[Geotiff] Geotiffs for mapping of imaginary worlds

[Daniel Denk]

I'm actually investigating this right now. There's a particular project that
myself and a couple friends have involvement in which already has a uniquely
created world, which we're looking to take to that next level.

For practicality's sake, if you wish to use or edit a unique world - means
that although you perceive the world as a different size, a
'work-around' would be to work with the data with the same structure as
Earth. This will at least produce the results you're after in the work-flow
with existing GIS software. If, on the other hand, and like I'm experiencing
as well - if you have a preconfigured coordinate system in this virtual
world, then it will require additional conversion after the editing process.
The goal would be though to be able to import it into a program that
understands and allows for capabilities - and adjustments or conversions may
have to be made as a final step.

There are a variety of Open Source and free tools available for these tasks,
namely Frank Warmerdam's FWTools with Open EV. It's an incredibly powerful
tool-set once you dig in and get yourself familiarized. Frank may have
better answers toward the specifics of operating with FWTools and how the
work-flow chain can be organized for your needs. (Actually, I've yet to bend
Frank's ear about this one.)

One of the primary goals with this pet project was to implement 'season
change' based on a variety of my techniques to produce such imagery in
Photoshop, and to incorporate actual realism using satellite or aerial
imagery as the source for the landscapes.

So I suppose my suggestion would be: Convert your datum to Earth's so that
it will view properly in existing programs and lend itself to being able to
be updated/edited.

I'm also curious... Would you mind discussing/devulging what your project is
for? If not, I'd understand.

Take care,
Daniel Denk




On 11/24/05, Mike Parkes <mikeparkes at rogers.com> wrote:
>
>  This will probably seem like a very weird request…
>
>
>
> What I am interested in doing is using GIS software to map an imaginary
> planet.
>
>
>
> My starting point is a number of raster images in different projections
> that cover parts of the planet (e.g. Robinson projection for a world map,
> different projection for larger-scale maps). I want to be able to integrate
> and overlay these images, then create vector shapefiles. I'm only concerned
> with surface mapping (no elevation modeling), at least for now.
>
>
>
> The imaginary world is perfectly spherical, but a different size from
> Earth. Hence, to georeference my images, I need a GIS program that allows
> user-defined datums.
>
>
>
> I have been investigating the GeoTiff file format, and (through the
> Listgeo and geotifcp utilities), it has all the machinery that I need to
> create an imaginary datum, a map projection and to attach the datum and
> projection to an image. However, I haven't been able to find a software
> package that can actually interpret and make use of this specialized GeoTiff
> information.
>
>
>
> Which free or low-cost GIS software packages can utilize Geotiff's
> capability for user-defined datums?
>
>
>
> Thanks for any help!
>
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