[proposal multi-day seminar] Critical Paths to Composing Basic Thematic Maps using QGIS

[Michael Bulosan]

Good day,

Looking at the map above (screenshot from Namria's Geoportal PH), there is still around half of the country without GIS capability.

As I have recently taught face-to-face for 4 whole days in CPDO in Cebu City Hall (PIEP Fellow & Cebu City Planning Dept Head Arch./EnP Joseph Michael Espina can corroborate, however he might be very busy now), I would like to humbly offer my teaching services for Basic QGIS (Critical Paths to Composing Basic Thematic Maps) to all EnPs & allied professions with zero or minimal GIS background and those needing reinforcement/refreshing/ transferring from ArcGIS. If you love or are curious about mapping, this is definitely for you.

I hope somebody organizes a face-to-face or online seminar, weekends or not. The more of us who know how to use GIS, the better for planning as a whole. This is doable and basic, however the scope of basic is very wide, thus needing a serialized, multi-day teaching lecture/laboratory setup with a CRITICAL PATH APPROACH (it could be compressed one 1 whole daytime but this would be information overload and too much detail will be lost). Gaining new knowledge needs spacing/rhythm for better absorption, I believe). We may also look at some intermediate topics like slope & aspect geoprocessing, also atlas setup and auto-generation.

Attendants will have to bring their laptops (installed with QGIS latest LTR (long-term release) version and Google Earth Pro desktop), optical mice and CLEAR & OPEN MINDS.  The venue will have to have a large hi-res either TV monitor (best) or projection screen (good). I will share my laptop screen to the projector/TV via HDMI/wireless; those with sight corrections may sit depending on their needs. If the auditorium/conference room.classroom has hi-speed internet then it is a plus for everybody because the datasets are out there and I will guide you how to look for them. We will also briefly discuss, among a LOT others, UTM and DMS grids and exporting to DXF towards a UTM georeferenced CAD file (informative, metric and actionable).

We will handle very large datasets (e.g. OSM Philippines latest dataset) then "clip" (GIS term for "crop") them according to border (layer extents) or worse case if no internet, I can share the big and cropped shapefiles via USBs. Also we can use a QGIS plug-in (with internet) to query for specific building types within the border then import them to QGIS.

Sample Venue: I remember the Fellow Talk in UP BGC auditorium 4-5 years ago, that is a great venue. I also remember SURP's auditorium from 2011 when Korean exchange students presented, another great venue. I can commute anywhere if you want localized GIS teaching but again MOSTLY weekends. I am not discounting weekdays as I am WFH but some people work at offices/sites too. I am open to official office hours & private tutoring too.

There are different ways of learning, this is for those needing a teacher/guide. I was self-taught but if a seminar came by I really would have attended. Esri seminars and software are expensive unlike this. I basically just need my travel, food and lodging expenses to be reimbursed/shouldered upon by the clients.

Flowchart for Lessons are attached below. Also,sample files are attached to whet your cartography appetite. This is not a walk in a park but an enjoyable uphill trek (needs full attendance, concentration,  and repetition to create "muscle memory" in dealing with the software) but doable (I did it myself while doing other things). If the powers that be can make this CPD thing, then better (I have up to next year to renew license).

If I happen to migrate abroad or for situations needing remote safety, I am also open for zoom/microsoft teams screen sharing with a more restrictive schedule depending on my situation. But beginning today, I think I can safely say I will be here and available for 2 months. Afterwards, those previous students can teach basics like me in their locales as I end my stint.

For interested entities, please contact me here outside the group. Time is running out, QGIS is constantly improving, it can now process lidar 3D point clouds.

Respectfully yours,

Ar. EnP. Michael A. Bulosan

+63-921-555-6188 (MAKATI CITY, PHILIPPINES) Smart Telecom / Viber #

FREELANCE BUILDING INFORMATION MODELLING / MANAGEMENT (BIMM) CONSULTANT / 

GEOGRAPHIC INFORMATION SYSTEM  (GIS) PRACTITIONER

PRC Reg. No: 25011 (2010) / UAP No. 24232

Master Plumber - PRC Reg. No. 5759 (2010)

Environmental Planner - PRC Reg. No. 734 (2011)

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Highly-Recommended Very Basic QGIS Tutorial from You Tube (topics cover a portion of my proposed lecture/lab): 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NHolzMgaqwE

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Additional Time-and-Money-Saver Legal Free Software to complement GIS:

PDF24  https://www.pdf24.org/en/ - to export/resize/combine jpegs/pdfs from QGIS

Libre Office https://www.libreoffice.org/ - to open XLSX/CSV from/to QGIS

Microsoft ICE (public domain): https://archive.org/download/ice-2.0.3-for-64-bit-windows/ice-2.0.3-for-64-bit-windows.msi - to stitch site photos/video-sweep into panoramic photo very quickly 

Geosetter https://geosetter.de/en/main-en/ - for geolocating site photos (turn on GPS on your camera app).