Comments on: Converting Raster Maps To Garmin Vector Format With BMap2MP

By: BMaP2MP

BMaP2MP — Fri, 05 Sep 2008 14:02:47 +0000

The only way (known to me) to upload any two (or more) different maps converted separately is to make them as two (or more) different families in Mapsource with own TYP file in each family. By default TYP file prepared by BMaP2MP is made with no Family ID (FID=0) and it is applied to any map which is not a part of any family. So you cannot use more than one TYP file which is not bound to any family.

If source bitmaps to upload have very similar colors then another approach could be to use fixed manual color settings for conversion of all of them. In such a case all TYP files will be same.

By: Leszek Pawlowicz

Leszek Pawlowicz — Tue, 26 Aug 2008 15:58:47 +0000

I suspect the reason is that each map has its own separate color palette created by BMaP2MP, and if you load in two maps, the Garmin only uses one of the palettes. No fix for that now, but I’m working on an upgrade that may help with that problem.

By: Thomas

Thomas — Tue, 26 Aug 2008 09:11:36 +0000

When uploading 2 maps made by Moagu using BMap2MP the colours in the one of the maps is off.

But when I only upload 1 map to my gps it shows fine.

Any workaround?

/Thomas

By: Thomas

Thomas — Mon, 30 Jun 2008 12:52:17 +0000

BMap2MP works very well!

Very handy program that fits nicely into Moagu!

/Thomas

By: Leszek Pawlowicz

Leszek Pawlowicz — Sat, 21 Jun 2008 18:44:31 +0000

I did what you did, exporting a map, and then opening it directly with BMaP2MP; now that I’ve added a BMaP2MP utility to Moagu, I don’t need to do that anymore.

If you haven’t seen it already, the author of BMaP2MP has posted a possible solution to your problem as a comment.

http://freegeographytools.com/2008/converting-raster-maps-to-garmin-vector-format-with-bmap2mp#comments

By: Leszek Pawlowicz

Leszek Pawlowicz — Sat, 21 Jun 2008 18:40:19 +0000

Thanks for your comments - BMaP2MP is a nice utility, very clever, and better than my Moagu program for many graphical maps.

I didn’t discuss the creation of custom colors because that was a bit too technical for the post. I hope to look at that for USGS topo maps in the near future.

By: BMaP2MP

BMaP2MP — Wed, 18 Jun 2008 20:30:10 +0000

2 Marek L.:
You can get “File format error” if your MAP file doesn’t contain an “OziExplorer Map Data File” string in the very first line.

2 All:
BTW, Moscow region map was made with manual color settings instead of automatic settings.

For scanned topo maps (with limited number of colors) manual settings (IndexColors=1 and all colors manually listed at the end of cfg file) usually allow to get much better results (with retaining of all necessary predefined colors).

For aerial photos (with many colors) automatic mode (IndexColors=3) could be better approach. To retain as much details as possible all filters should be switched off but this can lead to worse performance and larger file size. You need to vary IndexColors3Threshold= and DropSmallColors= parameters to find better result in every case of using of automatic mode.

By: Marek L.

Marek L. — Mon, 16 Jun 2008 14:12:18 +0000

It doesn’t work on my computer. I prepared BMP using OziExplorer’s “Save Map to Image File” item from menu. I have MAP file for it, but BMaP2MP still returns “File format error”. How did you get your BMP file from OziExplorer?