#FeesMustFall = #GMTResourcesFall

Due to the #FeesMustFall protests, UP campuses were shut down for an "early recess". As awesome as this 2 week long break sounds, it's a tad detrimental to our projects due to the fact that we now have no access to the much needed campus resources. At first it was a stress but then a fellow GMT320 student, Frikan, came to the rescue.

Frikan provided us with a study centre, which provided wifi access, that we could use to meet up and continue with our work. The Alaskan Assimilators met up and made some serious progress on the 3D model along with the hard copy maps.

The 3D model was constructed in QGIS while using specific icons to represent certain objects within the field of study. We chose to display current health hazard sites, proposed communal drop-off sites as well as locations of volunteer collectors within the community. We believe the 3D model is easy to read and appealing to the eye which is extremely important when designing and creating the model. A lesson we learnt while creating the 3D model is to use .PNG images instead of .JPEG as your icons. .JPEG images have a black background to them which blocks out a lot of the maps info while .PNG images have no background to them and are thus illustrated as clean floating icons on the map.

The hard copy maps are also being constructed within QGIS. We have decided upon 4 maps that we will create:

1) Display the study area of Alaska. Map will include main roads, footpaths, dwellings as well as an overview image displaying where Alaska falls within the Tshwane district.

2) Display the current illegal dump sites. Map will include current rubbish dumps, roads, proposed communal drop-off sites.

3) Display the analysis that went into selecting the proposed communal drop-off sites. Map will include the dwellings, buffer analysis output, proposed drop-off sites.

4) Display the overall end product. Map will include roads, footpaths, dwellings as well as the proposed communal drop-off sites.

Each map will clearly display where the Viva Foundation (Our client) falls within Alaska while also having a clear, aerial image as the base layer.