Looking For Free Area Calc Software?!

[Redrobes]

You can do any shape with that technique not just rects. What your doing is basically what we call a 1 bit DtoA with oversampling - digital to analogue filter and the mega blur is a huge amount of oversample. By using a mega blur that will find the average gray value for the image which is proportion of black to white ratio which is equiv to area of island to total map size. Anyway - gotta shoot off now.

[ravells]

I think drawplus might do it and I know the early versions are free downloads - let me check and come back to you. Have you looked at inkscape? That might do it too.

[Sigurd]

You can do any shape with that technique not just rects. What your doing is basically what we call a 1 bit DtoA with oversampling - digital to analogue filter and the mega blur is a huge amount of oversample. By using a mega blur that will find the average gray value for the image which is proportion of black to white ratio which is equiv to area of island to total map size. Anyway - gotta shoot off now.

Thanks Red, I understand and I'll try the process but I'd love something as simple as:

Trace shape(s)
Press button
Get area

Its sort of a fringe ability that becomes more useful the more easy it is to do.


Sigurd.

[NeonKnight]

neener, neener, neener. CC3 Does exactly what you want

Probably because it is mapping software based off a CAD program.

[Redrobes]

CC3 Free now huh ? hee hee

Seriously tho, a CAD tool or dedicated mapping app - esp a vector based one should be able to do it but its not too much of a pain to do this for any raster image and although its approximate, you might be able to get the area without any tracing which might in some cases be quite tedious - thinking of the UK coastline.

Since not everyone has CC3 and unless somebody says that there is a nice free app to do just the thing, ill do a quick tut to show how you might be able to do it. Not saying its the best way but its a way.

[NeonKnight]

No, not really free, but if it is what you use for mapping, you don;t need to port from here to there and back again to find the info, nor does one need an add-on, it's all right there.

[wacko76]

Thanks Red, I understand and I'll try the process but I'd love something as simple as:

Trace shape(s)
Press button
Get area

Its sort of a fringe ability that becomes more useful the more easy it is to do.


Sigurd.

Hi, I just registered now, specifically to answer.

I have something even simpler than "trace, press button, get area". What about "trace, get area"?

Use Paint.NET. Open your file, use the selection tools to select the area you want to measure and at the bottom PAINT.NET tells you exactly how many square pixels you have selected. All you need now is to convert that to meters or whatever.

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Now playing: George Harrison - Got my mind set on you (1987)
via FoxyTunes

[Redrobes]

Ah well that sounds like a perfect solution. I knew there must be something about like that.

Welcome Wacko. Another lurker plucked from the far reaches of obscurity

Edit -- Actually, I gotta ask - why do people want to do this sort of thing anyway ? I don't think I have ever felt the need to know areas. I guess for gaming you might want an area of effect spell...

[Midgardsormr]

Edit -- Actually, I gotta ask - why do people want to do this sort of thing anyway ? I don't think I have ever felt the need to know areas. I guess for gaming you might want an area of effect spell...

I can think of an application for my current Mapping Challenge entry, actually. I am currently wondering how much farmland I need to support my little village. Once I figure out how many people can be supported per square mile (probably around 80, given the terrain and available technology), I'll need to know what the area of my irregularly-shaped plots is so that I can determine how many more such plots I need to paint in.

[Sigurd]

The paint.net solution is damn near perfect. The easier it is the more useful it is - with due reverence to redrobes, we seem to have found a number of easy ways.

One of the really great opportunities of having a map to work from is discovering what really 'looks right'. I'm so used to having the idea first and the map second that this is a special challenge.

To me its central to the second level of the world building project.


Sigurd


Repping whacko76 for rushing in to save the day.

He has the highest percentage of solved problems per post on the entire board! (at least for now )