UK aerial maps?

Quoted message said:

Anyone know of any other sources of (free) online UK aerial maps of
comparable detail please?

Not everywhere is covered, but try http://maps.google.com

--
Please add "[newsgroup]" in the subject of any personal replies via email
--- My new email address has "ngspamtrap" & @btinternet.com in it ;-) ---

Colin Wilson said:

Quoted message said:

Anyone know of any other sources of (free) online UK aerial maps of
comparable detail please?

Not everywhere is covered, but try http://maps.google.com

Thanks, but I'd tried the UK equivalent and dismissed its 'Satellite'
view as next to useless. For example, this is the best I can get for
the area of interest:
http://maps.google.co.uk/maps?q=bewl (then click 'Satellite'😉

Compare that with the map I uploaded!

--
Terry, West Sussex, UK

Terry Pinnell said:

I have a set of UK aerial maps on CD from 'High In The Sky', which
were fairly expensive. They use ECW format files made by GetMapping.
It was an impulsive buy, and although I don't regret the expense, one
major snag I should have anticipated was the awkwardness of using them
around my locality.

The maps are sold by county, with no overlap whatsoever. I live on the
border of West Sussex and Surrey, with Kent too only a couple of miles
away. So any view in this area is likely to be partially grey,
representing the adjacent county. Same thing happens anywhere near a
border. For example, yesterday I was making a view of a 13 mile walk I
did last week around Bewl Water - which happens to lie in East Sussex,
just south of Kent. I've been using an image editor to piece together
a consolidated JPG map from captured sections of ECW screen, but it's
incredibly time consuming. Especially as there is no way of specifying
a consistent zoom level in the GetMapping viewer, so I find I have to
resize sections by trial and error to get them to fit!

Anyone know of any other sources of (free) online UK aerial maps of
comparable detail please? So far I've found MultiMap, which is OK. But
am I right that the only route to get an aerial map is to enter the
post code first? (Unlike the normal OS-based maps, which allow place
names, co-ordinates, etc.)

The results of my efforts so far can be seen in this 1.5 MB map,
showing the GPS track. What appear to be occasional cases of walking
on water are explainable by drought conditions, not any miraculous
qualities of my boots <g>.
http://www.terrypin.dial.pipex.com/Images/29Jun05BewlAerialRed1Annot.jpg

Terry,

Unfortunately you don't mention scale, but the NASA Landsat 7 satellite
aerial photography is freely available and is absolutely stunning in it's
detail, even from 435 miles up!

These can be downloaded from https://zulu.ssc.nasa.gov/mrsid/, once you have
mastered the technique, and are using broadband (they are over 130mb each!).
They come pre-calibrated in NAD25Conus datum, Transverse Mercator
projection, and are largely cloud-free over the UK (don't ask me how they
achieved this!) At maximum scale they are approx 1:45,000. They will work in
Oziexplorer if you download the file conversion utility for these from the
Oziexplorer site.

For sheer impact these will knock you socks off, but may be too small a
scale for your purpose.

You can download a simple viewer which enables you to section the maps into
smaller areas (tif files) from the Lizardtech site at
http://www.lizardtech.com/download/.

Have fun,

Dennis.

In article <[email hidden]>, Terry Pinnell
<[email hidden]> writes

Quoted message said:

Anyone know of any other sources of (free) online UK aerial maps of
comparable detail please? So far I've found MultiMap, which is OK. But
am I right that the only route to get an aerial map is to enter the
post code first? (Unlike the normal OS-based maps, which allow place
names, co-ordinates, etc.)

You can put in grid refs (such as SJ935979). Village names also work.

--

Dominic Sexton

On Tue, 5 Jul 2005 08:45:27 +0100, Colin Wilson <[email hidden]>
wrote:

| > Anyone know of any other sources of (free) online UK aerial maps of
| > comparable detail please?
|
| Not everywhere is covered, but try http://maps.google.com

If you have broadband :-(

--
Dave Fawthrop <dave hyphenologist co uk> http://www.webshots.com
Thousands of wonderful professional photos for your Wallpaper and
Screensaver. also 200,000 amateur pics. Four new pics each day.

NB follow up set

Terry Pinnell said:

just south of Kent. I've been using an image editor to piece together
a consolidated JPG map from captured sections of ECW screen, but it's
incredibly time consuming. Especially as there is no way of specifying
a consistent zoom level in the GetMapping viewer, so I find I have to
resize sections by trial and error to get them to fit!

I think using an image editor is the wrong way to stitch images to be
overlaid as maps. IMO you are better off noting a few known points on
the image and then calibrating the image with them. If the image is
already ortho rectified you only need to know 4 points near the
corners. Then load each calibrated tile into one of the free mapping
programs, add your track from the gps as a vector layer and capture
the image.

I thought Anquet or memory map could now supply aerial photos?

I imagine all the firms supplying this data will want to make copying
like this difficult. I do know that estate agents use a cd that
contains base mapping and aerial photos and can switch between or
combine views.

AJH (posting and reading from URW only so follow up set)

On Tue, 5 Jul 2005 11:36:48 +0100, Fran <[email hidden]>
wrote:

| In article <[email hidden]>, Dave Fawthrop
| said...
| > On Tue, 5 Jul 2005 08:45:27 +0100, Colin Wilson <[email hidden]>
| > wrote:
| >
| > | > Anyone know of any other sources of (free) online UK aerial maps of
| > | > comparable detail please?
| > |
| > | Not everywhere is covered, but try http://maps.google.com
| >
| > If you have broadband :-(
| >
| And the appropriate software on your machine.

The software is a big download, so no big problem.

--
Dave Fawthrop <dave hyphenologist co uk> http://www.webshots.com
Thousands of wonderful professional photos for your Wallpaper and
Screensaver. also 200,000 amateur pics. Four new pics each day.

In article <[email hidden]>, Dave Fawthrop
said...

Quoted message said:

On Tue, 5 Jul 2005 08:45:27 +0100, Colin Wilson <[email hidden]>
wrote:

| > Anyone know of any other sources of (free) online UK aerial maps of
| > comparable detail please?
|
| Not everywhere is covered, but try http://maps.google.com

If you have broadband :-(

And the appropriate software on your machine.

--
/
Fran O(<|={
\

In article <[email hidden]>, Dave Fawthrop
said...

Quoted message said:

On Tue, 5 Jul 2005 11:36:48 +0100, Fran <[email hidden]>
wrote:

| In article <[email hidden]>, Dave Fawthrop
| said...
| > On Tue, 5 Jul 2005 08:45:27 +0100, Colin Wilson <[email hidden]>
| > wrote:
| >
| > | > Anyone know of any other sources of (free) online UK aerial maps of
| > | > comparable detail please?
| > |
| > | Not everywhere is covered, but try http://maps.google.com
| >
| > If you have broadband :-(
| >
| And the appropriate software on your machine.

The software is a big download, so no big problem.

You need the 'correct' OS though, to start off with...

--
/
Fran O(<|={
\

Fran said:

In article <[email hidden]>, Dave Fawthrop
said...

Quoted message said:

On Tue, 5 Jul 2005 11:36:48 +0100, Fran <[email hidden]>
wrote:

| In article <[email hidden]>, Dave Fawthrop
| said...
| > On Tue, 5 Jul 2005 08:45:27 +0100, Colin Wilson <[email hidden]>
| > wrote:
| >
| > | > Anyone know of any other sources of (free) online UK aerial maps of
| > | > comparable detail please?
| > |
| > | Not everywhere is covered, but try http://maps.google.com
| >
| > If you have broadband :-(
| >
| And the appropriate software on your machine.

The software is a big download, so no big problem.

You need the 'correct' OS though, to start off with...

ITIYM the "wrong" OS? ;-)

--
Nobby

In article <[email hidden]>, Fran
<[email hidden]> writes

Quoted message said:

In article <[email hidden]>, Dave Fawthrop
said...

Quoted message said:

On Tue, 5 Jul 2005 11:36:48 +0100, Fran <[email hidden]>
wrote:

| In article <[email hidden]>, Dave Fawthrop
| said...
| > On Tue, 5 Jul 2005 08:45:27 +0100, Colin Wilson <[email hidden]>
| > wrote:
| >
| > | > Anyone know of any other sources of (free) online UK aerial maps of
| > | > comparable detail please?
| > |
| > | Not everywhere is covered, but try http://maps.google.com
| >
| > If you have broadband :-(
| >
| And the appropriate software on your machine.

The software is a big download, so no big problem.

You need the 'correct' OS though, to start off with...

http://maps.google.com doesn't require anything other than your normal
browser (and isn't particularly bandwidth hungry either so does not
require broadband).

As well as the map views you can click on the satellite button and get
satellite views - however a quick play near Manchesta shows the city
coverage reasonable and the countryside coverage almost useless :-(

On the other hand http://earth.google.com/ requires installation of
software which won't work on Win 98 etc.

--

Dominic Sexton

Dennis Pogson said:

Terry Pinnell wrote:

<snip>

Quoted message said:

Quoted message said:

The results of my efforts so far can be seen in this 1.5 MB map,
showing the GPS track. What appear to be occasional cases of walking
on water are explainable by drought conditions, not any miraculous
qualities of my boots <g>.
http://www.terrypin.dial.pipex.com/Images/29Jun05BewlAerialRed1Annot.jpg

Quoted message said:

Unfortunately you don't mention scale, but the NASA Landsat 7 satellite
aerial photography is freely available and is absolutely stunning in it's
detail, even from 435 miles up!

These can be downloaded from https://zulu.ssc.nasa.gov/mrsid/, once you have
mastered the technique, and are using broadband (they are over 130mb each!).
They come pre-calibrated in NAD25Conus datum, Transverse Mercator
projection, and are largely cloud-free over the UK (don't ask me how they
achieved this!) At maximum scale they are approx 1:45,000. They will work in
Oziexplorer if you download the file conversion utility for these from the
Oziexplorer site.

For sheer impact these will knock you socks off, but may be too small a
scale for your purpose.

You can download a simple viewer which enables you to section the maps into
smaller areas (tif files) from the Lizardtech site at
http://www.lizardtech.com/download/.

Have fun,

Dennis.

Thanks, Dennis, that looks a great source potentially. However, my
first attempts are not very promising! So far this is the closest I
can get ;-(
http://www.terrypin.dial.pipex.com/Images/UK1.jpg
Even that is already very pixellated, so presumably I have not yet
found the right places to click?

Going back to my map, I'm not sure how to specify the 'scale' of a map
converted to JPG? When effectively the same image is printed onto an
A4 sheet, my software (the excellent GPS Utility) displayed its scale
as about 22,600:1. And here is a zoom from the original JPG:
http://www.terrypin.dial.pipex.com/Images/BewlScale.jpg
As you see, it shows OS Grid references, 200m apart, so is just over 1
km wide.

Also, for convenience of possible further discussion, the intersection
of the 674 and 338 lines is at
OS TQ 674 338, or in full: 567400, 133800
or in Long/Lat: 51.07904 deg N, 0.38844 E

Any practical pointers you may be able to offer about using that
NASA site would be much appreciated please. I expect it will all be
embarrassingly obvious once I get the hang of it <g>. Can you for a
start tell me how to view even the small scale 'European' map without
the superimposed grid and text please?

Did you also see my reply to Colin? This satellite view
http://maps.google.co.uk/maps?q=bewl (then click 'Satellite'😉
is virtually *all* clouds!

--
Terry, West Sussex, UK

In article <[email hidden]>,
Nobody Here said...

Quoted message said:

Fran said:

In article <[email hidden]>, Dave Fawthrop
said...

Quoted message said:

On Tue, 5 Jul 2005 11:36:48 +0100, Fran <[email hidden]>
wrote:

| In article <[email hidden]>, Dave Fawthrop
| said...
| > On Tue, 5 Jul 2005 08:45:27 +0100, Colin Wilson <[email hidden]>
| > wrote:
| >
| > | > Anyone know of any other sources of (free) online UK aerial maps of
| > | > comparable detail please?
| > |
| > | Not everywhere is covered, but try http://maps.google.com
| >
| > If you have broadband :-(
| >
| And the appropriate software on your machine.

The software is a big download, so no big problem.

You need the 'correct' OS though, to start off with...

ITIYM the "wrong" OS? ;-)

Ha! Yes. Exactly. Buggrit, I'm going to have to 'upgrade'. Lots of
muttering going on here because although I'm running Windows I have no
particular problems with the version I'm using except that it's a
couple of years 'too old' soddit. Grump. Sounds like me.

--
/
Fran O(<|={
\

Quoted message said:

NB follow up set

Terry Pinnell said:

just south of Kent. I've been using an image editor to piece together
a consolidated JPG map from captured sections of ECW screen, but it's
incredibly time consuming. Especially as there is no way of specifying
a consistent zoom level in the GetMapping viewer, so I find I have to
resize sections by trial and error to get them to fit!

I think using an image editor is the wrong way to stitch images to be
overlaid as maps. IMO you are better off noting a few known points on
the image and then calibrating the image with them. If the image is
already ortho rectified you only need to know 4 points near the
corners. Then load each calibrated tile into one of the free mapping
programs, add your track from the gps as a vector layer and capture
the image.

I thought Anquet or memory map could now supply aerial photos?

I imagine all the firms supplying this data will want to make copying
like this difficult. I do know that estate agents use a cd that
contains base mapping and aerial photos and can switch between or
combine views.

AJH (posting and reading from URW only so follow up set)

Thanks, but I'm going to have to study that hard, as I don't follow it
at my present level of skill. I prepared my track picture with GPS
Utility. Two calibration points were fine. However, as I said in my
OP, to get the calibration map for GPSU, I had to stitch together
several sections from different counties.

Simplifying a little, I had two images, Kent and East Sussex. Below
the irregular southern border of Kent, the image was grey. Similarly,
above the (identical) irregular border of East Sussex, the map was
grey. The area of my walk straddled the border.

Can you spell out the steps to proceed along the lines you suggest
please, and specify what software is necessary?

--
Terry, West Sussex, UK

I'm sure Anquet and MemoryMap may be able to provide aerial maps. But
free?

--
Terry, West Sussex, UK

Dominic Sexton said:

In article <[email hidden]>, Terry Pinnell
<[email hidden]> writes

Quoted message said:

Anyone know of any other sources of (free) online UK aerial maps of
comparable detail please? So far I've found MultiMap, which is OK. But
am I right that the only route to get an aerial map is to enter the
post code first? (Unlike the normal OS-based maps, which allow place
names, co-ordinates, etc.)

You can put in grid refs (such as SJ935979). Village names also work.

Well, I can only repeat, that doesn't work here. For the standard
maps, fine. But not for aerial maps. Do you mean you ignore the fact
that the box is labeled 'Postcode', and enter a name or OS ref?

Perhaps you could spell out the links you're using and what you're
entering as a specific example please?

--
Terry, West Sussex, UK

[email hidden] wrote...

Quoted message said:

I think using an image editor is the wrong way to stitch images to be
overlaid as maps. IMO you are better off noting a few known points on
the image and then calibrating the image with them. If the image is
already ortho rectified you only need to know 4 points near the
corners. Then load each calibrated tile into one of the free mapping
programs, add your track from the gps as a vector layer and capture
the image.

I thought Anquet or memory map could now supply aerial photos?

I imagine all the firms supplying this data will want to make copying
like this difficult. I do know that estate agents use a cd that
contains base mapping and aerial photos and can switch between or
combine views.

You can assemble maps or photos using (free) GPS Trackmaker. If you know
the coordinates of the two opposite corners of each image than importing the
tiles is trivial, otherwise you have to calibrate each one after loading
using two known positions. GPSTM can interface directly with most GPS
receivers both as an up/download or else in real time.

David

Fran said:

In article <[email hidden]>, Dave Fawthrop
said...

Quoted message said:

On Tue, 5 Jul 2005 08:45:27 +0100, Colin Wilson <[email hidden]>
wrote:

| > Anyone know of any other sources of (free) online UK aerial maps of
| > comparable detail please?
|
| Not everywhere is covered, but try http://maps.google.com

If you have broadband :-(

And the appropriate software on your machine.

Could you clarify that please? What software, apart from a browser? I
can view both the normal and satellite maps from
http://maps.google.co.uk , but as mentioned in an earlier reply the
latter are pretty useless for the current project.

--
Terry, West Sussex, UK

Dominic Sexton said:

http://maps.google.com doesn't require anything other than your normal
browser (and isn't particularly bandwidth hungry either so does not
require broadband).

As well as the map views you can click on the satellite button and get
satellite views - however a quick play near Manchesta shows the city
coverage reasonable and the countryside coverage almost useless :-(

Hmmm. Why do the Mancs get the good stuff? If you keep zooming out you
can see which areas are in good detail and it is puzzling to say the
least. Mcr and Ldn I can understand but Norwich?!
--
Phil Cook looking north over the park to the "Westminster Gasworks"

In article <[email hidden]>, Terry Pinnell
<[email hidden]> writes

Quoted message said:

Dominic Sexton said:

In article <[email hidden]>, Terry Pinnell
<[email hidden]> writes

Quoted message said:

Anyone know of any other sources of (free) online UK aerial maps of
comparable detail please? So far I've found MultiMap, which is OK. But
am I right that the only route to get an aerial map is to enter the
post code first? (Unlike the normal OS-based maps, which allow place
names, co-ordinates, etc.)

You can put in grid refs (such as SJ935979). Village names also work.

Well, I can only repeat, that doesn't work here. For the standard
maps, fine.

In the aerial photos screen you can only search by postcode as you have
found. So instead you find what you want on the standard maps (with
postcode / place name / grid ref) and then click the camera icon above
the map to display the aerial photo.

If you want to go back to the map click the camera with a cross through
it that has replaced the camera icon.

You can zoom in / out and pan in either map or aerial photo view...

--

Dominic Sexton