Carlson Software Forum

I am trying to create a surface from a Google Earth image and not having much luck. I am using Carlson Survey 2010 with IntelliCAD, build 100713. Can anyone help me out?

Thanks,
Ben

I too will be very interested in seeing the answer to this.
As far as I know, there is no data in a Google image that can be extractef to build a surface. No elevations, no points, just a picture.
If that is not so, this will be a really neat tool to see in action and something new for this old dog to learn.
I just did a little looking. You need to go to carlsonds.com. Register and login. Then go to the very bottom of the page and click on "documents". That will take you to an area of training videos. One of the videos is on using DEM files. This appears to be along the lines of what you are wanting to do. The video recommends using data from the USGS because it is the most accurate. Yet they say 90% of the vertical data is +/- 7 METERS. That's 21 feet, plus or minus. Is that close enough? Not for what I do.
Anyway, register on that site and see if you can find what you need.

Thanks, I'll check that out.

Ben

check it out.

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Lord, here they come again!! What a Richard Canium!

I tried to do this a few weeks ago using 2010 embedded w/ AutoCAD and was successful creating a surface. I can't speak to the accuracy of the data, but I was able to bring "google" data into Carlson.

Before using the command you have to do a couple things. First, you have to make sure that you set your coordinate system in your drawing setup. Second, make sure you have google earth open.

Then run the command (surface --> Import/Export Surface Data --> Import Google Earth Surface). You have two options for the extent. 'Query' is the first, this is if you have zoomed in within google earth to your site, hitting query will pull the limits from google earth. The 'Select with Drawing Window' is simply creating a window within Carlson. If you use the second option, google earth should zoom to the corresponding area.

I did not mess with the Pixel Sampling Interval. Hit ok and it should ask you where you would like to save your .tin file. The command does not actually import/draw the surface from the .tin file, so you will have to bring in the .tin file (surface --> contour from tin file). Hope this was useful.

Sure is!! Neat planning tool if nothing else. It will be fun to do areas that we have already topo'ed and see how they compare. Thanks for sharing.

Be extremely cautious when working with Google Earth data. As mentioned earlier, it might be OK for a preliminary planning and presentation tool but I'd never use it for any type of design.

Although not necessarily representative of all the data it can yield, this Google KMZ file from November, 2010, illustrates some potential issues. User beware.

How often are the Google Maps satellite images updated? We've done quite a bit of renovations on our little farm and I'm curious when we'll get to see a change in the satellite view on Google Maps or Google Earth.
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According to http://earth.google.com/support/bin/answer.py?hl=en&answer=21417, "Google Earth defaults to displaying the highest-quality images available for any given location." This Google page has additional information and links where you can report (and be notified) when imagery is updated at a particular location.

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Ladd Nelson
Carlson Software