Mod9 - Flow Line Mapping

Flow Line Map of Immigrants to the United States in 2007.

I used the accurate placement method to create this Flow Line map. Accurate placement methods is style of creating flow line map that involves the placement of arrow headed lines that depict the direction of flow of people, ideas and commodities.

This map shows a Distributive  flow map of Immigrants to United States of America from all the regions in the year 2007.

To create this map, I used the imported base map from ESRI and an Excel spreadsheet of immigrants statistical data from the U.S. Department of Homeland Security's Office of Immigrant Statistics. 

I import the ESRI base map into Adobe Illustrator and created additional Layers from Flow Lines, Map Title, Legend, Region Names, and After Effects.

I then design the map to the standard specified in the lab instruction using tools available in AI. After creating the flow lines pointing towards the U.S. choropleth map, I then open the Excel document containing the Immigrants' statistical data, calculate the square root of the 2007 immigrants in each region in one column, and the width of line symbol in another column.

I then proceed to use the result of the calculations to re-size thickness of the flow line such that the flow lines are proportional to the amount of people from each region. I finalize the map by adding the Drop Shadow and Inner Glow effects to the map heading and flow lines respectively.

I really enjoy making this making this map and feel fulfilled using AI successfully after many years of avoiding it.