topic Re: 'DEM to Raster' tool not working? in 3D Questions

'DEM to Raster' tool not working?

RobStorrar — Mon, 20 Aug 2012 14:19:47 GMT

Hello,

I have some Lidar data that also comes with .dem files. All I want to do at this stage is simply look at these ready made DEMs but I can't seem to do this. There are no other files associated with the .dem file (no .hdr for example) and when I run the DEM to Raster tool I get error 010067.

Does anybody have any idea about this please?

Re: 'DEM to Raster' tool not working?

EricRice — Mon, 20 Aug 2012 15:40:25 GMT

Rob,

The DEM to Raster tool is somewhat of a legacy tool that is not needed in the past few releases. Assuming you have a USGS .dem file format, you should be able to navigate to it in the Catalog window of ArcMap, right click it and calculate statistics. After you have stats we just draw the data. You'll probably have to assign a spatial reference too though. Basically, .dem files have native support nowadays so there is no need to run the tool.

Eric

Re: 'DEM to Raster' tool not working?

RobStorrar — Tue, 21 Aug 2012 12:09:03 GMT

Hi Eric,

Thanks for the reply. I tried calculating the statistics (this appears to work but may not have) but then I still cannot add the data. Even if I right-click the data in Arc Catalogue it says: 'Failed to open dataset'. If I try to add the DEM to Arcmap I get: 'Invalid raster dataset. Failed to create raster layer.'

I don't know whether there is a problem with the DEM itself, or whether I have missed something.

Re: 'DEM to Raster' tool not working?

EricRice — Tue, 21 Aug 2012 15:46:34 GMT

Hi Rob,

What version of ArcGIS are you using? In 10.1 you can readily make use of the lidar data assuming its in LAS format. You can use it to derive your own DEM/DSM. Perhaps the .dem file you have is not a USGS .dem file? Is it available publicly - so I could download it and have a look?

Best,
Eric

Re: 'DEM to Raster' tool not working?

RobStorrar — Tue, 21 Aug 2012 15:54:07 GMT

Hi Eric,

I'm using version 10.0. It's not from the USGS so may not be in that format. It's NERC ARSF data and they included a .DEM just for convenience.

I do also have the raw data but they're in a slightly odd ASCII format which will take some work to be usable. I just wanted to view the example DEM before I start using the data but as I intended to create a DEM from this anyway I'll probably just continue on that route.

Thanks for your help.

Re: 'DEM to Raster' tool not working?

JeffreySwain — Fri, 24 Aug 2012 19:12:41 GMT

This can be a tricky problem when programs export their data to a format that is recognized in ArcMap as something else. I encourage you to take a look at the supported raster information. If your raster extension appears there, but the description is different then be prepared for issues. Beside the .dem (USGS) format another usual issue is the .map format, as ArcGIS supports PCRaster's version not Mapinfo's .map.