Hello all, sorry for the late sum. Thank you to all those who provided responses - in the end, I cheated, and got a colleague who has Imagine on thier computer to import the RAW file, and convert it to a *.img file. While that round-about way worked, for future reference other suggestions I received include : I have worked with raw image files in the past by creating an auxiliary file to hold info necessary for ArcView to display the data. The file is given the same name with the extension .hdr and looks like this: <<< Sample BIL header file Lines that don't begin with a keyword are treated as comments. nrows 11232 Comments can be placed here as well ncols 6848 nbands 1 nbits 8 layout bil bil,bsq skipbytes 512 amount to skip over (file header; try 0,256,512,1024) ulxmap 456789 x-coord of upleft pixel centre ulymap 5012345 y-coord of upleft pixel centre xdim 5.00 x pixel size ydim 5.00 y pixel size <<< Hopefully, you have the info such as pixel size and # of pixels and lines (ncols=pixel, nrows=lines) there is much more detail in the AV help - but it's hard to find. This might help: in AV Help: Under help topic go to "images, extended formats" select: Creating the temporary BIL/BIP/BSQ image file Here you will find the info Regards, John P.S. I also changed the image file extension from "RAW" to "BIL" (or BSQ,BIP) JM ____________________________________________________________________________ __________ The following is the documentation on the *.raw file format, maybe it might provide some insight. Good Luck, Bill Shelley Raw File Format One of the most important raster file formats to be supported within the Raster Dynamic Loaded Library (DLL) scheme is the generic or "Raw" format. The Raw DLL supports files which are not otherwise supported by a Raster DLL, but which are formatted in such a way that the arrangement of the data may be described by a relatively small number of parameters. In this way, rather than having to use the Generic Binary Import options to convert an image to IMAGINE's internal .img format, the data can be directly accessed using the Raw DLL after defining only a few parameters about the image (such as number of rows, columns, bands, etc.) The Raw File format is simply another raster format supported under the DLL umbrella, and as such does not need any additional DLL design. However, it does need a well-defined method of describing the image parameters, which is the purpose of this section. The default file filter is ".raw". A file with a raw extension is presumed to be a header file which indicates the name of the file(s) containing the pixel data and the arrangement of the data within the file(s). Format of the Raw File The .raw file is an ASCII file consisting of keywords and associated values. There may be only one keyword per line. Keywords should begin at the first character of a line. Any line which does not begin with a recognized keyword will be ignored; this means that a file may contain comments or other data which is not part of the raw file description. By convention, a comment line is one which begins with the `#' symbol (pound sign). All of the data associated with a keyword must be on the same line with the keyword, unless the continuation character `/' appears at the end of a line. Keywords and strings must be written in uppercase letters, except strings which denote file names. Keywords and associated data are separated by white space (spaces and/or tabs). Keywords may be in any order except the recognition keyword IMAGINE_RAW_FILE, which must appear first. Keywords The only keywords which are required are IMAGINE_RAW_FILE, WIDTH, HEIGHT, and if the data type size is greater than eight bits, BYTE_ORDER. All other keywords are optional and have default values. IMAGINE_RAW_FILE This keyword must be at the very beginning of the file, on a line by itself. WIDTH The number of pixels in the horizontal (x) direction. Must be an integer greater than zero. Required; no default value. HEIGHT The number of pixels in the vertical (y) direction. Must be an integer greater than zero. Required; no default value. NUM_LAYERS The number of layers (channels, bands) in the image. Must be an integer greater than zero. Optional; default value is 1. FORMAT The type of interleaving used in the file. Must be one of the following strings: "BIL" (Band Interleaved By Line), "BIP" (Band Interleaved By Pixel), "BSQ" (Band Sequential), or "TILED" (Tiled or blocked image). Tiled data is presumed to be band sequential within each tile. If the width and/or height of the file is not an even multiple of the tile size, the tiles must be padded with zeros so that all tiles are the same size. The tiles themselves are arranged left to right, top to bottom. For single-layer images, BIL, BIP and BSQ are the same. Optional; default value is "BIL". DATA_TYPE The data type used by the image. Must be one of the following strings: "Up", "U2", "U4", "U8", "Ul6", "Sl6", "U32", "S32", "F32", "F64". Optional; default value is "U8". LAYER_TYPE The layer type used by the image. Must be either "ATHEMATIC" or "THEMATIC". Optional; default value is "ATHEMATIC". BYTE_ORDER For data types of sixteen bits or larger, the ordering of the high and low bytes must be either "MSB" (most-significant-byte first, or Motorola ordering), or "LSB" (least-significant-byte first, or Intel ordering). Required for DATA_TYPE values of U16, S16, U32, S32, F32, and F64; ignored otherwise. PIXEL_FILES The name of the file(s) in which the pixel data reside. For BIL, BIP and Tiled formats, all of the pixel data must reside in the same file. For BSQ formats, each band may reside in a separate file. Optional; defaults to the name of the raw file without the .raw extension. If the file does not contain a path part, the same path part as the raw file will be assumed. Relative path definitions are allowed. DATA_OFFSET The number of bytes to be skipped at the beginning of a pixel file. Must be an integer greater than or equal to zero. Optional; defaults to zero. RECORD_SKIP_BYTES The number of bytes skipped between data records. A data record is defined differently depending on the format. For BIL and BSQ images, a data record holds one row of pixels from one layer. For BIP images, a data record holds one row of pixels from all layers. For tiled images, a data record holds one tile of pixels from all layers. Must be an integer greater than or equal to zero. Optional; defaults to zero. LAYER_SKIP_BYTES BSQ format only: the number of bytes to skip between image layers. Must be an integer greater than or equal to zero. Optional; defaults to zero. TILE_WIDTH Tiled format only: the number of pixels in the horizontal (x) direction per tile. Must be an integer greater than or equal to zero. and less than or equal to the image width. Optional; defaults to the minimum of 128 and the image width. TILE_HEIGHT Tiled format only: the number of pixels in the vertical (y) direction per tile. Must be an integer greater than or equal to zero. and less than or equal to the image width. Optional; defaults to the minimum of 128 and the image height. END_RAW_FILE Indicates the end of the raw file information. Useful if the raw file information is embedded within a larger file (perhaps the image file itself), it signals the DLL to stop scanning for further keywords. No associated values. Optional; if not present the DLL will scan to the end of the file. Examples Example 1: a 1201 x 1201-pixel DEM (Digital Elevation Model) file containing only pixel data, stored in the file "atlanta-e.dem" in the same directory as the raw file. The byte order is Motorola. IMAGINE_RAW_FILE WIDTH 1201 HEIGHT 1201 DATA_TYPE U16 PIXEL_FILES atlanta-e.dem BYTE_ORDER MSB Example 2: a 3-band image in BSQ format. All the data is in the file "/usr/people/Igscene.rgb". The file is 1000 pixels wide and 1500 pixels high. There is a 622-byte header at the start of the file. Each band contains a 2000 byte header and an 1000 byte trailer. IMAGINE_RAW_FILE WIDTH 1000 HEIGHT 1500 NUM_LAYERS 3 FORMAT BSQ PIXEL_FILES /usr/people/Igscene.rgb DATA_OFFSET 2622 LAYER_SKIP_BYTES 3000 Example 3: a 4-band image in BSQ format. Each layer is in a separate file, named "bandl.dat", "band2.dat", "band3.dat", and "band4.dat". The image is 6000 bytes wide and 4000 bytes high. Each line of data contains 128 bytes of non-image data at the beginning and 32 bytes of non-image data at the end. IMAGINE_RAW_FILE NUM_LAYERS 4 WIDTH 6000 HEIGHT 4000 FORMAT BSQ PIXEL_FILES bandl.dat band2.dat band3.dat band4.dat DATA_OFFSET 128 RECORD_BYTE_SKIP 160 Example 4: A thematic image, 1024 by 1024 pixels, tiled with tile size 64 by 64 pixels. The image data is in the file "landcover.001": IMAGINE_RAW_FILE WIDTH 1024 HEIGHT 1024 FORMAT TILED TILE WIDTH 64 TILE HEIGHT 64 LAYER_TYPE THEMATIC PIXEL_FILES landcover.001 -----Original Message----- From: Gauthier, Michel [mailto:Michel.Gauthier@CCRS.NRCan.gc.ca] Sent: Tuesday, June 26, 2001 9:27 PM To: 'JohnL@ERISS.ERIN.GOV.AU' Subject: image analysis - *.raw files hello, I read your request on the arcview information board and I belive that I can help. the raw file format is simply the grey scale value of pixels. you will need to know what type of raw, ie 8 bit 16 bit... also the band interleivement is it, band interleived, pixel interleived, a single band... and you will need to know the image size number of pixels X number of lines. once you have this information you can start to figure out what to do next. I would think that the simpelest way to deal with your proble would be to use a pains progran like Paint Shop Pro or Photoshop and convert your raw file into something more freindly, ie bitmap (bmp). from there you should be able to figure out hot to import it in arcview. notes about raw files. some of them have a header; information about the file at the begining of the file, the best way to find this out is to open the file in a Hex editor and looking at the begining.the information you need might be there. the rest of the file is just numbers. I hope this helps a bit, if you have any othe questions on this subject don't hesitate to write back I have also attached a document explaning raw files, it does not cover headers thow <> Michel Gauthier Canada Center for Remote Sensing