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Satellite Imagery in Flight Sim

I also use Global Mapper. It is pricey, but very easy to work with. In fact, it will handle the reprojection while downloading the "orthoimagery".

To do a small airport photoscenery, you can get the coordinates of the airport and tell Global Mapper to download the area within two miles of the airport and export it in GeoTIFF format projected to WGS84/Geographic. Then come back later and you have your image, ready to work with. If the source image is very high resolution, you can also set Global Mapper to export it at the resolution you want. Instead of 0.1m/pixel, you might want 1m/pixel. This can be done when choosing the settings for Global Mapper to do the export.

If you want to do some color correction, the file will be saved as a regular TIFF file. If the original file is exported by Global Mapper and the "save TFW" file is checked, Global Mapper can convert the TIFF back into a GeoTIFF for easy use with resample. The same would apply when creating water, blend mask and night textures. Global Mapper can use a TFW to export the TIFF into a GeoTIFF. It's worth the money (to me) because it makes the process so easy.

To do the Lake Ridge Aero Park 8NC8 scenery, I set Global Mapper to export at 1m/pixel and download an area that was 2 miles from the airport coordinates. I used 20 miles from the airport (40 miles x 40 miles) for the Page, AZ scenery to get much of Lake Powell, exported at 2m/pixel. I started the Prescott, AZ scenery with a 60 mile x 60 mile area, then easily expanded it to 60 miles x 83 miles to include Show Low, AZ, again at 2m/pixel. For larger sceneries, Global Mapper can also break it up into equal sized sections when the file size gets too big. The Page scenery was done in 25 pieces. The Prescott scenery uses 50 sections.
 
MapWindow bombs on my computer, FWTools is a geek's day in paradise, VTerrain bombs on my computer...DAMN!!! Why does trying to re-project a GeoTiff have to be so a.) expensive or b.) so much hassle?:isadizzy:


It's late for me and I'm hitting the sack shortly, but I did find something that *might* work and that doesn't fit into A or B above. Heck it might even fall under the stupidly easy catagory? I'll test with another file in the morning and follow-up with the findings.
 
kjb said:
[...]

and the "save TFW" file is checked, Global Mapper can convert the TIFF back into a GeoTIFF for easy use with resample. The same would apply when creating water, blend mask and night textures. Global Mapper can use a TFW to export the TIFF into a GeoTIFF. It's worth the money (to me) because it makes the process so easy.
Click to expand...


Sorry, OT, but where does it get the geo reference from, when it converts a TIFF back into GeoTIFF? Is it stored in the TFW file?

Interesting thread!

Cheers,
Mark
 
Yes. The TFW file contains all of the geo-reference data. Generally speaking, it looks pretty much like the data that Resample uses: the top left corner lat and lon, size of pixel, etc.

Jim
 
tfw works to get a tiff back into GM, but if you are using something else such as a geotiff header editor, be careful because you need a tag that specifies "WGS84" or resample will exit with "file not found".

scott s.
.
 
A little later than I hoped, but I was busy writing things up as a tutorial. Cryptic command line driven tools or $399 entry to a commercial package (GM's price has gone up since their acquisition by Blue Marble??) aren't what some people think of as a "hobbyist endeavor", so check the PDF in the Zip attachment and see if a GPS based utility might fit the bill?

No guarantees, warranties or implied fitness for use given! :icon_lol:
 
Meshman said:
A little later than I hoped, but I was busy writing things up as a tutorial. Cryptic command line driven tools or $399 entry to a commercial package (GM's price has gone up since their acquisition by Blue Marble??) aren't what some people think of as a "hobbyist endeavor", so check the PDF in the Zip attachment and see if a GPS based utility might fit the bill?

No guarantees, warranties or implied fitness for use given! :icon_lol:
Click to expand...

You put some good info into that doc, and I certainly appreciate the effort you went through to do it. I'm slowly learning this stuff.
 
Meshman said:
A little later than I hoped, but I was busy writing things up as a tutorial. Cryptic command line driven tools or $399 entry to a commercial package (GM's price has gone up since their acquisition by Blue Marble??) aren't what some people think of as a "hobbyist endeavor", so check the PDF in the Zip attachment and see if a GPS based utility might fit the bill?

No guarantees, warranties or implied fitness for use given! :icon_lol:
Click to expand...


Excellent tutorial, thanks, Lance!

Cheers,
Mark
 
Hi Falcon,

Really pleased you opened up the issue of satellite imagery usage once again sir - you're a brave man! I just wanted to throw in my thoughts and recent findings. At the end of 2011, I decided to try contact Microsoft over the usage of Bing Maps in freeware distribution [freeware scenery my buddy and I are developing for a base in Italy]. Anyhow, I heard nothing back [not that I really expected a reply]. Personally, I respect their stance on usage of their material, although I'm pretty saddened and frustrated that it can't be re-distributed as freeware... So...

Thanks to your raising the subject again, I thought I'd have another try at sounding out Microsoft via the Bing Maps contact.

Well, earlier today I got a phone call from the Bing Maps for Enterprise office and spoke with a very reasonable lady respecting the request I'd submitted to use their material for freeware distribution purposes. In brief, she was very understanding of my frustration at being unable to 'share' their mapping data, but she very clearly referred me to the current conditions that forbade the downloading and use of 'Tiles' in any shape or form. She did however state that their conditions can and may change over their usage [ok, maybe a curved ball but...] and she encouraged me to keep an eye on the terms of usage.

I just got an E Mail follow up with links to their distributor partner in the UK suggesting I investigate the cost of a commercial license. Nothing ventured nothing gained eh!

Like you folks, I've seen this issue raised a few times on FSDeveloper and I've respected the opinions and conclusions of the more experienced people over there. Doesn't mean that we can't keep knocking on the Google / Microsoft door and asking though!!

Thanks for reading :salute:
 
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