Mapping with Altitude: Designing 3D Maps

by Nathan C Shephard

Overview

Add an extra dimension to your maps.

You live in a 3D world—your maps need to be 3D, too. Representing and reviewing data on maps in 3D lets you explore complex spatial relationships in new ways, allowing you to identify patterns and potential problems more effectively. But creating digital 3D maps that are accurate, intuitive, engaging, and easily navigable can seem daunting, even to experienced cartographers.

Mapping with Altitude: Designing 3D Maps helps you create clear, compelling cartographic representations in 3D that are both eye-catching and informative. Written by Esri senior product engineer and frequent Esri UC workshop presenter Nathan C Shephard, this book uses a fun and enthusiastic approach to explore the concepts, challenges, and opportunities in 3D cartography.

Using easy-to-understand workflows, this book:

• Shows why some spatial content is best communicated in 3D.
  
• Explains 3D mapping concepts, such as surfaces, base heights, texturing, and lighting models.

• Introduces new twists on well-defined 2D cartographic principles, such as size, color, and text.

• Demonstrates how the z-dimension can convey time.

• Discusses the best delivery mechanism for your 3D content.

Mapping with Altitude focuses on the practical decisions and specific techniques you’ll use as you boldly enter the world of 3D map authoring in ArcGIS.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781589485532
Publisher:	Esri Press
Publication date:	07/16/2024
Pages:	350
Sales rank:	736,217
Product dimensions:	8.00(w) x 10.00(h) x 0.00(d)

About the Author

Originally from Australia, Nathan C Shephard currently works at Esri headquarters in Redlands, California, where he leads a team of software engineers who work on projects such as 3D and 4D navigation, flood simulation, and the authoring of animation videos. He acts as a 3D evangelist by presenting weird and wonderful 3D maps in technical workshops. In his free time, he writes fiction, shoots arrows, and spends time with his two daughters.

Table of Contents

A world of 3D maps

Why 3D?

Anatomy of a 3D scene

Authoring for distance and scale

Delivery formats

Using surfaces

Displaying draped content

Displaying features: Geometry types, base-heights, and anchor points

Displaying features: Form, rotation, and scaling

Displaying features: Textures and materials

Displaying features: Animated symbols

Displaying text and labels

Displaying volumetric content

Temporal content in 3D

Configuring the scene

Exploring the scene

Afterword: Three-dimensional cartography call to action

Index