After taking a second look at the USGS National Map interface, and after struggling with getting the JPEG output from USAPhotoMaps to align with anything, I’ve decided to not recommend USAPhotoMaps for anyone wishing to extract an image with coordinates.

When the author adds support for GeoTIFF, or any other format that includes the coordinates, projection, and datum in it, then I’ll change my mind.

I shouldn’t have to play guessing games importing an image because the software that created it decided to use a format that leaves out critical metadata.

With Global Mapper, I can import the GeoTIFFs that I downloaded from the USGS—including both the aerial photo and the elevation data—and they just magically align, giving me a high-resolution photo draped over a low-resolution terrain map. I expect my 2-foot contours to produce better results once I figure out how to perfect the terrain generation settings, but this is a quick-and-dirty way to get an initial view of the site.

And, as Mike from Global Mapper reminded me, his program can perform the same feat, and download images from TerraServer. The user interface isn’t the best (you can draw a window of the area you wish to download, but only on a smaller thumbnail image in the dialog box, not the existing map window), but it resulted in exactly the image I wanted being added to my map almost instantaneously.