Hello,

I'm new to the forum, so I hope you don't mind me jumping straight in with a question.

I have a VERY large raster map (60,000 x 60,000 pixels) which I would like to develop further. Unfortunately, when I started this project a few years ago, I did so in Adobe Photoshop. I have since established that the map would be easier to work with in vector format. However, I'm struggling to find an application that is good for cartography, yet capable of working with extremely large and complicated images.

To give you some idea of what my map looks like, here's an example. Please note that my original works doesn't contain any drop shadow or other special effects. It is simply a two colour (blue and white) image:




As you may be able to work out from the sample, my map is of a network of waterways. The example only shown is a tiny portion of one lake. However, my map covers a much larger area of wetland, which includes numerous lakes and rivers. I really would like to retain the detail from my work, but this is my problem.

Due to the simple two-colour nature of my map, I was able to use the 'Select Colour Range' in Photoshop, then convert that selection into vector paths. I also managed to import these paths into Illustrator. So far so good, but there is a problem...

In order to retain an acceptable level of detail in my map, the simple outline of the water mass requires somewhere in the region of 500,000 anchor points/nodes. Illustrator was able to accept this, but it is becoming clear (well, it would appear) that the program is not going to be capable of letting me develop the map much further. The application is already showing signs or reaching its limits on the performance front and I haven't even started to add any additional features/layers to it.

By home standards, my PC is fairly powerful. I use a Windows based PC with a Core i7 965 processor with 12Gb or RAM. However, Illustrator is not able to make use of the additional memory, nor is it capable of exploiting a multi-core processor.

Can anyone explain what kind of application would be suitable for my needs? Having spent several years producing the detailed maps, I'm very reluctant to reduce its detail considerably in order to accommodate Adobe Illustrator.

Many thanks in advance,
Craig.