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A study of people's sketching habits in GIS

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Spatial Cognition and Computation

Abstract

Sketching is traditionally associated withdoodling simple strokes on a piece of paper.Only few professionals outside of design andthe fine arts have recognized the expressivepower of this intuitive modality. However,sketching seems particularly well suited tocapture objects and situations in a spatialenvironment, such as geographic space. To learnmore about the techniques and strategies peopleuse when sketching, a survey of sketching wasconducted. The study showed that paper andpencil sketches contain mostly simple andabstract objects that are composed of only fewstrokes. The spatial configuration of a sceneis primarily expressed through the topologicalordering of objects relative to each other.Metric relationships are used to refine spatialconfigurations. These and other findingssuggest that sketching is an appropriatemodality to interact with a computer where onewants to describe and capture objectconfigurations in a spatial environment, suchas a geographic information system (GIS).

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. National Center for Geographic Information and Analysis, Department of Spatial Information Science and Engineering, University of Maine, Orono, ME, 04469-5711, USA

    Andreas D. Blaser

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Blaser, A.D. A study of people's sketching habits in GIS. Spatial Cognition and Computation 2, 393–419 (2000). https://doi.org/10.1023/A:1015555919781

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