Imray to stop publishing paper charts

[Sandy]

But the process of ingesting HO data, reformatting it and then doing the cartographic work to produce the added value for their leisure audience is skilled and time-consuming work. They had a small team of skilled people doing that; we recruited one of them! As others have said, the printing isn't a big cost, but prparing the data for printing is.

Thanks for the input.

Having worked in an area where we played with several terabytes of data, most of it dynamic I'd love to see how they processed it.

The 'small team' does not sound like an expensive part of the business.

Hairy engineer would love to know what the bean counters, I'm married to one, are playing at.

 

[B27]

I prefer the A2 format.
Imray's offering is printed double-sided.
Which limits which combinations of charts can be on the outside of the plastic wallet at any one time.
I have two plastic wallets, so I select which 4 of the Admiralty folio charts are on display before setting sail.
It's a small market for two players.

I've been thinking of getting some A3 charts printed

 

[onesea]

I cannot help but think that there is an lost opportunity here for a new format of chart.

Designed to compliment electronics and be useful for planning.
however with just enough info:
- to get you to a port or fairway buoy. Not the finer points to get you safely into all the ports. That where pilots and guides can step up.
- Basic buoyage
- racing marks to make it useful for them that race.
- So you can walk of distances across the chart, calculate courses and bearings complete tidal calcs etc.
- Information warnings about hazards, tidal races and gates could be added, with references to page of pilot.

If the world where to go to pot you could do fix’s, plot positions and get yourself to the required fairway buoy.

They would be larger in area the whole Solent, Solent to Portland, or even 3 or 4 for the whole channel.

The challenge would be to build in a little natural obsolescence so people want to replace every few years.
- Marina/ Berthing costs,
- Changes to anchorage areas,
- The growth of sea grass MCZ’s areas ,

Might do it?

 

[requiem]

For a coded vessel to switch to electronic only, the plotter currently requires dual redundant power and GNSS supplies, the ability to override the GNSS plot with a 3 point fix and a relatively large screen (I think 24").

There's a project running to create an easier standard for small coded vessels, but it hasn't published a spec. yet, so there's no product available. Plus without a massive market, it will take a while to be affordable.

RTCM 10900.7 is for ECS; it would likely make more sense to align with international standards rather than trying to go it alone, particularly if one expects manufacturers to adapt. (Unfortunately I'm not sure how many, if any, products are certified against this.)

My rant here is that this is work that should have been started many years back, so that the standards could have been incorporated into existing consumer products, rather than completely neglecting small vessels.

It should be possible to order a custom chart of your area so that you are in the center of it, instead of being in the corner of 4 different charts.
I would have thought it would not be difficult to make the business work - may be even outsourcing the printing, folding and sending bit.

Here is an example implementation: NOAA Custom Chart

Of course, I imagine things are much more difficult when you need to factor in charts from other countries.

 

[lustyd]

It isn't impossible, but it would a) require major changes to international agreements and b) an internationally agreed method for reducing the arbitrary datum of the dataset to local LAT

Well we aren’t going to fix it until we start. Every country is in the same boat right now so there’s motivation to make the change internationally. There are a tiny number of manufacturers making devices that consume charts so deciding on a standard shouldn’t be that hard.
I realise in the UK those in charge are set in their ways so change might not come easily for them. The solution here is also easy - sack them and get fresh blood in.

People used to think it would be hard to take photos of every street on the planet and integrate into a single mapping platform. Google not only did it, but spent almost nothing and made enormous profits. All that’s needed is people who start with the assumption that it’s possible.

 

[dunedin]

But the process of ingesting HO data, reformatting it and then doing the cartographic work to produce the added value for their leisure audience is skilled and time-consuming work. They had a small team of skilled people doing that; we recruited one of them! As others have said, the printing isn't a big cost, but prparing the data for printing is.

^ Folks need to listen to what the expert says above.
And also recognise that Lucy Wilson and the team at what was Imray, Laurie, Norie and Wilson Ltd know one heck of a lot more than anybody on here about the work involved, costs and income from paper charts. This will have been a very painful decison, taken only to protect the rest of the business. As they state, if anybody wants to take on the chart business they are welcome to make a bid for it before it closes down.

This is not a simple topic. And if you don’t already know about S57 standards, international IHO contracts, ENCs, LIDAR etc then perhaps recognise that you may not fully understand the complexities. And from what I know, it is FAR from a simple task of just taking official IHO data and printing a chart. To make a sensible leisure chart requires a lot of additional information to be added, taken from a wide range of sources.
And as Antarctic Pilot says it is a very skilled and labour intensive process to compile (on computer, using the S57 master data in vector format) a master of a chart able to be printed. So much information overlaps that a skilled person needs to decide how best to present. And add the harbour chartlets etc. For hundreds of charts this is a huge task.

In terms of coded vessels, for now the official UKHO paper charts - including the Small Craft Charts (for now, but who knows how long) - remain approved for navigation. Anybody else can buy these as well (though not as convenient or good value as previous Small Craft Folios).

The direction is clearly towards electronic vector charts. As far as I am aware, RIN, Cruising Association, RYA and others are currently working with MCA to seek to create a standard for electronic leisure charts that don’t have the “not approved for navigation” restriction. They are apparently speaking with most of the main leisure chart publishers - including Imray, So we should support these organisations with these initiatives. More info here although I am not sure if this includes the latest initiatives - https://rin.org.uk/page/SCG

 

[westernman]

^ Folks need to listen to what the expert says above.
And also recognise that Lucy Wilson and the team at what was Imray, Laurie, Norie and Wilson Ltd know one heck of a lot more than anybody on here about the work involved, costs and income from paper charts. This will have been a very painful decison, taken only to protect the rest of the business. As they state, if anybody wants to take on the chart business they are welcome to make a bid for it before it closes down.

This is not a simple topic. And if you don’t already know about S57 standards, international IHO contracts, ENCs, LIDAR etc then perhaps recognise that you may not fully understand the complexities. And from what I know, it is FAR from a simple task of just taking official IHO data and printing a chart. To make a sensible leisure chart requires a lot of additional information to be added, taken from a wide range of sources.
And as Antarctic Pilot says it is a very skilled and labour intensive process to compile (on computer, using the S57 master data in vector format) a master of a chart able to be printed. So much information overlaps that a skilled person needs to decide how best to present. And add the harbour chartlets etc. For hundreds of charts this is a huge task.

In terms of coded vessels, for now the official UKHO paper charts - including the Small Craft Charts (for now, but who knows how long) - remain approved for navigation. Anybody else can buy these as well (though not as convenient or good value as previous Small Craft Folios).

The direction is clearly towards electronic vector charts. As far as I am aware, RIN, Cruising Association, RYA and others are currently working with MCA to seek to create a standard for electronic leisure charts that don’t have the “not approved for navigation” restriction. They are apparently speaking with most of the main leisure chart publishers - including Imray, So we should support these organisations with these initiatives. More info here although I am not sure if this includes the latest initiatives - https://rin.org.uk/page/SCG

But surely all this is already solved for producing the image on your chart plotter??
Or at least on the ECDIS plotters.

 

[dunedin]

But surely all this is already solved for producing the image on your chart plotter??
Or at least on the ECDIS plotters.

So most chart plotters - and all ECDIS - work with vector charts. This is the future.

They generally work well on a computer device - where you zoom in and out for more detail.
But they don't tend to print well - there is a lot of skilled effort to decide how to best summarise all the wealth of information, what to show and what to suppress. You can of course (subject to copyright) look at a vector chart on a large screen and screenshot it. But that tends to be messy and miss important detail. it also generally lacks the compass roses, lattitude and longitude lines and scales etc.

I guess in time we could get Ai to do some of the skilled cartography work to convert vector charts to raster images suitable for printing. But by then everybody other than antiques collectors will be using digital only. All just my view

 

[st599]

The direction is clearly towards electronic vector charts. As far as I am aware, RIN, Cruising Association, RYA and others are currently working with MCA to seek to create a standard for electronic leisure charts that don’t have the “not approved for navigation” restriction. They are apparently speaking with most of the main leisure chart publishers - including Imray, So we should support these organisations with these initiatives. More info here although I am not sure if this includes the latest initiatives - https://rin.org.uk/page/SCG

The full report is worth a read to see the direction of travel.

But surely all this is already solved for producing the image on your chart plotter??
Or at least on the ECDIS plotters.

Nope, according to the RIN report, ECDIS users don't require a lot of information about really shallow water areas, marina infrastructure, launching ramps and the like, so it isn't present. They request leisure data be added to the Echart data.

 

[Mark-1]

I've seen elsewhere Imray are selling off their printed chart business. That suggests that rather than ceasing to be available "Imray Style" charts will just be sold from a different source. Maybe I've got the wrong end of the stick.

 

[AntarcticPilot]

I've seen elsewhere Imray are selling off their printed chart business. That suggests that rather than ceasing to be available "Imray Style" charts will just be sold from a different source. Maybe I've got the wrong end of the stick.

Only if they find a buyer. And where will you find a buyer with the necessary expertise and capital? If it's uneconomic for Imray, I don't think it will be economic for anyone else, at least not to the same standards.

Their email read very much as if they don't expect to find a buyer.

 

[westernman]

I've seen elsewhere Imray are selling off their printed chart business. That suggests that rather than ceasing to be available "Imray Style" charts will just be sold from a different source. Maybe I've got the wrong end of the stick.

The phrase is "Imray to phase out chart publishing".
It is not "Imray to phase out paper charts".

To me this suggests that they will not be supplying charts in any form to anyone.
If they continued to supply the data, then for me that would be continuing to publish even if it is not on paper anymore.

 

[lustyd]

The phrase is "Imray to phase out chart publishing".
It is not "Imray to phase out paper charts".

To me this suggests that they will not be supplying charts in any form to anyone.
If they continued to supply the data, then for me that would be continuing to publish even if it is not on paper anymore.

Hate to say it, but they've replied publicly on Facebook forums and it looks like they're just exiting the market.

 

[westernman]

Hate to say it, but they've replied publicly on Facebook forums and it looks like they're just exiting the market.

Are they selling the data to anyone?

 

[dunedin]

Are they selling the data to anyone?

That would be hugely difficult to do I would expect - the majority will be UKHO/ IHO data, but interleaved with other stuff from a variety of commercial and private sources. Would be a legal nightmare to sell the full data and technical nightmare to unpick the various sources.

 

[AntarcticPilot]

That would be hugely difficult to do I would expect - the majority will be UKHO/ IHO data, but interleaved with other stuff from a variety of commercial and private sources. Would be a legal nightmare to sell the full data and technical nightmare to unpick the various sources.

Are they selling the data to anyone?

I suspect that the only way that could happen would be to sell the entire chart-making business as a going concern. As @dunedin says, the data will have been licensed from various sources, so they can't just "sell the data" - it mostly isn't theirs to sell. And even selling the business may not be straightforward; it will depend on how tightly integrated the various cost-centres of Imray are, and what legal entity owns the licenses.

We had nightmares because some of our earlier maps were produced from our data but compiled by DOS. Because they were produced by DOS, they were Crown Copyright. So people coming to us to ask permission to reproduce our maps had to be referred to HMSO to get permission to use our data! Needless to say, HMSO had other fish to fry so the process was slow. We avoided Crown Copyright during my time but still had problems with legacy stuff.

It also needs to be borne in mind that having the data is only part of the problem. The software used to manipulate the data is non-trivial and costly to license. I don't know what Imray use, but there will be several packages, all of which require several seat licenses at commercial prices. It is very unlikely that Imray will be able to transfer existing licenses.

 

[Marsali_1]

The notice on Imray's web site states, as part of the message, "...As one of only two chart providers recognised by the Maritime and Coastguard Agency...". Who is the other receognized chart provider? I checked the M&CA web site but couldn't find that information.

 

[penberth3]

The notice on Imray's web site states, as part of the message, "...As one of only two chart providers recognised by the Maritime and Coastguard Agency...". Who is the other receognized chart provider? I checked the M&CA web site but couldn't find that information.

HM Government's Hydrographic Office?

 

[Mark-1]

The notice on Imray's web site states, as part of the message, "...As one of only two chart providers recognised by the Maritime and Coastguard Agency...". Who is the other receognized chart provider? I checked the M&CA web site but couldn't find that information.

" Imray is only one of two chart publishers with Maritime and Coastguard Agency recognition, the other being the UKHO, which has previously announced it will be withdrawing paper charts by 2030"

 

[lustyd]

UKHO did a u-turn though. POD charts are there until they state otherwise