[meteorite-list] Using GIS for Meteorite Hunting and Study
From: Del Waterbury <paseclipse_at_meteoritecentral.com>
Date: Thu, 26 Jun 2008 16:03:29 -0700 (PDT) Message-ID: <188711.49198.qm_at_web51310.mail.re2.yahoo.com> One huge difference between Google Earth and all the other GIS software packages I've seen so far (except a few) is the fact that I don't have to fork out 5,000+ dollars to use it... Google Earth only costs me 20 bucks a year. Don't get me wrong because I'd love to use the high end GIS software (especially since I use high end CAD software at work), but that's a very steep price to pay just to plot out coordinates of my finds. Del --- On Thu, 6/26/08, McCartney Taylor <mccartney at blackbearddata.com> wrote: > From: McCartney Taylor <mccartney at blackbearddata.com> > Subject: [meteorite-list] Using GIS for Meteorite Hunting and Study > To: "MeteoriteList" <meteorite-list at meteoritecentral.com> > Date: Thursday, June 26, 2008, 2:56 PM > I, too, am a GIS person. Since Land ownership & GIS has > just been > brought up, I have to take this one step farther and > mention good & free > GIS packages. > > Someone just brought up ESRI as a GIS progam, and I would > like to > discourage people from using it. ESRI gives you piecemeal > crippled > software that you'll have to pay licenses for each > piece you enable. > While there base 'hook' product is free, you can > quickly spend $2500 > getting the 'Basic GIS' which is just decent GIS > (ArcGIS $1500 and > ArcView $950). Then the extensions can cost $12,500 to > bring you up to > a complete GIS system that gives you map webpublishing and > db > interoperability. All of that is about the same as what > GRASS does, but > its free. > > There are some excellent Open Source GIS programs currently > available. > You can download these for free and have them running > within the hour. > Quantum can quickly import your GPS data. Both of these > run under > Windows or Linux. > > Quantum GIS -- Young, small, and runs fast on old > machines. Think of > this as a 'dune buggy' of GIS. Use this one first, > if you're new to > GIS. > http://qgis.org/ > > GRASS GIS -- Mature, stable, powerful, but very complex. > Good for 3D > and 4D plotting. Like if you wanted to plot a strewnfield > thru a > mountainous area then do a time lapse flyby. Think of this > as a diesel > MAC truck of GIS. > http://grass.itc.it/ > > There are a couple of other Open Source GIS packages, but > they are > immature and not ready yet, IMHO. > > On getting the basemap to use as your main layer, > here's a starting > point. > > http://www.gismonitor.com/data/index.php > http://seamless.usgs.gov/ > > > Steps to take once you have your program and basemaps. > 1. Load basemap into GIS > 2. Load GPS finds into GIS. > 3. Make sure you have all data layers on the same > projection (like > NAD83) > 4. Draw polygons of area searched! Important to know where > you've been. > 5. Draw polygons of area you are ALLOWED to search. > Important to know > where you can't go. > 6. Plot points of where meteorites where found. High > Confidence Data > gets a special symbol. > 7. Plot point of historically found meteorites that you > have low > confidence of where you think they were found. You could > even draw > small circle polygons to represent the 'fuzzy' find > location. > 8. Draw Line of best guess of upper limit of Main fall > axis. > 9. Draw line of best guess of lower limit of Main fall > axis. The space > in between is your best greatest statistical chance of > finding more. > > -mt > IMCA 2760 > > copyright 2008 - I reserve all rights to put some of this > in my upcoming > book. > > > ______________________________________________ > http://www.meteoritecentral.com > Meteorite-list mailing list > Meteorite-list at meteoritecentral.com > http://six.pairlist.net/mailman/listinfo/meteorite-list Received on Thu 26 Jun 2008 07:03:29 PM PDT |
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