OT - Google Maps

[DMBillies]

Looking for some thoughts, ideas, and solutions for a problem I'm having. Lot of techy types in here that I figured might have some good solutions.

I created a map of Centennial Park (http://www.communitywalk.com/NiVEs) that I am trying to use in my research. To my surprise, they don't have touristy maps of the park and the landscape architecture plans I was able to get were wrong (guy said they changed the plans quite a lot in the field and they never get updated officially). Anyway, that's why I had to create my own.

My plan was to draw it at that site, zoom all the way in on map mode, get screen captures of the parts of the map, stitch them together, and print them on a big printer so that I could get a map roughly 18" x 24".

My plan failed at the capture stage. It seems that saving the captures causes a mysterious loss in quality that is very problematic for me when I then stitch the images together and blow it up (I assume this is done so you can't just copy, at a high quality, any image you can get on your screen). Google maps (and this site) do not seem to have any kind of option for reproducing maps that go outside of the viewing window. The quality if I just print the map at a sufficiently small scale to fit it all in the window is even more appalling.

I realize there is probably no easy way to do it because google doesn't want people taking and printing huge versions of their maps without paying for them, but this is well within the terms of use and honestly I only used their data (the satellite images) to make my map. If I could just lift my lines right off of that page I wouldn't even need the google maps to be a part of the finished product.

Just looking for fixes to the problem. Any ideas?

P.S. If I can't get these printed off of here somehow I think I'll cry. I spent the past week drawing all of those paths and buildings in and then verifying that they are correct. I gotta make it work...

 

[sandalscout]

Brian, I may not be following you exactly, but how exactly are you attempting to capture the screen?

 

[DMBillies]

Using the snipping tool in Win Vista. I can't figure out a way to get high quality captures out of it. If there's another program I can use, I'm all ears.

 

[sandalscout]

Okay, had some more time to look at this, Last night the map wouldn't actually load from the Communitywalk.com site, so I was only playing around on google maps. I could do simply printscreen and paste these into paint, and all looked fine for me.

Today, your map is loading, but I'm a little confused, because I can get your entire route on screen zoomed in all of the way, and I can 95% of centennial park onscreen while zoomed in 100%. What resolution are you viewing it at? I'm @ 1280x1024 on a 19" and it's all there, so I could do a single capture and get it all into whatever program I wanted. The issue from this standpoint would be enlarging the issue, which would cause pixelation, but since you are talking about taking snippets and splicing them together, I suspect this isn't your problem.

Am I misunderstanding?

 

[Mnemic]

I can capture GoogleMaps for you at 1920x1200 from home. Minus the Borders at least, but its a HUGE chunk of maximum zoom on google maps.

I've never tried to capture data from google maps, but my general philosophy on the internet is, if I can see it, I can copy it

Would a few of these big screen caps help?

 

[DMBillies]

My screen res is 1280x800 on my laptop. At the closest zoom I am getting about 75% of the park in (including all of the green and the space between 27th and 28th ave). If you have a bigger monitor and/or a better resolution it seems likely you could be getting the whole thing in.

My basic problem is that I need all of the park on one map at a high enough resolution that when I print it on 18x24" paper you will still be able to read the street names and the image won't be overly pixelated. I need to make the map rectangular, so I'll need a little bit extra on each side to get the whole park in.

I thought taking screen caps from vista and stitching them would work (simple, flat images merge really well). The problem seems to be a mysterious loss in image quality between my capture and what I see on the screen. When I first do the capture it looks the same, but after saving it and reopening the file there is a clear reduction in quality that will prevent me from getting a clean looking map out of it.

So, if either of you guys can get better screen caps at a full zoom from the site listed above, I would appreciate it. The higher the resolution the better because it will give me the option of further zooming to print specific parts of the map, but I only really need something that will allow me to print the full map on an 18"x24" piece of paper in a file type that will allow me to easily edit it and add text labels/shapes/lines etc.

The only reason I did any of this online is because I had to have a satellite image on which I could overlay the paths and buildings and then easily remove the satellite image. If I had better editing software this would have been a snap to do on there with layers (or if my photoshop worked with Vista...or if MSpaint didn't suck).

 

[Mnemic]

See if this looks ok.

http://www.wickedawesome.net/img/gmap1.png

edit:
I use Dual Screens at work, and just captured that using a free (I think) app called "FastStone Capture"

if the quality is ok, try using it.

 

[sandalscout]

Mnemic, I THINK Brian is looking for the map data, not the satellite photos. Am I right?

Brian, consider your self lucky finding good satellite image when you did your traces, the satellites don't take straight down photos, when I did my GIS project, we did something similar, and discovered that a square block was twisted and off by as much as 100 feet on one corner!

I've only got a little laptop at home with me this weekend, but I can take a capture on my desktop (sorry Mnemic, I've got TRIPLE 19" flat panels at work! haha ) monday.

Oh, just had a thought, what program are you using to make your saves? Paint has SERIOUS problems distorting data with many different file formats.

 

[ocd_mariner]

Oh yeah! My office chair is MADE from 19" flat panels. Bam!

 

[sandalscout]

HAHAHAHAHA, NICE!!!!! I/T Guys are all such one-upping nerds!

 

[DMBillies]

I was going to use photoshop elements on my old laptop to edit in the last of the things I need (a key, a compass, etc.).

If you've got displays that are that big and can grab one capture of the whole thing, that will save me the trouble of stitching it. I'm going to play with this some more tonight/tomorrow and see if I can't get anything good off of it. The capture program Mnemic suggested works fine as a trial and it is dragging good images. I think I can just manually line them up in photoshop and call it a day. I just have to actually find the time and motivation to try that out.

 

[sandalscout]

Brian, PM your email address, I'll shoot you what I can get, and see if it's usable.

 

[yerboy]

how about just using the Ctrl printscreen then open paintbrush and paste the screen shot.

 

[yerboy]

as such.. however photobucket did resize the photo

 

[DMBillies]

Just so y'all know, I was able to get a decent looking map by using that screen cap program posted above and then just manually merging the images together in photoshop. Thanks for the input and ideas.

 

[Mnemic]

Hey!!

Thats NOT a Tennis court, those are Sand Volleyball courts!

 

[sandalscout]

Glad you got it Brian, just was coming on here to get the shots.... Good luck with the rest of your project!

 

[DMBillies]

Ok, so it does look more like sand than a tennis court in the satellite pic... :sad1:

I drove by on the road below it and just glanced up and saw the tops of some nets (couldn't see the surface). I guess I jumped to the tennis conclusion because it seemed more likely.

I'll fix that when my advisor gives me her feedback and, without fail, asks me to change the things that are the hardest to change.

 

[rsteagall]

You should also experiment with google earth and overlays.

 

[sandalscout]

<a href=showthread.php?s=&postid=13137964#post13137964 target=_blank>Originally posted</a> by rsteagall
You should also experiment with google earth and overlays.

He'll run into the problems that I did:

"the satellites don't take straight down photos, when I did my GIS project, we did something similar, and discovered that a square block was twisted and off by as much as 100 feet on one corner!"