Have you ever wanted to overlay your GPS route on top of an orienteering map? This article explains how it can be done.

A full-sized image is not a great way of interacting with an orienteering map. PDFs are OK – you can zoom and move about pretty well. But what if you want to overlay your GPS route on top of the orienteering map?

Demo

Here’s an orienteering event in Sydney from November 2020 that uses the techniques from this article.

Tools Required

This can all be done for free.

  • An orienteering map in either PDF or raster format. https://www.omaps.net/au is a great source to experiment.
  • QGIS
  • A static web server such as Netlify or any number of other solutions. There are free tiers available.

Prepare the Map

If you have a digital image of an orienteering map, chances are that it is not geographically enabled. It is just a series of pixels of different colours that went put together form a map. It is not connected to the real world, and we need it to be! This process is called georeferencing.

Import the GPX

TODO: importing GPX into QGIS

Set QGIS styles

TODO: setting some basic colurs in QGIS for the GPS track.

Export the tiles

TODO: THe processing toolbox is your friend.

Edit the HTML

TODO: Customise the default generated HTML and location of tiles.

Publish the HTML

TODO: Put the HTML and tiles where people can see them