GPS Logging and Mapping

I'm a big fan of logging flights with my handheld gps and plotting them on
various maps,
for giving maps to friends who I've taken for "fun flights", and especially
for evaluating my
instrument training and competency.

I use OziExplorer and OziExplorer 3D. Below are some notes I've made about
the various processes (sorry about the format, it was pasted from a Word
doc)

Also, I posted some examples to alt.binaries.pictures.aviation entitled
"Oziexplorer Examples"

Cheers,
John Clonts
Temple, Texas
N7NZ


Ozi Explorer

------------- Waypoint generation

http://www.navaid.com/CoPilot/

Be sure to include waypoints and airway intersections if desired. Many
waypoints

\are actually considered "reporting points"

important: indicate version 3.0 of Copilot, and "add db to existing points"
= No

Then convert the copilot database to oziexplorer waypoints using

http://wayhoo.com/index/a/gpsbabel

important: for some reason the generated waypoint file will not be usable by

oziexplorer. To fix, open the file with wordpad and then just save it.

(must be some cr/lf goofiness or something)

------------- To print:

Printing from oziexplorer directly causes an application error.

Instead, print to a color image (bmp). convert this immediately to a jpg or
png,

'cause bmp's are huge. (especially if you're going to email it to folks)

------------- Conversions:

The trial/demo version of Oziexplorer can use only bmp's.

pdf-to-bmp: use imagemagic, convert somefile.pdf somefile.bmp

or better, ghostscript:

gs -sDEVICE=pnggray|png16 -r150 -dBATCH -dNOPAUSE -sOutputFile=DAL_KNEAD.png
DAL_KNEAD.pdf

For some reason approach plate pdfs from myairplane.com convert more clearly
than those

from AOPA (despite the converse in the adobe reader)

The demo version of Oziexplorer will only use bmp for map. Otherwise though,
always use

something else because bmps are huge.

------------- Map sources:

---- Sectionals: kyler laird's
http://aviationtoolbox.org/raw_data/...onals/current/

May have to rotate/warp by .5 degree or so to "orthogonalize".

(Registered version of oziexplorer allows multiple reference points)

also see rec.aviation.misc postings marked "AVIATIONTOOLBOX"

Also available at www.myairplane.com

---- Approach plates:

www.myairplane.com (these seem to convert to bmp more clearly than AOPA's)

www.aopa.org (members only)

---- Civil maps:

yahoo, mapquest, etc

my favorite though is: http://tiger.census.gov/cgi-bin/mapbrowse-tbl. To get
an

image bigger than 422x359 though, click on "download GIF image", then
manually change

the URL parameters at the end of the URL from "ht=359&iwd=422" to whatever
you want.

---- Radar Images


The NWS radar city references seem to be from the US Census Gazetteer:
http://www.census.gov/tiger/tms/gazetteer/. Another source for similar data
though is from USGS Geographic Names Information System ,
http://geonames.usgs.gov/pls/gnis/we...web_query_form. The latter
is what is used by Wayhoo.
CBAV references seem to be airports as opposed to VORS. Except that the
ones marked '+' are actual radar sites.


------------- Other Topo and Sat Image

http://terraserver.microsoft.com/geographic.aspx
http://www.terrafly.com/TP/advancentry.html
http://www.mapquest.com/maps/map.adp...ude=42.48&long
itude=-71.15
http://www.multimap.com/map/browse.c...2.43&lat=48.88