Showing posts with label GeoCart. Show all posts
Showing posts with label GeoCart. Show all posts

Friday, August 24, 2012

GeoCart 2012

Starting from next Monday, 27th August following ten days will be a peak of activity for cartography in New Zealand. In just ten days three events will take place - Map Design with ArcGIS Workshop, GeoCart conference and Mountain Cartography Workshop. 

First event is Map Design workshop where Dr Kenneth Field and Dr Aileen Buckley will show attendees number of cartographic techniques in ArcGIS and how to create maps for web. This workshop continues the series from last one led by Cynthia Brewer. Workshop will be an excellent opportunity to learn and discuss cartographic tips and tricks from esri's top echelon of cartography.

This will be my fourth GeoCart conference and I am really looking forward to be there. Each conference offers great number of paper presentations, great map display and competition and most importantly opportunity for networking. As usual there will be a number of great speakers including Aileen Buckley, David Fairbairn, Tom Patterson, Roger Smith and Georg Gartner, President of the ICA.

If you want to combine cartography and potential to view volcanic eruption first hand then take a trip into "danger zone" at Mount Tongariro where 8th Mountain Cartography Workshop will take place. 

I'll try to keep posting (and maybe tweet) about these events over next couple of weeks. In worst case scenario I'll post an overview when all is done.

Hope to see you there.

Tuesday, September 7, 2010

GeoCart 2010 impressions

GeoCart 2010 is over. This is third GeoCart I've been at and it proves to be a very good conference. More about that later. 


Before the conference on 30-31 August I have attended Map Design with ArcGIS workshop led by Dr Cynthia Brewer. It was very well attended (actually quite big one - 45 attendants) and over two days various aspects were covered. Being a very large workshop Igor asked me if I could assist and help out students when needed. Of course, I was more than happy to help. Technically, there wasn't any unknowns for me but Cynthia's and Chris's experiences and advices were very helpful. Most interesting parts were relief shading exercises and generalization. For sure I'll be going back to notes and "playing" more with generalization.


On Wednesday, GeoCart started. I have no intention to write about each keynote or paper presentation. For full details of programme check this link. As usual (for last 3 GeoCart conferences that I can speak for) keynote presenters and presented topics were very well picked. If you have William Cartwright, Cynthia BrewerManfred BuchroithnerPhil Allen, Colin MacDonald and David Crossman as keynote speakers it can't fail. 


Paper presentations were divided in two streams: applied cartography and academic papers. This was a nice balance and change from previous conference. I prefer to see more applications and products then just cartographic theory and research. In some cases paper presentation quality was below par. I would like to see more skilled presenters delivering these papers. Unfortunately, this is up to author(s) to decide - present it yourself of let the more skilled presenter/colleague to deliver it.


Most valuable part of GeoCart (and any other conference) is seeing old friends and meeting new people interested in cartography. Being relatively small conference (my guess is about 80 attendees) it is easy to talk to anyone. As a result, presentation were sometimes 5 minutes or more delayed. 










There were only two vendors present - us (Eagle Technology Group) and GeographX. Igor Drecki did a great job organizing this conference but he run out of time to get more vendors. Both stands had a reasonable attendance as visible from photos below. 










Map exhibition was relatively small but maps very interesting. Probably the NIWA's map got most attention but Health Atlas of England and Wales, Geomorphology and other got their share of attention. 











This GeoCart, like several previous was put together by Igor Drecki and his team. Thank you for hard work and see you again at next GeoCart.


Friday, August 20, 2010

GeoCart 2010 is only 11 days away

It is almost time to meet cartographers from New Zealand and rest of the world again at GeoCart. This is fifth conference (I have missed the first two) and the theme of this one is:


Cartographies of Tomorrow: Mapping in a mashed-up world


As before there are keynote speakers from all over the world including:




  • Cynthia Brewer, Pennsylvania State University, USA
  • Manfred Buchroithner, TU Dresden, Germany
  • William Cartwright, RMIT University, Australia, President of the ICA
  • Phil Allen, GeoSmart, New Zealand
  • David Crossman, Royal New Zealand Navy, New Zealand
  • Colin MacDonald, LINZ, New Zealand



At last GeoCart in 2008 I had a privilege to listen William Cartwright, David DiBiase and others. I am really looking forward to hear Cynthia's keynote and even more to be in the "Map Design with ArcGIS workshop" . Workshop will be held before GeoCart, from 30-31 of this month. This will be a nice opportunity to focus on cartography rather then on geodatabase or other technical aspects of GIS.


I'll post more on GeoCart and the workshop when it starts. See you there.