GIS lingo

[Grandma & Grandpa]

[Team B Squared]

@Gram&Gramps wrote:

“Specifically, she asked me about, “State Plane NAD83, Zone 4803 South coordinates”.

I will take a stab at this…I work in GIS in the UP and have a master’s in the field. I will try to put it into everyday terms as best I can, but it is difficult since I am what is referred to as a “map geek”.

State Plane NAD83, Zone 4803 South coordinates refers to what is known as the projected coordinate system. Basically, what this means is that in order to get everything to overlay (line up) correctly on a map, everything has to be projected in the same manner, or things will not line up correctly. Think about all the different world maps that you have seen in your lifetime, there are many different types with distortions that occur at different places depending on what type of map it is. These distortions also happen while working with maps at a state or a regional level because of the curvature of the earth (you are mapping a curved surface to a flat picture).

So getting back to the State Plane NAD 83, Zone 4803 South, that is the method that the county uses to project their data (image). I am not familiar with the software that they mentioned, but basically you should be able to plot your lat-long coords into the software they cited, and convert it to to the projected coordinate system that they mentioned above. This will allow your gps points to correctly line up with the aerial imagery the county has for mapping purposes because they will both be projected in exactly the same manner.

Most GIS software will have the above mentioned coordinate system built in as it is a national standard for that particular part of Wisconsin. Every state in the country has these coordinate systems standardized for different regions of their state, this system is known as the State Plane coordinate system.

@Gram&Gramps wrote:

” If you’d like me to register your image we could try to do that. Just attach it to an email along with the waypoints and I’ll see what I can do.”

In this statement registering an image refers to tying an image into the projected coordinate system based upon known points so that it can be used in conjunction with other data layers for display purposes (basically you could look at it in mapping software and the latitude and longitudes will be known).

Hopefully this helps a little bit to answer your question in layman’s terms. If not please let me know and I can try to do a little bit better for you.

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