.g., Bedell 1989; Green
et al
.
1990; Green and Calvert 1998; and Peterson
1995); albeit a quite expensive and slightly
complicated 'toolbox' at the time.
extremely powerful, and in fact still has a vital
role in allowing the cartographer and non-
cartographer alike to produce both traditional
and illustrative cartography quickly and easily.
Good examples of the software that was and still
is in use are Superpaint, Canvas, Aldus Freehand,
Adobe Illustrator and subsequently, Corel Draw
(Figure 41.1). These packages are still widely used
today in many cartographic units and offices in
educational institutions, albeit in more recent
versions, on either Macs or PCs (http://
www.mun.ca/geog/ muncl/manual.htm). The
Ordnance Survey(OS)/ UK Hydrographic
Office collaboration, resulting in the
experimental Coastal Zone map series of the
Southampton area, used an Apple Macintosh
running Adobe Illustrator (Eden 1993).
Monmonier (1989) also mentions the widespread
use of Apple-based software packages in
newspaper offices for journalistic cartography
(Figure 41.2) (see also Whitehead and Hershey
1990).
With the growing number of GIS applications,
and demands for more sophisticated map
generation tools, packages such as Adobe
Illustrator (version 7.0) now come with additional
plug-ins such as Map-Publisher from Avenza
Software. Many maps produced in GIS software
are in fact exported to graphics software for
'finishing' (e.g. DiBiase 1991).
THE WINDOWS INTERFACE AND
GRAPHICS SOFTWARE
The emergence of the user-friendly Windows
graphical user interface (GUI) or the Windows
Icons Mouse Pointer (WIMP) work
environment, however, had a huge impact upon
the so-called 'usability' of computer hardware
and software. It is the Apple Macintosh (and
subsequently PCs and workstations running
Windows 3.1/95/98/NT and Open Windows,
respectively) that perhaps can be credited most
with opening up the way for the cartographer
and non-cartographer of the 1980s. What was
once difficult to undertake, requiring
programming experience or computer literacy,
was replaced by a simple-to-operate, intuitive
and quick-learning-curve environment, the
complexity of operation being concealed behind
multifunctional menus in the Windows interface.
Graphics design software provided a far wider
range of possible mapping applications and
flexibility than the existing map packages and
offered cartographers a major new tool for map
design, creation, and production. Although many
of the early software packages were not
connected to cartography, the combination of
both vectors and raster-based graphics software
products provided excellent map-making
toolboxes for both the practising cartographer
and the novice. The software was simple to use,
CARTOGRAPHIC DEVELOPMENTS IN
REMOTE SENSING AND GIS
SOFTWARE
In today's world, many different types of map are
produced in different ways (Green 1996). Many
are freehand-drawn maps, e.g. journalistic
products, which simply require a good graphics
package that is capable of adding a recognisable
'cartographic' element e.g. scale bar, north arrow,
border, to the graphic. Others are maps produced
through the analysis of GIS data sets and overlays,
and digital image processing and classification.
While it was once the case that map production
capabilities within GIS and RS software were
