Effects of Cartographic Elevation Visualizations and Map-reading Tasks on Eye Movements

Putto, Katja; Kettunen, Pyry; Torniainen, Jari; Krause, Christina M.; Sarjakoski, L. Tiina

doi:10.1179/1743277414y.0000000087

Cited by 11 publications

(10 citation statements)

References 59 publications

Supporting

Mentioning

Contrasting

Order By: Relevance

“…To name a few common use cases, contours are useful for rapid reading of large terrain formations, for estimating elevation differences, or for comparing elevations of distant places (e.g. Putto, Kettunen, Torniainen, Krause, & Sarjakoski, 2014;Wilkening & Fabrikant, 2011). Contours are seldom represented alone but mostly together with a multitude of other cartographic symbols, typically in topographic maps.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

A design of contour generation for topographic maps with adaptive DEM smoothing

Kettunen

Koski

Oksanen

2017

International Journal of Cartography

Self Cite

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

Due to digitalization and rapid development of collection techniques for elevation data, the emphasis of users' needs for elevation contours has moved from needs of accurate elevation assessment towards needs of perception of landforms. This article introduces a design approach that considers the changed need, and a solution for accordingly generating contours for topographic maps from digital elevation models (DEMs). The solution builds upon comprehensively modifying and blending complete DEMs in order to make the generation procedure understandable for the map readers and to facilitate the readers' reliable interpretation of contours throughout the depicted terrain. The core of the solution is blending lightly and strongly smoothed DEMs according to the Topographic Position Index (TPI) that measures local deviation from surrounding variations of elevations. The solution is built to continuously consider the requirements for different levels of smoothing in areas of uniformly varying and locally deviating relief. An initial case study for typical and challenging Finnish terrains is described and success of the solution is qualitatively evaluated based on the resulting contours. Eventually, limitations of the solution as well as further evaluation and refinement needs are outlined with an intention to prepare the presented contour generation procedure for production. RÉSUMÉEn raison de la numérisation et du développement rapide des techniques de collecte de données d'élévation, la priorité des besoins utilisateurs en matière de courbes de niveaux a évolué d'un besoin en vérification de la précision de l'altitude vers le fait de pouvoir percevoir les formes du terrain. Ce papier présente une approche conceptuelle qui considère ce changement de besoin ainsi qu'une solution pour générer des courbes de niveaux pour des cartes topographiques à partir de modèles numériques de terrain (MNT). La solution est construite sur une modification complète et une fusion de MNTs afin de rendre la procédure compréhensible pour le lecteur de carte pour faciliter l'interprétation fiable des courbes de niveau par le lecteur sur tout ARTICLE HISTORY

show abstract

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

A design of contour generation for topographic maps with adaptive DEM smoothing

Kettunen

Koski

Oksanen

2017

International Journal of Cartography

Self Cite

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

show abstract

“…Maps that include a comprehensive representation of terrain together with a landform relief (topographic or tourist maps) have not been studied from a user perspective as deeply as other types of geovisualizations (i.e., city maps or urban plans; Burian, Šťávová 2009), although their importance remains high in many common tasks, necessitating a high-level understanding of terrain (Putto et al 2014).…”

Section: State Of the Artmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…One of the first eye-tracking studies dealing with terrain visualization was performed by Chang, Antes, Lenzen (1985), who analyzed the effect of experience on reading topographic relief maps. Putto et al (2014) performed an eye-tracking study evaluating three different terrain visualizations (contour lines, relief shading, and oblique view) in solving three types of spatial tasks (visual search, area selection, and route planning). e results showed that performance on contour line visualization and shaded relief were comparable (oblique view was the slowest).…”

Section: State Of the Artmentioning

confidence: 99%

Eye-tracking analysis of the influence of relief shading on finding labels on tourist maps

Popelka

2018

Geografie

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

This paper evaluates the influence of relief shading in finding labels on tourist maps. Two types of maps were compared, one in which terrain was depicted with contour lines and spot heights, and the other enhanced with relief shading. The task was to find specific hills and villages. Two aspects were investigated – whether shading helped users find hills, and whether shading made it more difficult to find villages. The eye-tracking method was used for this study. The results indicate that respondents prefer shaded maps from an aesthetic point of view. Pairwise comparison of individual stimuli pairs and groups of stimuli was performed with the use of five eye-tracking metrics. Most of the eye-tracking metrics were significantly different for most of the stimuli. The results of the experiment show that shaded maps are less suitable for finding hills and villages. The least effective result was observed in finding villages on a shaded map.

show abstract

“…Contour lines are a key features of topographic maps as they make the comprehension of terrain more easy (Wilkening & Fabrikant, 2011;Putto et al, 2014). In order to produce topographic maps more quickly, contour lines are no longer drawn by cartographers based on stereoscopic vision, and are rather automatically derived from digital terrain models (DTM).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Contour Lines Generation in Karstic Plateaus for Topographic Maps

Touya¹,

Boulze²,

Schleich³

et al. 2019

Proc. Int. Cartogr. Assoc.

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

<p><strong>Abstract.</strong> Contour lines are a key features of topographic maps as they make the comprehension of terrain more easy. But they are no longer drawn by cartographers, they are mostly automatically derived from digital terrain models. Despite real progress in this automated derivation, some specific terrain landscapes remain incorrectly depicted with such techniques, and this is the case for karstic plateaus full of sinkholes. This paper proposes a specific automated method to derive better contour lines in plateaus, particularly around sinkholes. The process first detects karstic plateaus with many sinkholes, as well as the individual sinkholes. Then, the DTM is smoothed to better reflect the terrain in the plateau and in its surroundings. As a third step, the contour lines around sinkholes are enhanced to draw legible round features that better reflect the real terrain. The process was implemented in a QGIS plugin and tested on a small area with a karstic plateau in the Jura mountain in France, and the cartographers of IGN, the French national mapping agency assessed the results as a great improvement compared to the generic automated process to derive contour lines.</p>

show abstract

Effects of Cartographic Elevation Visualizations and Map-reading Tasks on Eye Movements

Cited by 11 publications

References 59 publications

A design of contour generation for topographic maps with adaptive DEM smoothing

A design of contour generation for topographic maps with adaptive DEM smoothing

Eye-tracking analysis of the influence of relief shading on finding labels on tourist maps

Contour Lines Generation in Karstic Plateaus for Topographic Maps

Contact Info

Product

Resources

About