Geography Reference
In-Depth Information
to see what is already known. Effective geographic visualization should reveal novel insights
that are not apparent with other methods of presentation. In an instrumental sense, then,
geographic visualization is a powerful prosthetic enhancement for the human body: '[l]ike
the telescope or microscope, it allows us to see at scales impossible for the naked eye and
without moving the physical body over space' (Cosgrove, 2003, p. 137).
1.4 Digital transition and geographic visualization
The development and rapid diffusion of information and communication technologies in
the last three decades has affected all modes of geographic visualization, changing methods
of data collection, cartographic production and the dissemination and use of maps. This
has been termed the 'digital transition' in mapping (Pickles, 2004) and it is continuing
apace (for example, developments in mobile communications and location-based services;
see Chapter 16; Raper
et al
., 2007). As such it is a vital component in understanding the
milieu in which new modes of geographic visualization are emerging. Nowadays, most
geographic visualizations are wholly digital and created only 'on demand' from geospatial
databases for temporary display. The Web mapping portal MapQuest.com, for example, has
already generated more digital maps than any other publisher in the history of cartography
(Peterson, 2001); the popularity of Google map's API,
3
launched in the summer of 2005,
has inspired an explosion of new online mapping tools and hacks (Gibson and Erle, 2006),
and there is even the prospect that GIS itself will begin to adapt and evolve around such a
Web services mapping model (Miller, 2006).
Cheap, powerful computer graphics on desktop PCs, and increasingly mobile devices,
enable much more expressive and interactive geographic visualization that are potentially
available to a growing number of people. The pervasive paradigm of hypertext as a way to
structure and navigate information has also influenced digital geographic visualization and
increasingly it is being used as a core component in larger multimedia information resources
where locations and features on the map are hot-linked to pictures, text and sounds, to create
distinctively new modes of geographic interaction (see Chapters 6 and 9). In design terms,
the conventional planar map form itself is, of course, only one possible representation of
geographic data and new digital technologies have enabled much greater diversity of forms,
including pseudo 3-D landscape views, interactive panoramic photo image-maps, fully 3-D
fly-through models and immersive VR space (see Chapters 9-11; Dykes, MacEachren and
Kraak, 2005). Developments in computer graphics, computation and user interfaces have
enabled visualization tools to be used interactively for exploratory data analysis (typically
with the interlinking of multiple representations such as statistical charts, 3-D plots, tables,
and so on).
Developments in networking and computer-mediated communications, and the rise of
the World-Wide Web in the mid 1990s, means that now geographic visualizations are very
easy to distribute at marginal cost and can be accessed 'on demand' by almost anyone,
anywhere. The provision of Web mapping and online GIS tools is significantly shifting
the accessibility to geographic visualization and spatial data, as well as altering the user
3
An API (application programming interface) allows technically savvy users direct access to the database
enabling sophisticated and novel third-party applications to be developed.
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