Tuesday, February 16, 2016

GIS 1 Lab 1

Goals


The goals and background of Lab 1 were to build several data frames which showed feature data of the world through different projection systems. It was also our goal to create a new shapefile for the state of Wisconsin and change the projection system of it. We worked with data sets in different projection systems as we went through the lab. We ultimately created a map displaying each of the projection data frames we created, as well as a map of the counties and rivers in central Wisconsin.


Methods


Projection Data Frames

The first method we used in creating the projection data frames was to add the country and geogrid shapefiles within the WORLD folder from our Lab 1 data. We did this 7 times in seven different data frames to create seven different maps of projection systems. After we added the shapefiles, we changed the projection systems to: GCS of WGS 1984, Mercator Projection, Sinusodial, Equidistant Conic, a Wisconsin UTM data frame, and I chose the Azimuthal Equidistant as my last one.

Problems

The States.shp file projection did not line up with the stroads.miv5a.shp projection so we had to project the states' projection into the state roads' projection system. To do this we imported the states' projection into the available projection systems to the stroads. This allowed us to overlay the two on top of each other with the same projection system.


Central Wisconsin Counties and Rivers


The second method we used in creating our lab was to create a map with Wisconsin's central counties and rivers. We first added the Central_WI_Cts.shp file from the Central Wisconsin folder in the Lab 1 data folder. When added, you are informed that the shape file has no spatial reference. Looking further into this, we discovered that the file does not have a projection system. We looked in the meta-data to find out that the file has been made from the NAD 1983 datum. We then gave the file NAD 1983 North American Zone 16N G.C.S. to ascribe it to the part of Wisconsin that has the specific zone the counties are in. We then added the  Lower_Chip_strms.shpfile from the Central Wisconsin folder. We had to change the projection system of the shapefile to NAD 1983 North American Zone 16N to match up with the counties file.


Results



This map represents 7 different projection systems in place upon maps.





This map represents the central Wisconsin counties and all of the rivers that run through them.


Citations



Projection Coordinate System Data Frames



Central Wisconsin Counties and Rivers