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2.6 The Cartoon Procedure 
After preparing a few SOP sheets, it became obvious that some 
procedures did not require documentation as much as others. In 
fact, the procedures which did require documentation seemed to 
require extensive graphic demonstration while several 
procedures were so well understood that no documentation was 
required at all. So the specifications team abandoned the plan of 
making an SOP sheet for each branch of the flowcharts 
(although the flowcharts remained a valuable tracking and 
work-order processing tool) in favor of selected "cartoon 
procedures”. 
In this example, a cartoon procedure is used to describe how 
cartographic offset distances are calculated when the 
compilation for parallel features is distributed on separate 
manuscripts. Note how the cartoon procedure uses the standard 
plate icons to communicate that the manuscripts involved are the 
Culture Clarification Overlay (24) and the Hydrography 
Clarification Overlay (4). 
  
1:50,000 ic Maps 
Engraving ications: Space Between Roads 
  
Fans 28Jan-id 
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
N 
SA Ko) 
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
Ebkber 
  
  
28 
30. 
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
Figure 10--Cartoon Procedure: Scribing Displacements 
2.7 The Bilingual Procedure 
Try as we might, some procedures were too complex to 
describe without supporting text, so the specifications team 
adopted a format for the bilingual procedure. In this example, 
guidelines for deciding how many pylon symbols to place along 
an electric powerline are demonstrated. 
3. THE RESULTS 
3.1 What We Did Wrong 
The most common source of misunderstanding in the 
procedures and specifications had to do with the conventions 
used in the Color Separation Reference to describe feature 
dimensions. Numbers placed after a measurement triangle icon 
proved to be no substitute for the large-scale blowup with 
dimension lines found in conventional symbol sheets. 
179 
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
1:50,000 Topographic Maps hall Sluis 8c + « ot | gulls Tgp 
Eagraving Specifications: Power lines (302) (727) VOLE EA ap adt 
dFuse 1800-08 
When a segment is ^ M M3 e LA asc Laie 
between 6 and 12 mm, M Sg xe gl p» pa 
place a box at each Lab 
When a segment is des VLA aS Lane 
between 12 and 20mm, > gd pa¥e VY 
place a box at each end 3 95 J£ Ze oll 
and one in the middle. Ley be ues 
When a segment is (t ILU cum lati 
between 20 and 28mm JS die gol pd pa YAY 
place a box at each end WIE Jas pe tears U6 
and two boxes evealy abl! gg 
When a segment is more in AS E TNNUE Lote 
than 28mm, place 2 box RA ARI vo 1 IS al ab ph 
each 8mm until you BLA LE J Joss 
"The angle of the bax f gl uan. L4 cd Val 
Where two segments / eub uns o 
meet follows the 0. ) OLI aa dgbl Lana. 
When you have a 1,-10% 9 ex ded gs Lane 
transformer, scribe it lag! uà je. Us Us 
first. Then consider it tes Joli ya gêne s 
as a break between oblil 
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
Figure 11--Bilingual Procedure: Powerline Pylons 
Some confusion resulted from the necessarily grainy sketches 
of the symbols. The specifications team chose to use 
Hypercard for its ease of operation and seemingly universal 
installation. Unfortunately, Hypercard allowed only raster 
images comparable to screen resolution (72 dpi) which were too 
coarse to describe geometry of some features. As an 
alternative, a database such as Acius' 4th Dimension may have 
been more suitable because of its capacity to incorporate 
scalable vector graphics. 
3.2 What We Did Right 
What proved to be a significant benefit in the specifications 
development strategy we chose was the improved coordination 
between departments which resulted from standardizing plate 
names and procedure labels. Photo lab work order processing, 
for example, was greatly simplified. Rather than having to 
describe to the photo lab which plates needed to be exposed in 
which manner, the color separation technician could now initiate 
a work order by simply asking for process CN4 for example. 
The photo lab technician would then find process CN4 on his 
flowchart and see which plates were to be used for which 
exposures. 
Some of our most positive responses from the technician level 
were received as a result of the "cartoon procedures." We 
found technicians eager to write their own captions to the 
pictures which then became their most frequently used 
references. 
Perhaps to hardest to quantify, but potentially the most 
significant benefit was the reusable quality of the work which 
had been done. Since the original release of the 1:50,000 map 
specifications, several changes to the Feature Cards and Color 
Separation references were made and the documents were 
printed and distributed rapidly. Because the data was organized 
in a database, there was no time wasted in reformatting sheets 
for the insertion or deletion of features. Furthermore, the cut- 
and-paste approach to reusing feature sketches and 
specifications greatly accelerated the development of 
specifications for additional map series.