Orienteering map technology

The coming edition of the Australian Orienteer carries three articles relating to technology and orienteering maps. If you do not yet subscribe then do so via your state orienteering association or email mikehubbert@ozemail.com.au. Per annum 4 editions, AUS A$40. NZL A$49 inc. airmail. Rest of world A$58 inc airmail.

Mapping for Oceania and WMOC 2017

This article by Selwyn Palmer will interest event entrants as well as mappers. Selwyn describes some of the terrain and covers the use of LiDAR with examples.

Karttapullautin – Finnish for auto-generated maps

Lidar hill shading

Stefano Raus, a visiting coach and mapper, writes of his experience and successes with using Karttapullautin for easily producing orienteering training maps. Stefan also describes how he and Adrian Uppill obtained and tested locally flown LiDAR data.

Unmanned Aerial Vehicles in Orienteering

In the final article for the summer edition, Geoff Peck describes how a UAV (drone) helped field work a school map when it was inconvenient for him to go there. Will this offer opportunities to produce maps for remote schools at lower cost? Read Geoff’s experience (previously posted here) and judge for yourself.

OA, ONZ mapping sources refresh

The stars align

Orienteering NZ MapTalk

MapTalk has now moved to a wiki format on the ONZ website (thanks Michael Wood). The first thread is on automated map generators including Karttapullautin. Even if you subscribed to the old MapTalk, you need to register anew – it is easy and fast.

Orienteering Australia mapping

Just in case you haven’t caught up with the move, this is now at orienteering.asn.au/index.php/mapping with an improved layout.

Aiming off

Why printed maps are not dead yet

The latest Royal Automobile Club of Victoria e-News carries an article entitled Why printed maps are not dead yet.

Neil James, Services Manager of RACV and Murray Godfrey, Publishing Manager of Melway  (same stable as Sydway and Brisway and perhaps others) expressed some valid points. These included;

• Google Maps not easily being able to show you more interesting routes
• Online maps lagging current editions of city maps by a year or two.

But to me the most interesting point is made by Murray Godfrey;

…teachers complain that those who rely exclusively on phone navigation lack “spatial awareness”, i.e. a sense of their surroundings and their place in it.

Read the full Royal Auto eNews article Why printed maps are not dead yet