Garden Planning help

Garden Planning help

You can scribble a new garden design onto an A4 piece of paper and this will work well for most, you measure the boundaries, scale it down and draw it out.

But there is another way, go to google maps Google Maps and zoom into your town, your street, your house, switch the map to "Sattelite view" and you will have an aerial photo of your garden/plot. Press the print screen butto on your keyboard and you will then be able to use it in your preferred photo/graphic/painting software by pasting the image there. Combine that aerial "shape" with your boundary measurements and you have an accurate "plan" of your garden/plot. You can go another step forward to this by installing the google earth plugin...which will allow you to zoom in even more...making your garden almost full screen size.

This is my alottment plot. The design to the right has now been transferred to the plot and it has been marked out.



With another free program you can determine where the sun sets and rises at any time of the year, helping you to place both plants and/or greenhouses to make best use of the small ammount of winter sun. This is helpfull if your new to an area. Download Photo ephemeris from the following address..its free and safe to use.

The Photographer's Ephemeris | Plan your shoot



I hope this helps someone out.

Steve...

 

never thought of using google earth for that. thanks

 

I'm very tempted to have a go with this, my only trouble is I'm an all or nothing kind of a guy and if I start using it I will have to go into it bigtime and learn it backwards. It was the same when I learnt photoshop, I know it backwards now (but not completely) and now I write tutorials on using it, write my own scripts and applications too etc etc.

I am tempted though

Steve...

 

Not sure it is relevant to the discussion, but just in case:

I use Punch Design:

http://www.punchsoftware.com/

 

hi...i want to plant a flower garden...Can somebody please suggest me from where i should start planting?? how much cost in needed for small flower garden????

 

Great reply Steve, got good info you seem to know your stuff

 

Great ideas here,you could even crop the satellite photo and use a free photo editing software like Gimp to add various plants and shrubs to get an idea what everything will look like completed.
Bookmarked this page as well some fantastic sources,thanks again.

 

I use flash earth to help plot the layout of my client's gardens. This, and a ground survey, gives an accurate plan. Trouble is, the pictures are usually taken in summer, when the trees are in full leaf, so the outline is not always clear. However, it's better than nothing.

Chris

 

Do you want seasonal salads? Maybe lots of root crops, tons of tomatoes, or a bit of everything? Could be you are a backyard all-you-can-grow spud person, or aspire to rich asparagus beds?
Hello! Earth to gardeners, hold on a mo. Hard as it is not to just get out there and muck around... do yourself a favour and plan your home vegetable garden layout first.
For example, to feed a family of four all year round, you will need to plan a vegetable garden that is about 100 sq meters (1076 sq ft) of growing area, not including paths.
And remember if you live in a cold climate, that will put the kybosh on growing all year round. So you may need to be planning a vegetable garden that is larger than normal and then make preserves.

 

I use Flash Earth to help plot the landscaping of my client. This, and an on-site, offers a precise plan. The problem is that the photos are usually taken in the summer when the trees are in full leaf, so the scheme is not always clear. However, it is better than nothing.

 

I am looking at software packages .... the best I have seen (so far) is this:

Realtime Landscaping PLUS 2011 - TopTenREVIEWS

snip:

IDEA Spectrum has spent time making their application appear as realistic as possible. Almost 1,000 of the plants are high-resolution images. The grass has a 3D edge to make it appear to stand on a slightly higher plane than the sidewalk.

You can select the time of day and how much wind you want to blow during your walkthrough to increase the landscape’s authenticity. The shadows during the day and the lighting at night add a subtle touch to the view.

When you import your own photo and combine it with the plants and other design elements from the application, the combination of photo and computer generated graphics mesh together well, providing you with an image that looks realistic and professional.


When you’re in design mode, you can choose to see a bird’s-eye view of the area you’re working on or change the angle to see exactly what you’re working on. You can also choose the walkthrough view that allows you to move through the area and see the landscape at any height or angle, using your mouse and simple keyboard commands to navigate

This landscaping software allows you to create full 3D landscapes or design landscapes over your own photo.

Version 2011 has more than 4,600 realistic-looking plants, along with detailed information about what climate they need to survive, how tall they grow and at what rate, and their common and botanical names. You can choose the age or height of the plants you insert into your landscape and see what they’ll look like as they mature.

You can rename plants and place them in your favorites file, or you can establish a shortcut key for them so you don’t have to go through the plant menu every time you want to find them.

You can determine the amount of wildlife present and the amount of wind blowing as you conduct a walkthrough of the layout. Additionally, you can see what your landscape will look like when the sun is rising and setting, as well as how the shadows will fall. You can also see the scene at night.

Version 2011 has improved shadows and lighting, including new “ray tracing,” which is supposed to make the lighting at night more realistic. We had trouble, however, differentiating between when ray tracing was selected or not. Still, the lighting at night looks pretty true to life.

Version 2011 comes with brand name products from companies such as Jerith, Belgard, Philips Hadco, Amarr, Kichler, Eldorado and Unilock. The brand names make it easy to locate specific products when you’re ready to purchase materials. As you configure your landscape, you can keep track of your materials and estimates on the costs.

If you can’t find an image you want in Realtime Landscaping PLUS, you can find free objects in Google’s 3D Warehouse, which is just a few clicks away. With these free objects, you can further customize your landscape. Or, if you’d prefer, you can import a picture using the Import Photo Wizard. Another option you can choose is to have IDEA Spectrum create a model for you at an additional cost.

Anyone familiar with photo editing and illustration applications is familiar with the concept of layers. Most landscape software allows you to divide the design into nicely layered chunks, but this can often be a pain to set up. On the other hand, Realtime Landscaping PLUS makes it a snap to add, modify, and delete layers at will.

Realtime Landscaping PLUS 2011 has new deck and panel fence options. Add post caps, glass panels, railing, balusters, fascia, skirting and posts to your decks. Choose from picket, ornamental, privacy, chain link, wooden, or post and rail fences. You can create your own deck and fences, or you can use pre-designed materials. Once you insert a pre-designed item, you can make changes to it if you’d like.

Whether you have a large yard with multiple acres to landscape, or the smallest lot your city's zoning ordinances will allow, you need the ability to add rows of various plants easily, without tediously having to add one at a time. The Plant Fill and Plant Row tools allow you to add multiple plant varieties to an area. The Plant Row tool lets you add rows of trees along a driveway or property boundary, flowers along edging, and more.

You can generate videos of the landscapes you create. With several clicks of your mouse, you can set up Realtime cameras along the route you want displayed in your video. Once you save the video, you can burn it onto a DVD, add it to Facebook or upload it to a website.

In the walkthrough mode, you can take photos of the landscape. Realtime Landscaping PLUS 2011 allows you to save the photos as they appear, with high or low contrast, or in an artistic style. You can unleash your inner Monet with an impressionistic rendering in the form of a watercolor, painting and colored pencil sketch.

herewith a video presentation of the software:

http://landscaping-software-review.toptenreviews.com/realtime-landscaping-plus-p601-video-1.html


----------------------
I am fully proficient in several 3D Cad packages so will be a breeze to learn something new. $80 USD but will need to check if the software licence has to be upgraded annualy (thats how they catch many people)

I am still checking other options though and don't mind spending considerably more