Mapping Hacks

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Chapter 1, Mapping Your Life

#10 Georeference Digital Photos

HACK

the photo. As long as the GPS is on and storing tracklogs while you take

your photos, you can link the photos to their respective locations.

To start out, just like two robbers about to heist a bank, the digital camera

and the GPS need to have their internal watches synced. Since the GPS picks

up the current time whenever it locks onto a satellite, it will always be dead-

on. The only problem with this method is that if you change time zones, you

have to resync your camera’s time, since the camera isn’t quite as clever.

Next, make sure your GPS has a lock on your location, and carry it with you

as you photograph. See “Don’t Lose Your Tracklogs!”

[Hack #58] for tricks on

saving your tracklogs.

The GPS will record your tracks, giving you a record of your movement that

can be later downloaded to your computer. Using the common bit of infor-

mation, the timestamp, various programs can match up the photos to their

respective locations. For the PC, there is Microsoft’s free World Wide Media

Exchange (WWMX, available at http://www.wwmx.org/), RoboPhoto ($35,

at http://robophoto.com), RoboGeo ($22.95, at http://robogeo.com),

Quakemap ($10, at http://www.earthquakemap.com/), and TopoFusion

($40, at http://www.topofusion.com/). You can also use purely web-based ser-

vices such as GeoSnapper.com or Thingster.com.

Alternatively, and for less