Cartography Crash Course resources

The following resources—articles, tools, tutorials, and more—accompany the Cartography Crash Course workshop from OpenVis Conf 2016, by Andy Woodruff and Mike Foster. They are categorized according to topics covered in the workshop, and offer some paths to learning about those topics in much more detail.

Other resource lists

Many of the links on this page were copied from resource lists that others have diligently compiled. In those cases we've plucked some mostly on the educational side of things. Visit these lists for much more, especially for links to technical tools and resources!

• Resources list from Robin Tolochko.
• Geo how-to from Nathaniel Vaughn Kelso
• DUSPviz resources page
• Maptime Boston tutorials and resources
• MaptimeHRVA meeting links and notes

General mapping

• Cartography and Visualization course website, Penn State
• mapschool.io
• Thematic Cartography Guide by Axis Maps
• GIS Commons, an introductory textbook on geographic information systems
• Unrequested Map Tips and part 2 by John Nelson
• DUSPViz, mostly by Mike Foster
• CartoTalk forum hosted by NACIS
• How to Start Web Mapping? - message thread with a variety of suggestions for getting started in web mapping
• List of map-related blogs, publicly editable

Books

• Thematic Cartography and Geovisualization, Terry Slocum, Robert McMaster, Fritz Kessler, Hugh Howard. Comprehensive textbook on thematic mapping.
• Making Maps, Second Edition: A Visual Guide to Map Design for GIS, John Krygier and Denis Wood. A beginner-friendly overview of mapping concepts and principles.
• Elements of Cartography, Arthur Robinson, Joel Morrison, A Jon Kimerling, Stephen Guptill. A longtime standard cartography textbook.
• How to Lie With Maps, Mark Monmonier. A good guide to the biases and agendas in maps, and how to read maps critically.
• How Maps Work, Alan MacEachren. For the truly ambitious map nerd, a densely detailed book on how maps and our brains work together to form meaning.
• Semiology of Graphics, Jacques Bertin. A seminal work in cartography and information design, introducing the visual variables and much more on how graphical communication works.
• Cartographer's Toolkit, Gretchen Peterson. Handy reference for color palettes, typography, and other elements of map design.
• Designed Maps: A Sourcebook for GIS Users, Cynthia Brewer. A guide to good map design using GIS.
• Web Cartography: Map Design for Interactive and Mobile Devices, Ian Muehlenhaus. One of the precious few texts on map design specifically for the interactive, digital, and mobile age.

What is a map? What is GIS? What is Cartography?

• Communicating Geographic Data: What is a Map?, Penn State Geog 160
• The Lost Art of Critical Map Reading by Mike Foster
• Map Purpose and Audience, Penn State Geog 486
• When Maps Shouldn't Be Maps, Matthew Ericson

Types of maps

• Types of maps, Penn State Geog 486
• What are thematic maps? from the Axis Maps guide
• Choropleth Maps, Axis Maps
• Choropleth Maps, Penn State Geog 486
• Porportional Symbols, Axis Maps
• Graduated and Proportional Symbol Maps, Penn State Geog 486
• Dot Density Maps, Axis Maps
• Dot Maps, Penn State Geog 486

Map design

• Design is Human by Daniel Huffman
• More Principles of Map Design by John Krygier
• Easy Steps to Better Maps by Mike Foster

Hierarchy

• Visual Hierarchy, Penn State Geog 486

Visual Variables

• Visual Variables, GIS wiki

Color

• ColorBrewer, Cindy Brewer + Axis Maps
• Using Colors on Thematic Maps, Axis Maps
• Using COlor in Maps - handy guide compiled from work by John Krygier
• Map Color Resources

Data Classification

• Classification, GIS wiki
• Telling the Truth, John Nelson
• Classification Schemes, Penn State Geog 486

Scale and generalization

• Generalisation of Map Data, Geographic Information Technology Trainling Alliance
• Map generalization exercise by David Woodward
• ScaleMaster - Flash-based interactive tool from some Penn State research about designing multiscale maps
• Zoom levels, pixel sizes, and scales, oh my - a bit about how scale works on web maps Gretchen Peterson

Map projections

• Coordinate Systems and Projections concept gallery, Penn State 486
• Projections and Coordinate Systems by Mike Foster for Maptime Boston
• Map Projections by Daniel Huffman for the Axis Maps thematic cartography guide
• Map projection reference by Bill Rankin, grouped by use cases
• Why Mercator - Tom MacWright explains why the Mercator projection is used for web maps
• Map projections and distortions, Hunter College

Text

• Labeling and text hierarchy in cartography from the Axis Maps guide
• Labeling and Text concept gallery, Penn State Geog 486
• Maps and Prose by Marty Elmer

Geographic phenomena and data

• The Nature of Geographic Information course from Penn State
• Map symbolization lecture notes by John Krygier includes examples of types of phenomena and how they can be represented.
• Levels of measurement from the Axis Maps guide
• The Nature of Geographic Data, lecture notes from an Oregon State course

Data formats

• Spatial Data Formats by Shaun Walbridge for Maptime Boston
• GIS file formats, Wikipedia
• More than you ever wanted to know about GeoJSON by Tom MacWright

Working with data

• OpenRefine tutorial, Enipedia
• Mapshaper and its command line tools, by Matthew Bloch
• GDAL, a utility for working with raster and vector data
• geojson.io, a nice web tool for creating and converting GeoJSON data

Geocoding

• Geocoding, Wikipedia
• Geocoding resources from Robin Tolochko
• Pelias by Mapzen

Data sources

• Maptime DC list of data sources
• Data sources list maintained by Robin Tolochko
• Natural Earth
• geojson.xyz, a website and command line utility for downloading Natural Earth data
• DUSPviz data sources list

OpenStreetMap

• OSM 101 by Jake Wasserman for Maptime Boston
• Mapzen metro extracts
• Geofabrik OSM extracts
• learnOSM

General GIS

• What is GIS?, Esri
• Geographic information system, Wikipedia
• Geographic Information Analysis Penn State course with some general information about GIS analysis
• List of GIS software, Wikipedia

QGIS

• QGIS project home
• QGIS Training Manual
• QGIS Tutorials and Tips
• QGIS 101 by Mike Foster for Maptime Boston

What is a web map?

• Web Maps 101, Maptime Boston
• Anatomy of a Web Map, Maptime SF
• Intro to Web Mapping, Maptime Detroit
• How web maps work, Mapbox
• Why tiled maps?, notes from a Penn State geography course

When should a map be interactive?

• Why We Are Doing Fewer Interactives by Archie Tse, New York Times
• Making maps, part 1: Less interactivity by Brian Boyer
• Interactive maps: What we know and what we need to know by Robert Roth

Building a custom map with Leaflet

• Leaflet examples
• Leaflet documentation
• Leaflet Intro, Maptime Boston
• qgis2leaf plugin for QGIS
• Leaflet Basics by Joshua Frazier for Maptime Toronto
• Dynamic Cartography lab assignments by Ryan Mullins for Penn State. Comprehensive beyond just Leaflet, but includes advanced Leaflet-based mapping.

Basemaps

• Leaflet Providers Demo (code and preview for various basemap tile sets)
• Basemaps by Stamen Design
• About vector tiles, a newer way to do tiled maps, in a Maptime presentation by Lyzi Diamond
• Technical details on vector tiles in a talk by Tom MacWright

More on web maps

• Thoroughly excellent D3 tutorial by Scott Murray
• Mapping with D3, Maptime Boston
• Intro to D3 Web Mapping, Rich Donohue
• Let's Make a Map D3 tutorial by Mike Bostock
• D3 examples gallery
• D3 Workshop for DUSPviz by Mike Foster
• Turf, a JavaScript library for GIS operations
• Mapbox and its guides
• CartoDB Map Academy
• Maptime DC CartoDB tutorial
• MaptimeATX CartoDB Exercises