Caltopo tip

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croz2173
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Caltopo tip

Unread postby croz2173 » Wed Aug 06, 2014 1:08 pm

Hi guys, I was turned on to caltopo through people on this site talking about it, and have spent a couple weeks with it so far. I wanted to mention how helpful the shaded relief feature is, especially for hill country. I found if you select shaded relief and then move the slider in the upper right hand corner to 90 or 95%, its amazing how all the terrain features really pop. This has made it much easier for me to identify subtle features that you really cant see well with just the topo. Small benches, humps, and gullies really pop out in shaded relief. Maybe all of you have this down already but I just stumbled on it tonight and wanted to pass it along.


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backstraps
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Re: Caltopo tip

Unread postby backstraps » Wed Aug 06, 2014 1:14 pm

Good tip. Caltopo is by far my favorite mapping source.

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Thermals
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Re: Caltopo tip

Unread postby Thermals » Wed Aug 06, 2014 1:49 pm

Would you mind showing how you do some of these tips

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backstraps
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Re: Caltopo tip

Unread postby backstraps » Wed Aug 06, 2014 2:10 pm

jeremy wrote:Would you mind showing how you do some of these tips

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Not my video, but here is one on layers...that also include the shaded relief layer.

Should check out DEM shading too. VERY handy when you are looking at a topo map, and you want to "color" the wind tunnel area around the entire map (given the elevation range is very close for your map)
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backstraps
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Re: Caltopo tip

Unread postby backstraps » Wed Aug 06, 2014 2:24 pm

Here is an excellent topic on Caltopo and some of its uses.

viewtopic.php?f=5&t=23604&hilit=Caltopo+DEM

I will actually bump the topic as well. Its very good!
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Thermals
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Re: Caltopo tip

Unread postby Thermals » Wed Aug 06, 2014 2:29 pm

I've seen the one before on the shading, do I need to change the elevation for my places to make it work, that's were I got off somewhere.

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wmahunter
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Re: Caltopo tip

Unread postby wmahunter » Thu Aug 07, 2014 1:57 am

Here is how I use cal topo with my gps.

I not only create the layers for shading but mark points, than save them as a kml file.

I import this kml file into my gps software. Go out in the field and check the points.

If I do not want them than I delete them from the gps software. Than I re-save the kml file.

I then re-import this new kml file into caltopo with the changes.

This way I am always using the same kml file for the area I am looking at.
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Re: Caltopo tip

Unread postby wmahunter » Thu Aug 07, 2014 2:07 am

Example for NE Side shading

s1-45a1-90e70f-140f FF8000

s1-45 is the degree of the slope 1 - 45 degrees

a1-90 is the azimuth direction

e70f-140f the contour or elevation range you want shaded in this case 70 - 140 feet

FF8000 is the hex color I chose
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Thermals
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Re: Caltopo tip

Unread postby Thermals » Thu Aug 07, 2014 3:41 am

Going to have to print that off for a cheat sheet thanks a ton I will try it out.

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wmahunter
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Re: Caltopo tip

Unread postby wmahunter » Thu Aug 07, 2014 4:13 am

The only difference with the other directions is this

Example for NE Side shading

s1-45a1-90e70f-140f FF8000

for the other directions the s1-45 stays the same so does the elevation e70f-140f
the only things that changes is the azimuth instead of a1-90 use and color

NW a270-360 71C671
SE a90-180 54FF9F
SW a180-270 FF7256

This should give you a colorful map.

enjoy.


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