QGIS 2.14 bug alert!

If you are using QGIS in archeology, almost probably you want also to produce georeferenced photomosaics, like we do with the "Metodo Aramus" technique (read the related post 1 and 2) and its further evolutions (check this post), which up to day  involves just Kate, QGIS and GIMP). This post is just to warn you that is currently present a bug in QGIS 2.14, so that the georeferencer tool does not work properly. In the screenshot below you can read the details of this bug (and check it at this link).

Screenshot form the official QGIS link (name and images removed for privacy reason)

My advice is to do not update QGIS to the version 2.14 until the bug will be fixed (which I guess will happen very soon).

Have a nice day!

PS

This post reminds e that I should record a new videotutorial with the updated and simplified version of the "Metodo Aramus" (Kate-QGIS-GIMP). I will do it ASAP!

Bibliography

The "Metodo Aramus" in described in English in this publication: 

Aramus Excavations and Field School. Experiences in Using, Developing, Teaching and Sharing  Free/Libre and Open Source Software (here in ResearchGate and here in Academia)

It has been used both in field excavations (e.g. in the case of this article:  "Mura Bastia". Dati archeologici, informatizzazione e rilievi 3D laser scanning del Castello degli Onigo (Pederobba, Treviso) and in archaeological finds documentation, as described by this article (in Italian) proposing a new methodology in this field:

Proposta per un metodo informatizzato di disegno archeologico (here in ReasearchGate, here in Academia)

The "Metodo Aramus" is part of the methodology we teach during our lessons in master and courses, as you can read in the report of one of this experience: 

Corso base di Free Software e Open Source in archeologia: bilancio di un'esperienza di divulgazione pratica (here in ReasearchGate, here in Academia)

QuantumGIS and OpenJump: Photomapping with more pictures (Corte Inferiore method)

Hi all,
i would like to share a new method to realize georeferenced 2D-photomosaic. Thanks to the new version of OpenJump (r3856), now it is possible to export the GIS-view to any kind of resolution (no more block to 3800 width-pixel). Just set in the oj_linux.sh file (OpenJump bin folder) the allowed memory in the line 24

JAVA_MAXMEM=${JAVA_MAXMEM--Xmx2048M}

with 2048M my computer can export GIS-view till the value of 6905 width-pixel. More memory gives more resolution.

This is the videotutorial:

and this an example:

Software recovery: e-foto rectification module for 64 bit

As you can see from this mail (ArcheOS developer mailing list), since July 2011 one of the problem in mainatinnig ArcheOS e-foto package was related with the rectification module of this software. In fact this module seems to be abbandoned in the latest releases. Unfortunatly this code is very important for our archaeological field-work, being connected with the Metodo Aramus (the procedure we use to obtain georeferencad photomosaics).

e-foto's rectification module at work (Metodo Aramus)

For this reason I fisrt tried to contact the software developers (in the official forum) and then, having too few time to dedicate to this problem (I know, my fault...), I decide to upload the code on github at this link: https://github.com/archeos/rectify. This solution should help to keep the rectification module of e-foto ("rectify") an active project as a stand-alone application, avoiding the risk to become an abbandonware.

However, looking to the development of ArcheOS new release (codename Theodoric), there was still a big problem: I was not able to compile "rectify" with Qt4 also for 64 bit, as ArcheOS 5 should have both a 32 and a 64 bit version.

To solve this situation I asked again the help of the community, writing a post in the italian Qt forum. As you can see from the discussion (sorry, just italian) an user (Tom) helped me in updating the source code. It was necessary to modify just two files: matriz.cpp and matriz.h, so I did a new commit on github and now the code is ready to be compiled with Qt4. I did not yet packaged rectify for 64 bit, but I will do it ASAP. Anyway if someone has this kind of machine and needs to compile the module, he can use the source-code in github (It should work, but if there are problems please report them).

I hope it was usefull.

Ciao.

The commit in the source code (Github)

Metodo Aramus

In 2006 we joined the Aramus Excavations and Field School. That one was our first year in the project as a society. Our primary goal was to help in software migration from closed source softwares to FLOSS. The migration ended without problems, thanks to ArcheOS, but it caused some minor changes in the archaeological workflow. One of most important was the new methodology we had to develop in order to performe a fast photomapping technique of the excavation (at least as fast as the system they used before). We called this new methodology "metodo Aramus" and, untill now, we are still using it. The main reason is the quality we reached with the georeferenced photomosaics: compared with other traditional techniques, every single photo in the final image is equlized in brighteness and contrast. The result is a composite picture in which is more or less impossible to recognize the borders between the single photos.  

Comparison between traditional methodology and Metodo Aramus