How to display maps/images in RAMMS?
sometimes it is a bit tricky to display georeferences maps and/or orthophotos in RAMMS. This tutorial should help to successfully achieve this task.
There are two ways of organizing maps and orthophotos:
- Place all your maps and orthophotos in a general 'Map' and 'Orthophoto' folder on your PC and link these folders in the RAMMS Preferences (Track -> Preferences - Map directory and Orthophoto directory). (please do not create the folders in 'My Documents', because 'My Documents' is normally located in 'C:\Documents and Settings\......', and as you know, RAMMS does not like the spaces in directory path names!)
- For every project, create a 'Map' and 'Orthophoto' folder in your project directory and save the maps and orthophotos in there. Link these folders in the RAMMS Preferences (Track -> Preferences - Map directory and Orthophoto directory). For every project, you have to adjust the preferences.
Format and size of maps/orthophotos:
- IMPORTANT: Map/Orthophoto area must cover more than the project region
- TIFF (only TIFF at the moment)
- Compression: none, lzw, jpeg, pack bits
- RGB, Indexed, Grayscale
- 8-,16,24-bit (True Color)
How to create maps/orthophotos for the use with RAMMS?
If your map/orthophoto is a georeferenced TIFF-file, then RAMMS should be able to display the file. Georeferenced means, that you need a World-file (*.tfw) together with the TIFF-file. The World-file georeferences your TIFF-file.
If RAMMS can not display your file, then the easiest way is to load your map or orthophoto in ArcMap, zoom to an appropriate view and export the map using 'File -> Export Map'. Make sure to select TIFF-Format, ca. 300 dpi resolution and activate the checkbox 'Write World File', see picture below: