Using the map composer

The QGIS Map Composer allows you to combine a map with nonspatial elements that help enhance our understanding of the map. In this recipe, we'll create a basic map composition. A composition requires you to define the physical paper size and output format. Even a simple composition example such as this has over 20 lines of configuration options.

Getting ready

You will need to download the following zipped shapefile and extract it to your qgis_data directory, to a subdirectory named hancock:

https://geospatialpython.googlecode.com/svn/hancock.zip

You will also need to open the Python Console under the Plugins menu in QGIS. You can run this recipe in the console or wrap it in a script for the Script Runner plugin, using the template provided with the plugin.

How to do it...

In this recipe, the major steps are to load the shapefile into a map, build the map composition, and render it to an image, described as follows:

1. First, we need to import the Qt libraries for image...