Labeling techniques of
physical and cultural features

This was the opening exercise of the course Applied Cartography, a course dedicated to teaching better map design. My task was to select a country and create two A4-sized, reference-styled map designs, one of the country as a whole and one focusing on a part/region of the country. The maps were to provide an overview of key features (physical and cultural) in the chosen country and selected area, respectively. Particular focus was devoted to the application of labeling techniques, the use of annotation and masking, as well as post-processing in Photoshop.

The maps below show the locations of hydropower stations and their installed power capacity throughout Iceland. The first map shows the locations of the hydropower stations in the whole country, while the second map focuses on a cluster of stations in a smaller area - the Westfjords.

Through this exercise, I learned that labeling different features requires consistency, time, and patience. I got familiar with the convention of using serif fonts for physical features can help distinguish them from cultural and man-made features that use sans-serif fonts.