Place an old image on the map, in your browser
Give it a photo, a scan or a satellite frame and a rough location. It finds where the image sits on the ground and exports the result for QGIS, ArcGIS or GDAL. The matching runs on your own computer, so the image is never uploaded.
Experimental. This is an early version. Results can be wrong, and some images will not match at all. Check every result before you rely on it.
See it work first
The tool has four built-in examples: small crops of declassified 1970s satellite frames, each set up with one click. On all four, the tool placed the frame within about 30 m of where it is known to be. One of them is deliberately a harder case, so you can see how the tool tells you when to double-check. Open the tool and try one.
How it works
- Load your image. A JPEG, PNG or TIFF. If the file carries a GPS tag, the location is read from it in the page.
- Say roughly where it is. Search for a place, draw a box on the map or type coordinates.
- It fetches a reference. A current satellite or aerial image of the same area, or a rendered map for scanned maps.
- It matches the two. Feature matching finds the same points in both images and fits the transform.
- Export. A world file, QGIS Georeferencer points or a GeoJSON footprint.
What it uses as a reference
| Source | Detail | Licence |
|---|---|---|
| Copernicus Sentinel-2 | 10 m, worldwide | Free, commercial use allowed |
| USGS NAIP | About 1 m, United States only | Public domain |
| OpenStreetMap rendering | For scanned maps | ODbL, attribution required |
| Your own reference image | Any image you supply | Yours |
These sources were chosen because they can be used commercially. Several sharper basemaps cannot be used this way.
Private by design
The matching models run in your browser on your graphics card. Your image is not sent to a server. The page only fetches reference imagery for the area you choose.
Honest about limits
This is a prototype. The fit is an affine transform, which cannot represent paper distortion or a change of map projection. Check every result before you rely on it. Read the FAQ for what works and what does not.