Creating your first map: an introduction to Arcmap
1. Locate the Arcmap Icon on your desktop and double-click. The software will start and you will be presented with a blank work space (the work space is called a GUI – graphical user interface). Note that there are a series of menus and tool bars. The tool bars can be free-floating or anchored at various locations in GUI.
2. Before you start, save your session by going to File/ Save. You can save to desktop for our session but in general you want to save to folder that is at/near directory. Other hints include keeping names of directories/folders short and descriptive. Do not include spaces or non-alphanumeric characters in names. SAVE AND SAVE OFTEN, BEING SURE TO SAVE ALTERNATE COPIES!!!!!!
3. Now, let’s add some data by pressing the ‘+’ button (or alternately File/ Add Data) and navigate to the folder labeled CILAGISMNSTATE and open the mnstate file. Find the hand button and try moving map around. Experiment with the other buttons in the ‘Tools Menu.”
a) Selecting the ‘i’ button and then clicking on the various county shapes provides you additional information about the counties.
b) To return to the original, full view of data layer hit the ‘world’ button in the tools menu.
c) Now, double click (or right click) on the name of the map in the table of contents (note that you can also click on the single color square below the name to change the color). There are now a series of tabs each of which provide information about your map layer and/or provide you with options to change your map layer. Click on the ‘Symbology’ tab and this is one place you can control appearance of map. Try changing the color of the state by clicking on the colored square. Note you can change the color,thickness, etc of the outline surrounding each county. Now try giving each county a different color by (a) clicking on Categories in the Symbology Window, (b) selecting CTY_Name for the Value Field, and (c) hitting the Add All Values button. Play with different color schemes using the Color Scheme Button. Note: If you don’t like the colors in the color scheme window right click on this window and deselect Graphic View. Try double clicking on individual color(s) for a County(ies) of your choice. You can also click on the names of a County in the Labels Column and change its name.
d) Finally, once you have made all of your changes, right click on the mnstate layer in Table Of Contents and chose the save as layer option. This preserves all the symbology changes so that you can open up the new layer file in a new document without having to repeat all the above steps.
4. By default you have been inspecting your map in what is termed the ‘Data View’. If you look to the bottom left of the viewing screen you will see a small ‘world’ icon. Press the layout view icon (looks like a blank sheet of paper) next to the world icon. The resulting view is what your map will actually look like when you print it. The size of the page can be controlled by going to File/ Page Set Up just as you would in a Powerpoint or Word Document.
a)Click and drag on the small boxes surrounding your map to resize your ‘data frame’.
b) You can add additional data frames by doing Insert/ Data Frame. You can also copy and paste an existing data frame which has the advantage of preserving the same aerial extent and scale of previous data frames. Once you have done this note that a new Data Frame Icon shows up in the Table of Contents.
c) To the new data frame add the CRMinor layer. Then add the drgnc4033 file and 24k streams file and ricedem to this data frame. Can you see all the data layers?? Note: DRG stands for digital raster graphic and DEM for digital elevation model. You can click and drag on names of layers in a frame to change their order of appearance.
5. Finally, every good map requires (a) a title, (b) a legend, (c) an indication of scale, (d) a north arrow, (e) and typically a neat line.
a. For a title, Insert/ Title. To change the font, size, style of title, you can double click on text of title and then hit ‘change symbol’ You can also right click on title and select properties or if you have the draw menu up you can use that as well.
b. For a legend, click on the data frame for which you want the legend and then do Insert/ Legend. This will take you through a series of choices to create your legend.
c. For a scale bar, Insert/ Scale Bar (note be sure to have data frame highlighted that you want scale bar to be attached to).
d. The north arrow, Insert/ North Arrow.
e. For a neatline, Insert/ Neat Line (chose all elements).
f. You can add lines and other graphic elements by using tools/options in Draw Menu. Finally, if you right click on blank section of map page you can pull up grids, change order of graphical elements, align elements of your map, change the color of the background, etc.
6. As you have time, create a map with the following elements
a. A data frame containing outline of Minnesota with only Rice County in color.
b. A second data frame that includes Rice County DEM overlaid with 24kstreams. The DEM should have the ‘Elevation 1’ symbology and the 24k streams should be symbolized quantitatively by Stream Type.
c. A descriptive title, north arrow, neatline, and scale bar and legend for the DEM and Streams.
7. Your new map can be exported in a variety of formats by chosing File/ Export. Beware the size/resolution of your map since these files can get very big, very fast.