Please refer my March 2025 diary entry as this is changes only.

• Changed the voice recording notes method to a dedicated microphone nearer my face. I launch a script at the same time I start the side cameras. It still saves as date/time stamped 1 minute length files.

• Use a dedicated 2nd WiFi device on the laptop for direct connection (not using in van WAP) to the 225deg side facing camera. This increases the max framerate slightly. The 270deg side camera is still USB connected.

• Procured a cheap 2K dashcam and mounted it rear window. Actually has a GPS position reporting fault, but the clock is okay. Do a lot of local processing to geotag against the UBLOX GPS unit to give 1FPS above 45kph and 3FPS below. Very handy for capturing the back side of speed signs by either swapping views locally or seeing the signs recognised on Mapillary.

• The WiFi/cell router now has two antennas connected (MIMO) which helps the upload rate rate and low signal area performance. Now upload 15-40GBytes for each drive day.

• One of the 20 year old Toshiba laptops had a temp sensor fail such that the cooling fans wouldn’t start. Upgraded both to 10 year old HP Probooks. These reduce processing time approx in half. The extra dashcam included. Still running Debian Linux.

• No longer beacon APRS.

• GPS nav unit now has giveway and stop sign POI’d displayed, so I can add these to the voice notes. I continue to create other special POI’s plus modify the mkgmap process for better end use.

Currently near Injune Qld about to sit still for a while.

Cheers Bob

A few minor changes, so this is more an update, but with close to full details.

The tools;

• Forward looking 8.3MP/4K dashcam 2FPS.
• Left facing (270 degrees) old Samsung 8MP phone 1FPS. (Out passenger window)
• Left rear facing (225 degs) old Samsung 3.6MP phone 0.6FPS. (Out passenger window)
• The dashcam records audio (my voice) in one minute chunks.
• All photos and audio are geo-referenced to their current location.
• The Garmin navigation GPS has a current OSM based (mkgmap) map, a POI set of OSM FixMe’s.
• I am a permanent road dweller, retired and wandering Australia. For 10 years now.

The methods - Start of day;

• Start a GPS/NMEA (USB via laptop) UBLOX recording function that also flags movement >3kph and <40kph.
• Start an APRS beacon for those that like to track me. (msg me for details)
• Mount/power up the side facing phones and launch their (laptop) 3>40kph recording scripts.
• Power up the dashcam and let its own GPS settle for 2-3 mins. This is also the voice notes recording device.

The methods - Basic drive;

• Open high speed road 70*100kph. Just let it capture doing voice as below.
• Can’t really play music as it can trigger voice events.

The methods - Voiced items;

… See full entry

I have just spent the last 2 months “intensely” making observations around lesser populated areas in WA’s southwest almost solely from the vehicle drivers seat. I then enter that data into OSM ID most afternoons/nights.

The tools;

• Forward looking 8.3MP/4K dashcam 2FPS
• Left facing (270 degrees) old Samsung 8MP phone 0.3FPS
• Left rear facing (225 degs) 1.3MP webcam 1FPS
• The dashcam records audio (my voice) in one minute chunks
• All photos and audio are geo-referenced to their current location
• The Garmin navigation GPS has a current OSM based map, a POI set of all WA stopping places from MRWA and any OSM FixMe’s.

The methods;

Most of the data is by voice prompts that are reviewed afterwards, but a small proportion come from only viewing (mainly) the 270 camera images of shop etc fronts and signs. It is surpising how useful the multiple camera views are.

Voiced items;

… See full entry

I run a Mapillary supplied BlackVue dashcam uploading my take via the mapillary_tools in two “stabs”. The first is usually same day for road speeds segments below 55kph, the second is up to 2-3 months later. This gives town/village streets and remote road intersections/signs coverage first, for other mappers. I am also taking 1FPS rear left (webcam) and right angle left images (Samsung phone) at less than 40kph for immediate geotag, process/upload. (after manually culling privates)

… See full entry

Thought it worth posting this.

After much frustration I have come up with what I do regarding amenity=parking and highway=rest_area (plus details) and have been running this way for 6-12 months. This is live data input (my eyeball/camera/recording etc) as I drive through. I think there have been maybe 1200-1400 objects so far!

I have generally adopted a formal vs informal data set. Formal is almost based wholly on site signs and informal on a mix of triggers and interpretations.

This generally only applies to regional places, not so such towns and high population areas.

There are always contentions! I have come across many (other mapper) highway=rest_area objects that are not “my formal”, as I make no allowance for locations that “could be”. Indeed any parking area could be an informal rest area, so are informal ones needed at all? In the end I sometimes use informal=yes or informal=no to clarify.

So looking at the SA and WA govt databases and my limited travels, SA calls everything “rest areas” and their naming system starts “RA”. This is also seen on roads where virtually every stop has a rest area sign at 1km before, followed by a “P” or two. WA calls everything “stopping places” with a plain number designation. It’s almost as if “P” locations in WA are not allowed to be rest areas! There is also a distinct lack of HGV defined “P” in WA where I wonder if trucks actually get stuck in small ones! Of course Qld is quite unfriendly in defining large areas with useful facilities as HGV only, but that’s another story!

The “informals” are basically NHVR Green Dot, Stockpiles/gravel pits and any place that looks like a truck has been parking for a few years! I also map gravel pits that “could be” used for parking.

So onto the process.

MAIN DECISIONS

… See full entry

14th March 2022

I am now starting to tackle (mainly my own) fixme’s.

Something like a farm gate and station name is not always readable on my imagery, but even after creating a feature and merging in other sources (like overheads), there are information gaps. A fixme is handy, but I need to action them as well!

I ran a simple overpass query for all node and way fixme’s in a boundary box, then exported it to gpx. I initially thought a Viking moving (GPS) map would work well, but the laptop is on the passenger seat away from my driving vision. I ended up (default) converting the gpx to a Garmin poi file with gpsbabel. set to warn at 800m distance . The “name” is displayed if that feature field is populated, else the node/way number. Additionally if one calls up the POI information on the GPS navigating unit the fixme text is displayed.

Basically I just navigate to the nearest fixme POI using the Garmin GPS display/selection tools. (Note that most of my work is in rural/remote areas, not urban)

I can then drive up close to the “problem” with the dash camera and capture for later editing. I also use the audio from the dashcam mp4 which is me talking into it! Each movie and frame are time referenced to the audio, so it is easy to correlate. I can for example read a fine print sign at a distance that the camera doesn’t capture as well.

5th April 2021

As I tour around Australia I both capture street images for Mapillary, plus do online OSM editing. I don’t have a fixed address, so all my work is done mobile.

Mobile Internet access is quite expensive here, so the daily take of between 8 and 20 Gbytes is saved to a portable USB drive and another mapper kindly uploads 500-1500 GBytes for me at a time. This of course can delay online imagery by 3-4 months as I have to mail or take the drive to the upload location.

The same imagery (downrated to 1FPS) I take on a daily basis is locally geo-encoded and viewed at perhaps 10FPS - 8,000-15,000 per day. Those of interest (100-200) I save to a FIFO directory and periodically run a gpscorrelate job to dump lat/lon to a text file. This text file is then used to cut/paste into the OSM ID editor search/location fiel. Each completed image is moved to a “done” directory and the co-ordinate cut from the text file makes it easy to know which is next.

I correlate the overhead Bing/DCS/Mapbox etc view with ground level ones to make map changes.

I tried launching OSM/ID from Viking or the image directly but it always created a new browser instance.