Agreed, there are better sources for aerial photos.

Boulder's planning office takes new photos every year or two, so I can run down there an get new photos of the neighborhood. I haven't visited their web site lately, it was still up and coming last time I visited. I can always tell when new photos are going to be taken because they run around town painting big white marks around important utilities, benchmarks, and major corner pins. What is really interesting is going back to old photos and checking out the neighborhood before it was sub-divided. This is useful for detecting old drainages that might cause basement flooding.

I'm also lucky to live a half an hour from the Federal Center in Denver where I can go look at Forest Service and BLM air photos before I buy orthorectified photos for use in AutoCad. (what version are you using, BTW? I'm still with AutoCad 2000, wondering if I should upgrade) Not only that, but the feds often take infra-red photos, which are great for seeing some geologic structures through biomass. However, a big color reprint gets expensive, I can print for much cheaper if I've got a good digital image.

I do like the new civilian satellite photos, but they are so dang expensive! Both Digital Globe and Space Imaging require you to purchase a large area even if you are just interested in a small area. That's why I'm glad Digital Globe is providing a different way of getting their images. But they always have interesting free downloads in their sample imagery pages. Oh, I see that Space Imaging is now offering posters...cool!

I too go to TopoZone for maps. To get better rez I'll choose the large image, then do Alt + PrintScreen to get it on the clip board, then paste it into Paintshop.

I highly recommend the National Geographic Topo CD sets. They are expensive, but if you buy alot of topos (like I used to) it pays off eventually. I can also plot out paper maps of any size and scale or export to tiff for use in AutoCad. What's really fun is hooking this program up to a GPS with a laptop in the truck and going out in the field. The profile feature makes constructing cross-sections a breeze.

National Geo also makes a line of water-resistant paper for printing maps. It's pricey, but comes in handy on rainy days. They have it at REI.

How did I do geology before the digital age?

~jms~