CARTOmazing

I enjoyed this week's module as I don't get to work on 3D scenes that much wherein this week we focused on using line of sight or viewshed to navigate both in 3D scene and local scene. It is amazing that data like DEM can be visualized or symbolized in 3D that creates a more realistic feel to your map features. The Line of Sight analysis shows the line of sight for 2 observers and the target. It gives the user an overview of what is visible and what is not (ex. if there are any obstructions like mountains) across a certain terrain.  Then we used the viewshed analysis that helps visualize visible areas from an observer point. This greatly affects decision making to determine if a certain location is favorable for development.  Lastly was learning how to share 3D content using scene layer packages which I am aware of since I used this once for visualization in a story map. 

Module 2 focuses on analyzing LiDAR data from the United States Geological Survey (USGS) and creating a map that will be useful to foresters to understand forest canopy and terrain. This will help them to be cost effective forest management and activities without having to be in the field. This lab taught us to decompress the data from Virginia's LiDAR application and creating DEM, DSM, forest height, forest biomass and canopy density. I initially tried doing this in my local machine but unfortunately running the 3D Analyst tools usually requires a better video card. I forgot my other laptop that has NVIDIA as video card to run this process smoothly. With the .las file, we had to convert it to raster and geoprocessing the raster into DEM and DSM data. From there, I used the attribute table to create a tree height distribution map with its histogram. Lastly, applying different tools like LAS to Multipoint, Count, Is Null, Con, Plus, Float and Divide to get the Canopy density layer f...

Scenario 4 lets you pretend to be a park ranger in the Coronado National Forest and is assigned to create a corridor between two protected areas for black bear movement. This will help us keep the area protected on different factors especially urbanization keeping away people and noise away from our black bears yet giving them the best suitable area to live. Below is the ArcGIS model I created for the said scenario. We are given 3 factors to consider (1) roads, (2) elevation and (3) land cover. I realized that besides these if we have data of rivers, and if lucky GPS tracks of black bears (if that's even possible) so we can get a glimpse of their movement as well. First, I applied Euclidean distance tool with the roads layer to transition it to raster and then reclassified all of them according to the suitability criteria given. The reclassified layer were then combined using Weighted overlay tool with the following weights: land cover (60%), elevation (20%) and roads (20%).  Moreo...

 1: Blog post that includes: 1) a medium resolution image of your final map layout and 2) a brief discussion of your analysis steps and results. This discussion can be in qualitative terms and there is no need to include your numerical results. To be honest, I had underestimated the time I'll be working on this knowing that we tend to have power outages here in the rural area in the Philippines. It took me exactly 12 hours to go over each step making sure that I didn't miss anything especially when using advanced geoprocessing tools.  Scenario 2 required us to be a property developer analyzing the land as a suitable location for building development. The following factors are considered: (1) land cover, (2) soils, (3) slopes, (4) streams and (5) roads. I then converted all factors considered into rasters (if applicable) and then reclassify them into suitability classes. Once I had all 5, I used the weighted overlay tool to compute their values based on percentage influence. Th...

Hi I'm Janeen Kim Cayetano, I'm currently taking my GIS certification in UWF and pursuing my application in UWF's Master's in GIS Administration. It took me a year to find the right school for my needs that will help me to gain experience even online. I live in the Philippines and there's no dedicated degree anywhere in our country that offers GIS hence, I took the courage to look for an online Master's. Luckily, my work provides me educational assistance to pay for the university fees. I work as a Data and Geospatial Analyst at Catholic Relief Services providing Information, Communication Technology For Development (ICT4D) insights and support using Power BI and ArcGIS to different country programs/projects worldwide. My interests are emergency response works focusing on disaster risk reduction and management. You can check some of my works in these articles below: How to Protect Refugee Camps from Floods and Cyclones Using Geographic Information Systems Digiti...