Photography GPS Question

[eggzlot]

I have an eTrex30x which I got about 6-7 months ago. I've taken it on several day hikes and 2 backpacking trips. For these trips the goal of the GPS was:
1) make sure I stayed on the trail
2) record my own trail for stats (time, distance, etc)
3) have a GPX file that I could put into lightroom and merge into my photo files so I could have GPS coordinates attached to my photos. I have a nice Olympus OMD EM5 camera, it does not have GPS built in, so this is how I tag the photos

I am about to leave on a 2 week vacation. I want to tag my photos with GPS. Do I just create 1 very long track? I dont really care about time/distance, etc as with a hike. People suggest 1 track per day? What is the best way to manage? Again the focus is 99% photo tagging, not worried about the distance I traveled or wanting to share the track with family/friends (I do that with my hiking/backpacking but do not see the need to send someone a GPS graph of my walking around a city on vacation).

 

[Nuvi-Nebie]

One track is fine as long a the geotagging software can handle a GPX file with up to 10,000 trackpoints in it, your Etrex30x can store 10,000 trackpoints in anything from 1 to 200 seperate GPX files.

It is also worth concidering how your Etrex30x generates the trackpoints, it can be set to Auto, Distance or Time, I would recommend Time*, which will force a new position / time log every say 3 seconds, this will give you 8 hours before the log is full

BTW
Remember to clear the old track each day after saving it to make space for the new one

*Setup >> Tracks >> Track Log >> Record Method >> (Auto, Distance, Time) >> Record Interval

 

[eggzlot]

One track is fine as long a the geotagging software can handle a GPX file with up to 10,000 trackpoints in it, your Etrex30x can store 10,000 trackpoints in anything from 1 to 200 seperate GPX files.

It is also worth concidering how your Etrex30x generates the trackpoints, it can be set to Auto, Distance or Time, I would recommend Time*, which will force a new position / time log every say 3 seconds, this will give you 8 hours before the log is full

*Setup >> Tracks >> Track Log >> Record Method >> (Auto, Distance, Time) >> Record Interval

Thanks for the prompt response. If it fills up at 10,000 trackpoints and I am away for 2 weeks, it is going to fill up fast especially logging every 3 seconds? So I guess still do a track a day? that may be the easiest? then in Lightroom just import my files by day and match up to that day's GPX file?

 

[Nuvi-Nebie]

Yes, I have added a note to post #2

 

[eggzlot]

Yes, I have added a note to post #2

great thanks! I was fairly certain I could not run a log for an entire 2 weeks. Each day I'll just start a new track. for battery saving purposes i'll turn off when i know i am not planning on shooting anything. i think the lithium batteries are good for ~40 hours though I swear I've gotten more out of them. I'll put in a fresh set, bring 2 back up sets and worst case just by non lithium batteries on my travels if I run out.

 

[Nuvi-Nebie]

It's a good idea to photograph the time on your GPS screen so that you can measure the time error on you camera, as GPS time is always correct and the clock in your camera isn't, this time offset can usually be entered into the geotagging software

There is no problem in switching the GPS off when not in use, but it will start a new track log file, so you will have more than one file to backup each day

 

[eggzlot]

It's a good idea to photograph the time on your GPS screen so that you can measure the time error on you camera, as GPS time is always correct and the clock in your camera isn't, this time offset can usually be entered into the geotagging software

There is no problem in switching the GPS off when not in use, but it will start a new track log file, so you will have more than one file to backup each day

hmm ok thanks, maybe ill play around now. when i did backpacking i did turn it off overnight, but at the end of the trip i only had to save/export 1 file and i got the entire 3 day/2 nights track log....

i also plan to just change my camera to the local time, but yes lightroom does have a sync feature so it can see where your camera's time is set, the local time on the GPX and make modifications to sync up where necessary. to me, just easier to change my camera date/time

 

[Nuvi-Nebie]

i did turn it off overnight, but at the end of the trip i only had to save/export 1 file and i got the entire 3 day/2 nights track log....

Yes, you are correct, There will be multiple tracks (if viewed in Garmin Basecamp), but they may be contained within a single GPX file

Setting the time on the camera is a good plan, but it is sometimes difficult to set it accurately enough, (sometimes only hours and minutes are settable), small differencies are not usually a problem but some geotagging software works better when time is accurate

 

[eggzlot]

Yes, you are correct, There will be multiple tracks (if viewed in Garmin Basecamp), but they may be contained within a single GPX file

Setting the time on the camera is a good plan, but it is sometimes difficult to set it accurately enough, (sometimes only hours and minutes are settable), small differencies are not usually a problem but some geotagging software works better when time is accurate

hmm the piece about multiple tracks but basecamp seeing them as one I do not wrap my head around but in this case I will not be using Basecamp. Again just want the GPX files to attach to photos in lightroom. so if its best to do a new track per day that is fine. just so i know that if i need to get in the car and drive for an hour i can shut off the gps tracker knowing I am not taking photos/saving battery and when i get to a new destination I can just turn on the tracker and continue. end of day just export what i did?

 

[Nuvi-Nebie]

I don't think it will be a problem for Lightbox but, I was saying that Basecamp would see multiple tracks if the GPS is turned off and then back on because a new track will always be started on power-up.

On some GPSs one *.GPX file would contain a single track so there would be multiple *.GPX files produced, on other GPSs a single *.GPX file will contain all tracks in the unit