Hi Richard. There is a large number of raster to vector programs out there.
Depedning on what you need to do, you will find packages ranging from free to a few thousand bucks. I have worked extensively with R2V (http://www.ablesoftware.com). Not cheap, but the best one I have tried so far. They have a demo online in case you want to try it. No matter what program you use, do not expect fully automatic conversion, there is always a large amount of manual work you need to do, specially if you try to extract streets, human constructions, and so on. It works pretty well for iso-lines (like topography), water boundaries an so on. Unfortunately, if your map contains a lot of text and grids you will spend some serious amount of time cleaning up the results. R2V includes some features for automatic text detection, but training the program to recognize text for each scanned map may be a pain. Regarding free stuff: I have done some experimenting with the raster to vector (r.to.vect) function in GRASS, and it works fines as long as your image is clean. However, my experience may not be of much use in your case: I used it to extract hidrography from a series of Landsat images. Good luck. Armando > -------- Original Message -------- > Subject: [Maptitude] raster to vector > From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] > Date: Mon, June 20, 2005 7:32 pm > To: [email protected] > Cc: [EMAIL PROTECTED] > > I have scanned images of B&W maps of towns in Perú. I want to turn these > into GIS layers. > > Applications that will do this (free or cheap)? and make a file Maptitude > will read. > > Words of caution and/encouragement? > > These maps are scanned at 400 dpi but many of the lines are spotty, > unintentional breaks, likely not all that good maps to begin with (I do not > have access) > > Several have map grids overlaying the map. I have control points, again, the > line quality is sometimes broken. Also some noise, that is little smudges, > also text. > > thanks - > > Richard Hoskins Yahoo! Groups Links <*> To visit your group on the web, go to: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/Maptitude/ <*> To unsubscribe from this group, send an email to: [EMAIL PROTECTED] <*> Your use of Yahoo! Groups is subject to: http://docs.yahoo.com/info/terms/
