Cartographic Skills: Module 9

In this week's module, the topic was flow maps which show the movement of any phenomena between different geographic regions. There are three types of flow maps and they are distributive, network, and radial. The type of map that we created for this week's lab assignment was a distributive flow map since we are depicting the movement of immigrants moving from one region of the world to the United States. In this map, it is presenting the number of immigrants from six different regions in the world who migrated to the United States in 2007 which is where the distribute flow map fits the bill for displaying this type of data. The purpose of a distributive flow map is to show the movement of commodities, people, or ideas between geographic regions. The map was created from start to finish in Adobe Illustrator. We also used Excel to help calculate the proportions of the flow lines of each region of the world.

To create the flow lines on the map, I had to use the 'Pen Tool' and while using the 'Pen Tool', I was able to curve the corners of the anchor points instead of having the squared corners which disrupt the flow of the map. I used the ‘Inner Glow’ effects on the flow lines on the map. This effect allowed me to soften the lines which in turn will allow the viewer to not being overwhelmed by bold flow lines that are present on the map. The other effect that I applied to this map was the ‘Drop Shadow’. I used the ‘Drop Shadow’ effect on my flow lines and number of immigrants’ bubbles showing the movement of immigrants from the different regions. The ‘Drop Shadow’ helps me emphasized on those lines and bubbles from the other map features that are present.