Best practice - orientation of original sketch?
Hello everyone - This is not really a Therion question. It is more of a general survey question. Therion is sort of involved in the situation, though ... When you are drawing the sketch in the cave, is it normal to ALWAYS make north the same direction on each sheet of paper? What is considered "best practice" in this regard? Background: I have been helping with survey of a cave that has grown to slightly over 5000 feet as of a week ago. I have been both sketching and doing cartography. Therion is my weapon of choice! :-) At least 6 people have done some part of the sketching in this cave. All of us have oriented our sketches so as to best fit each section of cave onto the paper. We always indicate north, but it can be any edge of the paper. The man who is coordinating the project is also doing cartography using Windows tools (Walls, Xara, etc.) He sent me an email today asking if I will commit to making all future sketches with north being the top of the page. He asks because some of the computer work he does results in portions of the sketch being upside-down and therefore more difficult to read. Thanks - Bill Gee
+++ Bill Gee [2015-09-14 19:48 -0500]:
When you are drawing the sketch in the cave, is it normal to ALWAYS make north the same direction on each sheet of paper?
No - whatever fits on the paper best is generally best (although if surveying in one rarely knows how that will go unless you have a very joint-controlled cave). In practice I do almost always put North up (and 'up' up on elevations) as I don't know which way the cave is going to go for more than a couple of legs.
What is considered "best practice" in this regard?
Always marking 'N' and 'up' on the sketches so it's obvious.
The man who is coordinating the project is also doing cartography using Windows tools (Walls, Xara, etc.) He sent me an email today asking if I will commit to making all future sketches with north being the top of the page. He asks because some of the computer work he does results in portions of the sketch being upside-down and therefore more difficult to read.
That is probably true with most drawing tools, including xtherion (which doesn't have a way of rotating the view to more easily read the writing, for example (SFAICS)). Wookey -- Principal hats: Linaro, Debian, Wookware, ARM http://wookware.org/
15. 9. 2015 v 4:03, Wookey <wookey@wookware.org>:
(which doesn't have a way of rotating the view to more easily read the writing, for example (SFAICS)).
Wookey, in Therion if labels has not fixed orientation they are automatically oriented to top of map. If North orientations is to top of the sheet too, it is what that man needs. If you draw a particular map in Therion in any direction it will be exported with North to top of page if not rotate in layout is used. m.s.
+++ Martin Sluka [2015-09-23 22:38 +0200]:
15. 9. 2015 v 4:03, Wookey <wookey@wookware.org>:
(which doesn't have a way of rotating the view to more easily read the writing, for example (SFAICS)).
Wookey, in Therion if labels has not fixed orientation they are automatically oriented to top of map. If North orientations is to top of the sheet too, it is what that man needs. If you draw a particular map in Therion in any direction it will be exported with North to top of page if not rotate in layout is used.
Martin, you misunderstand my comment. I am talking about the labels/writing on the sketch drawing. If N is not up on the paper, but the scan is imported with N up, then the writing is sideways/upside-down in the xtherion editor, which can be quite tiresome. Wookey -- Principal hats: Linaro, Debian, Wookware, ARM http://wookware.org/
25. 12. 2015 v 21:33, Wookey <wookey@wookware.org>:
Martin, you misunderstand my comment. I am talking about the labels/writing on the sketch drawing. If N is not up on the paper, but the scan is imported with N up, then the writing is sideways/upside-down in the xtherion editor, which can be quite tiresome.
Wookey, I really don’t understand. Therion will import any sketch with orientation as it was scanned or photographed. How Therion will recognize where is north of sketch? m.
+++ Martin Sluka [2015-12-25 21:56 +0100]:
25. 12. 2015 v 21:33, Wookey <wookey@wookware.org>:
Martin, you misunderstand my comment. I am talking about the labels/writing on the sketch drawing. If N is not up on the paper, but the scan is imported with N up, then the writing is sideways/upside-down in the xtherion editor, which can be quite tiresome.
Wookey,
I really don’t understand. Therion will import any sketch with orientation as it was scanned or photographed. How Therion will recognize where is north of sketch?
Exactly, and there is no way of rotating the interface, so if you have one sketch with the writing a different way up from the others, it's difficult to read. It would be nice to be able to rotate the whole drawing area whilst drawing scraps based on that sketch so that one can read the notes/labels. Perhaps there is a way, but I couldn't find one, last time I had this issue. (And this lack is presumably why the drawer in the original post asked for sketchers to use N=up so that writing/notes/labels and N are consistently aligned in the scans). Wookey -- Principal hats: Linaro, Debian, Wookware, ARM http://wookware.org/
Wookey, and there is any reason to have more than one sketch in one file? Just make shorter scraps :) m.
25. 12. 2015 v 22:23, Wookey <wookey@wookware.org>:
Exactly, and there is no way of rotating the interface, so if you have one sketch with the writing a different way up from the others, it's difficult to read. It would be nice to be able to rotate the whole drawing area whilst drawing scraps based on that sketch so that one can read the notes/labels. Perhaps there is a way, but I couldn't find one, last time I had this issue.
In theory I try to be economical with my paper usage and align the passage sketches such that they will nicely parallel the edges of the paper I'm using. In the southeastern USA where I am this means that passages often trend along NE/SW or SE/NW, so north would be rotated 45 degree (clockwise or anticlockwise, depending on the passage) in the sketches. In practice however, I most commonly just make north towards the top and then stuff cross-sections into the awkward whitespace left over. -Jonny On Fri, Dec 25, 2015 at 3:50 PM, Martin Sluka <martinsluka@mac.com> wrote:
Wookey, and there is any reason to have more than one sketch in one file? Just make shorter scraps :)
m.
25. 12. 2015 v 22:23, Wookey <wookey@wookware.org>:
Exactly, and there is no way of rotating the interface, so if you have one sketch with the writing a different way up from the others, it's difficult to read. It would be nice to be able to rotate the whole drawing area whilst drawing scraps based on that sketch so that one can read the notes/labels. Perhaps there is a way, but I couldn't find one, last time I had this issue.
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My comments written some years ago http://therion.speleo.sk/wiki/doku.php/do#plan_rotation discuss some other implications and frustrations of sketch scan orientations and map output rotations. These days I just choose an orientation for the map before the first survey of the cave system, and adopt that for all scans of survey sketches and outputs. Problems solved but flexibility lost. For surveys that do not conform, all is not lost, they are just trickier to process. Martin I don't think scrap size/length has much relationship to the number of sketches in a th2 file. I always try to draw many short scraps (rather than few long ones) and 95% of the time keep to one survey per th2 file. But if for example I have paper surveys (ie not PocketTopo) and that teams survey for the day is say 1km long, then there may be many separate scanned sketches inserted into that file. If I have n scans, I probably need to have at least n scraps, but usually I will have many more than n scraps for reasons unrelated to the number of scans/sketches. Bruce -----Original Message----- From: therion-bounces@speleo.sk [mailto:therion-bounces@speleo.sk] On Behalf Of Martin Sluka Sent: Saturday, 26 December 2015 11:51 a.m. To: List for Therion users Subject: Re: [Therion] Best practice - orientation of original sketch? Wookey, and there is any reason to have more than one sketch in one file? Just make shorter scraps :) m.
25. 12. 2015 v 22:23, Wookey <wookey@wookware.org>:
Exactly, and there is no way of rotating the interface, so if you have one sketch with the writing a different way up from the others, it's difficult to read. It would be nice to be able to rotate the whole drawing area whilst drawing scraps based on that sketch so that one can read the notes/labels. Perhaps there is a way, but I couldn't find one, last time I had this issue.
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26. 12. 2015 v 5:53, Bruce <bruce@tomo.co.nz>:
but usually I will have many more than n scraps for reasons unrelated to the number of scans/sketches.
Bruce, you are right, but I was answering to Wokey. It looks he has several sketches oriented to North and one or two oriented differently. So I wrote him to just make separate scraps from that sketches. Therion will rotate it appropriately. Martin
Hello everyone - I started this thread, so I think I need to jump in with some additional comments! :-) For me, the starting point for the discussion is a project I am working on where there will be multiple maps produced from the same sketch data. I am doing a set of maps in Therion, and another person (who is also the project manager) is doing a set using Xara/Walls/Compass. I and two other sketchers have turned in drawings oriented so as to fit maximum passage on the page. In some cases sketching at 1 inch = 20 feet, it is not possible to fit the sketch on the page unless north is some direction other than up. When the project manager scans the sketches, he always scans them with up=north. That makes it easier for him to lay out the backgrounds in Xara. However, it also means that comments, cross-sections, elevation profiles etc. are not "right-side up" for reading. He is immensely bothered by this, and so has asked all of us doing sketch to always make up=north. I have not agreed to this because 1) I think it is not necessary and 2) It severely restricts how much cave I can get on a sheet of paper. Since I am no expert at cave survey, I decided to go to the group and see what other people think. As others have commented, Therion does not care what the orientation of the background sketch image is. As long as there are two or more survey stations, Therion will rotate and align things as needed. Cross sections can be rotated by the alignment of the scale line, and elevation profiles usually have survey stations in them. I can easily read notes in most orientations, and if it is a problem then I can open the background image in a regular image viewer and rotate for reading. Martin's comments here and on the Therion web site illustrate that there are considerations regarding map rotation. If the map is produced with north <> 000, then some things will be off. Embedded images are among them. My solution is to choose a map rotation early and stick with it, and also to not put images on the map until almost the last step. Bill Gee On Saturday, December 26, 2015 09:11:51 Martin Sluka wrote:
26. 12. 2015 v 5:53, Bruce <bruce@tomo.co.nz>:
but usually I will have many more than n scraps for reasons unrelated to the number of scans/sketches.
Bruce, you are right, but I was answering to Wokey. It looks he has several sketches oriented to North and one or two oriented differently. So I wrote him to just make separate scraps from that sketches. Therion will rotate it appropriately.
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participants (5)
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Bill Gee -
Bruce -
Jonny Prouty -
Martin Sluka -
Wookey