Manually collecting points using GPS Essentials
Some mappers find it annoying to collect waypoints in an app. If you would prefer to write down your GPS coordinates, here's a brief tutorial for finding live GPS location in UTM in the GPS Essentials app.
Objective
In this tutorial, you will set up your smartphone to tell you:
- Your GPS coordinates, in UTM format
- The accuracy of the coordinates reported
If you have an Android, great! Continue for detailed instructions using the app GPS Essentials.
If you have an iPhone, sorry, I don't... so you will have to figure this part out yourself. Internet research tells me that Polaris might be a good free app for this, but I haven't tried it.
Get the app
Download the app GPS Essentials and open it.
The app will immediately ask you if it can access location. Click "Allow".
Configure the dashboard
From the home screen, tap "Dashboard".
Tap in the big blank space to add elements to the dashboard.
Add "Position".
Tap on an empty space and also add "Accuracy":
By default, these will show position English units and the minutes/seconds format of latitude and longitude.
Set units to UTM and metric
In our work, we're using the Universal Trans-Mercator (UTM) coordinate system (why? Here's a quick explainer.)
Open the menu and go to Settings:
In settings, select "Position Format".
In "Position Format", select "UTM".
Back in the Settings menu, select "Units".
Select Meters (standard for orienteering) so that you will see accuracy in meters.
Get back to the dashboard by selecting "Standard" from the menu on the left:
Here is our fully configured app, reporting out position coordinates in UTM and accuracy in meters:
Use the app for fieldwork
In the field, you can use this method to know your exact position. Use it as a reference point for where you are mapping from, pencil in feature locations, etc.
You want as low a number as possible in the Accuracy window– 4.55m is good.