 long time, please review this section
Main article: City mapping
In dense cities, one-way systems and grids of roads, it can be difficult to record the hundreds of street names encountered.
One method is to sketch how the streets intersect (not to scale), and correlate that later with the pattern of tracklogs generated.
Another technique is the two-pass approach, to record tracklogs, then go back with a printed map of street outlines from OSM and fill-in the road names by reading road signs.
A one-pass variant of the two-pass approach is to use aerial imagery (instead of track logs) to make the outline, then print out the untagged segments (i.e. a JOSM screenshot), then go write down road names.
If you don't have lots of space in your paper sheets, consider marking numbers in the print-out, then correlate those numbers to road names (or landmarks) in another sheet of paper.
Main article: Field Papers
User prints black-and-white map of some region and then uses pen/pencil to collect information using text and/or special signs.
This technique is similar to a hand-drawn map, but it gives you a head start with what we already know and you have the option of letting another volunteer edit the map from your notes.
Visit the web site and choose the area where you will be going, print out the OpenStreetMap for that area, then take it with you and make notes on what needs to be changed.
After you are finished making notes for an area, you can choose what to do with them. You can just look at your notes while editing the map normally or you can scan in your notes. After scanning, you, or any other map editor, can edit the map while using your notes on the screen as a backdrop.
Voice recording / Audio mapping
Main article: Audio mapping
Some mappers have found voice recording to be the medium of choice mapping. It's a form rapid data gathering which leaves quite a lot of interpretation work to do later, but it is also quite "hands free", so can be great for mapping by bike for example, avoiding continuous stopping and starting
There are a great number of different audio mapping styles, with different accuracy, level of detail, using different hardware and software. There are easy techniques for the beginner and difficult but extremely powerful techniques for the advanced mapper. Check out the completely restructured main article.
Main article: Video mapping
For those driving alone who can't stop to take notes: mount a video camera (or digital camera in "movie" mode) somewhere that it can see roadsigns, and leave it recording for the duration of your journey. You can combine this with audio mapping (speaking road names and information into the video camera's microphone, e.g. "turning left into Darwin Drive").
Afterwards, note the timestamp of anything interesting in the video (e.g. "Shops on the left between 1:32 and 1:37") and correlate that with the GPS tracklog. It's also easy to correlate features seen on the video with the tracklog ("I turned left here on the GPS track, but the road still continues ahead"; or "I turned left here onto a cobblestone road").
Main article: Photogrammetry
Photogrammetry is a technique used by many mapping agencies and companies to gather data. When you have two photos of a scene from different positions it's possible to extract the geometry of the scene. This can be done manually or by software and by using this, features such as buildings, road shape and amenities can be added to the map with a high relational accuracy.
Main article: Armchair mapping
|This article is a stub. You can help OpenStreetMap by expanding it.|
Quite popular method, but it has several drawbacks.
Colourizing the map
Once all the tracks have been added and updated, you are ready to begin colourizing the map. Some areas can be added from memory, but not all areas have clearly defined boundaries. It is important to make sure the streets (the GPS tracks and TIGER data) are properly updated first because often times they form boundaries for other areas.
You can use aerial imagery (e.g. the default ones in our editors) to fill in