Animation (one of the visualization methods)

(San Diego Wildfire Animation, Animated GIFs)

Early development back to 1930s with camera and hand-drawing maps.   -->  computer-based animation:  Waldo Tobler's 3D portrayal  of a population growth model for the city of Detroit. (1970).  (stored in Video Tape now).

1991, David DiBiase and Alan MacEachren -- define visual variables for animation and categorize various types of animation.  (MacEachren, A.M. and D. DiBiase. 1991. Animated Maps of Aggregate Data: Conceptual and Practical Problems. Cartography and Geographic Information Systems 18:4, pp. 221-229.)

"Animation requires additional visual variables beyond those used for static maps, namely duration, rate of change, and order."

Duration: (d) is the length of time that each frame of an animation is displayed.   Short duration --> smooth animation, long duration --> choppy animation.  (slow motion vs. fast forward..)   (frame 1 --> one second --> frame 2)

Rate of Change: (m/d)  is the magnitude of change (m) divided by  the duration of each frame  (A --> A1) or (A --> C).  (point --> location changes, or change the size of points)

Order  is the sequence in which frames are presented.  (We can re-order the frames to change effects of animation).  (Back-ward play)

Example:  NASA California Wildfire animation.

http://svs.gsfc.nasa.gov/vis/a000000/a002800/a002858/index.html

Types of Animations:

Emphasize change:  change in position vs. change in an attribute.

Time series emphasize change through time.  Examples: AIDS Mortality in the United States http://www.ciesin.org/datasets/cdc-nci/regions.html

Re-expression provides an alternative graphic representation (like change the classification methods in Population density). 

Dr. Michael Peterson's animation (Change of classes and change of classification methods)

http://maps.unomaha.edu/books/IACart/book.html#ANI

Emphasize location (warning signals)

Emphasize attribute

Dr. Michael Peterson's animation (Change of attributes)

http://maps.unomaha.edu/books/IACart/book.html#ANI

Early Example of Cartographic Animations (during World War II, Disney Studio):

http://maps.unomaha.edu/AnimArt/ActiveLegend/Peterson.html  (created by Prof. Michael P. Peterson, Department of Geography / Geology, University of Nebraska at Omaha )

Another good example:  Battle of China (1944)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=krOFpw5O7Pc&feature=response_watch

User Interactivity  (Movies vs.  Programs)

 

No Interaction:  a movie  (3D workstation, expensive to create).

NASA Animation Website: http://svs.gsfc.nasa.gov/index.html

Wilhelmson et al.’s depiction of thunderstorm development http://www.mediaport.net/fr/CP/CyberScience/BDD/fich_050.en.html

Treinish’s Climatology of Global Stratospheric Ozone http://www.research.ibm.com/people/l/lloydt/ozone_video.mpg

 

Interactive Animation Program (software programming + graphic tools):

Mark Harrow's Earth Systems Visualizer (Director software) http://www.geovista.psu.edu/grants/VisEarth/animations1.html

 

 

Visualization with Maps: (2D vs. 3D. vs. 4D)

 

2D Mapping: 

Choropleth Mapping:

The need for data standardization (normalization), in which raw totals are adjusted for differing sizes of enumeration units. (Administration units, like state or county boundary)

 

2.5 D Symbols (2.5 dimensional, Volume):

2 1/2 -D: a surface in which geographic location is defined by x and y coordinate pairs and the value of the phenomenon is the height above a zero point. 

lack of true Z coordinate  (replaced by the attribute values)

2.5 D San Diego Temperature Map 

　

 

3D symbols and objects (Three-dimensional): 

Any point on the surface is specified by four variables (X, Y, Z, and the values).

3D maps (usually mixed up with 2 1/2 maps)

Underground water quality

CO2 level in the atmosphere.

 

4D (Adding the Temporal Dimension)

Animation (San Diego Wildfire animation) http://map.sdsu.edu

Fire Spread Animation Movies (created by Harry D. Johnson, Department of Geography, SDSU).  Quicktime Movies (Require 6.5 or later version. Click here to download the Quicktime 6.5.1 player. http://www.apple.com/quicktime/download/standalone/ ) (Cedar Fire Animation)                        (San Diego County)

 

 

 

5D? 6D? 7D?  (Other dimension ?)

 

 

Mental Map Exercise (Bonus two points)

Examples: 

http://groups.ischool.berkeley.edu/mentalmaps/index.html

 

Unit-10  Questions:

1. Please select one Web mapping example for the purpose of geographic visualization and give a short introduction.   What type of maps (2D or 3D or 4D) is it? What are their color scheme? What kinds of knowledge are provided by this visualization example.

 

  
This web site is hosted on MAP.SDSU.EDU
and Geography Department.

This web site is hosted on MAP.SDSU.EDU and Geography Department.