Inland River Charts in RNC Format

[Daddy's Dream]

I installed the opencpn program last night...... I wasn't pleased. It's not even half the program SeaClear is. It locked up if I tried to put more than a handful of maps in the folder, it didn't find my GPS mouse. But it does open both ENC and RNC maps. That said, I do thnk it would be workable if and when they get all the bugs worked out.

[Morgan Paul]

OK Daddy, this could be the solution to your problem, Fugawi Marine ENC. Go to: Fugawi Software - Demo
They allow you to test the product for 10 days. After 10 days you can pay for it or if you feel 10 days is not a long enough time to evaluate it, and you look hard enough you can find a "Crack" that will remove the time limit. I have only used Fugawi to open
open NOAA BSB raster charts and ENC charts. I have not used it yet with GPS, but as soon as I buy a GPS antenna I will try it.

Good luck pal,
Paul

[Morgan Paul]

By the way I agree with you about OpenCPN, I farted around with it for a few hours and got frustrated. But thanks for posting the link Bob, I had not heard about it before.

[W32PAMELA]

I agree that opencpn is a pain with enc's. I much prefer using SeaClear in US coastal waters. Fugawi will work. I used it with the 10 day free trial 2 years ago to bring my boat up from Mobile to Demopolis on the TennTom.

I was running a computer with a Via C3 1 ghz cpu and found that the enc's really needed a faster processor. Panning was very slow for ENC's even though raster works fine with that processor.

Bob Stewart

[GordMay]

Inland Electronic Navigation Charts (IENCs)
http://www.erdc.usace.army.mil/pls/e...rNavigation.pd

and
Electronic Charting Home

and
Inland Electronic Navigation Charts

[Daddy's Dream]

Thanks Gord, I've already read all that. That's way I was looking for the Inland River Charts in Raster BSB format.

[Morgan Paul]

Daddy, try the link below. I had too open an account which takes about 2 mins. The downloads are free when you click on the normal download icon (light green color). They have a "**** load" of NOAA inland charts. All seem to be in BSB files. I had no problem loading it into Fugawi. I did not try SeaClear, but I bet it works.

By the way thanks for starting this thread, since electronic navigation is new to me, I have learned a lot.

The image below is a cropped screen-shot from Fugawi.

United States, NOAA Raster Navigational Charts (RNC) - Free GIS Data - GIS Data Depot

[dacust]

Originally Posted by Morgan Paul

Daddy, try the link below.
...
United States, NOAA Raster Navigational Charts (RNC) - Free GIS Data - GIS Data Depot

Only problem is, there are still iRNCs.

To follow their naming convention (I think this is what they stand for):

• ENC = Electronic Navigation Charts (vector)
• iENC = Inland ENCs
• RNCs = Raster Navigation Charts

So, by extrapolation, I would call what we are looking for:

• iRNCs = Inland RNCs.

I have been looking for iRNCs for rivers ever since they started the free charting.

@Retcoastie: You mentioned MapCal, Google turned up "Mapping Calendar", but the description didn't sound right? Is that it? Or is it something else? You got a link?

Which brings up what I've been working on. See a new thread I'm gonna start in a few minutes: Converting JPG/JGW arial photos to BSB format.

[Daddy's Dream]

dacust,
MapCal II is a program that installs with SeaClear II. SeaClear uses it to install and calibrate the maps it uses. You can also create BSB maps from other formats with it. It would be very very time consumming to do that with all the maps I need(ie.. jpg to BSB).

[Retcoastie]

MapCal I suspect stands for map calibration. You can use it to calibrate a JPG, a scanned map or photo, or other formats, into a form SeaClear can use. It converts those files to a WCI file. You need to know two or more positions in the WCI and MapCal will figure all the points on that WCI. Then SeaClear can find them and operate with them.
Its not to difficult, just time comsuming on small river charts. Just the thing for a cold winter evening.

Ken

[dacust]

Originally Posted by Daddy's Dream

dacust,
MapCal II is a program that installs with SeaClear II. SeaClear uses it to install and calibrate the maps it uses. You can also create BSB maps from other formats with it. It would be very very time consumming to do that with all the maps I need(ie.. jpg to BSB).

Ah, I noticed it for myself when I loaded to SeaClear to check it out. However, it looks to me (OK, so I haven't tried it), but it uses a WCI world file. You can import BSBs or geo-reference your own .bmps (I can't see how to import a .jpg), but I don't see a way to save them as BSBs. Maybe I'm just missing it.

So I agree with you. I'm not willing to do all that work to be stuck only using SeaClear. I wanna create .kaps so any program can use them.

[Daddy's Dream]

dacust, I stand corrected. MapCal does not convert to BSB. It only converts to WCI. Sorry about that.

I agree. I don't want WCI files. I want BSB files. If I only needed a few files converted I'd try MapCal. But I'm looking at converting 49 files. Of course, who knows, in a few weeks I might just try converting all these into WCI files if I can't find any IRNC files.

[Retcoastie]

MapCal can convert JPGs to WCI and can convert an entire directory at one click. The rub is that the converted files then need to be calibrated. You must have two or more points to calibrate the chart so that SeaClear can use it.
I just finished converting the Tennesse River and they look great. It was easy but time consuming. I am now working on the Cumberland River which is worse. They are in PDF files. I have to bring them up in PDF, screen save them, paste them into Paint, crop them, save them as JPGs, convert them into WCIs, and then calibrate the WCIs. This is a cold rainy winter night project or if I get weathered in at anchor somewhere.
Does anyone know an easier way???

[GPSNavX]

Most of you are probably Windows users, but for Mac OS X users, MacENC supports the Inland ENCs found here..

Inland Electronic Navigation Charts

macenc.com

[Daddy's Dream]

GPSNavX, Thanks I am sure the Mac users can use that info.

There are plenty of programs to open ENC's for Windows. I like using SeaClear and would like to find RNC's of the Inland Rivers.

I might just have to Convert to WCI's.