Hello Jacob, On the flip side to having the most expensive/best camera, you can always use your phone. There are lots of apps out there that allow you to take GPS tracks/way points/even photos and create maps via google earth or other GPS programs. And most of them are free. One of my favorites is "GPS Essentials" for android. It does all of the things I think you would need at a decent resolution.
Most of the new phones these days take great pictures as well as has great satellite tracking (though of course you are still subject to the things others have listed for GPS quality). Depending on budget, photo quality and GPS accuracy that that is needed for the project it may be a great alternative for a better price. Just depends on what you are looking for. Cheers, Erin On Sun, May 3, 2015 at 1:52 PM, Jacob Hadle <jjha...@gmail.com> wrote: > Hello, > > I have a question for those of you who are familiar with point and shoot > digital cameras that have built-in GPS units. A project I have acquired > this summer involves a plant inventory on a ~7,000 acres site (open and > dense canopy areas). In part, the protocol requires us to take a picture > of each plant species and document their latitude and longitude > coordinates. To optimizes my time effectively, using a camera that > geotags each picture would seem to work well. > > The main interests I have in the point and shoot camera in not so much > how the quality the picture takes, but how accurate the camera will pick > up coordinates. I have spent a considerable amount of time online, and > calling local camera stores researching which point and shoot camera > would have the best GPS quality; however, I have found very little > information about the accuracy and performance in these built-in GPS > units. I am currently looking into the Canon PowerShot D20 or the Ricoh > G700 SE-M. > > If anyone has experience using digital cameras with built-in GPS units > in the field, I would truly appreciate your thoughts. > > Most grateful, > > Jacob > -- ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ *Erin Frolli, M.S.* Research Science Associate I University of Texas, Marine Science Institute 750 Channel View Drive Port Aransas, TX 78373 530.251.7172
