Case Study:
Using digital maps in architectural modelling
Evaluation
Both students and staff were given a questionnaire.
Students response
The students' responses were very positive.
Second year students have not been on course very long, but they have
been using 1:1250 city maps since the beginning of their first year. They
were very happy with the accurate detail the digital maps gave them.
In our discipline "accurate detail"
means that the buildings, including quite recently built ones, are in
the right place. With an average three year revision, the speed with which
newly completed developments appear on Digimap impressed the students.
The students were also pleased to be able
to see contours across the city. With the contours and spot heights they
are able to construct good digital models.
Staff response
Staff were even more impressed than the
students about the information found on the maps. While their students
have always used maps, they are using them even more often.
One member of staff complained vehemently
that the students were coming back with maps at silly scales. This was
the first year Tutor. His students must have found the maps on our server,
or registered and downloaded the maps. However, they had not had the instruction
about printing them to correct scales. Perhaps I should teach How to
Use Digimap when the First Years get the IT induction!
The Principal Librarian reported considerable
increase in the use of paper maps.
Personal comments:
The font mismatch is a problem. Helvetica is not a font that we
have. PCs wetend to have Arial rather than Helvetica, and I have not
found a way to replace correctly. The scrambled text can be intrusive.
Students who have taken the course described in the case study want
to use digital maps thereafter.
Often the maps are used not for digital model making, but are printed
out in order to act as a template for physical models. Fine!
There is now a heavy demand for digital maps from students in all
years. Since our final (fifth) year students are taught in a large
number of different groups, the requirement for maps is spread very
widely.
