OpenJUMP
Using Your Own (Geologic) Symbology

Part 1

Geoff has made the Vertex-Symbols Plugin which allows you to load your own svg graphics and use it as point symbol.
His Vertex Symbols Plugin can be downloaded here

Part 2

How to rotate symbols according to an attribute value

This tip is very useful for geologist since many point
symbols (planar, linear and fold structures) must
be rotaded according to the azimuth (dip or plunge direction)
This solution doen’t require extra plugins.
It only uses the label style function of Openjump
Any kind of installed fonts can be used as a point
symbol in the OpenJump workbrench.
I post a special font set for geologist with a
sepatate reference table (Geological_Symbols.TFF and
Reference_Table.pdf download here as zip-file).

1) First of all, print the Reference_Table.pdf. This reference table help you to know
corrispondence of each geological symbols to regular alphabet
(“a” is symbol 1, “b” is symbol 2, etc).

2) Create a new point dataset (ex. geological_points.shp) with two attribute values:

• (SYMBOL) for the type of symbol, for each
  symbol I give the regular letter of the alphabet
  (a,b, etc), according to the Reference Table.
• (AZIMUTH) for the azimuth, with
  values between 0° and 360°.

Remember that OJ label style calculate the rotation in
anticlockwise direction. If the azimuth of
your geological symbols is clockwise, please correct
the values, entering your azimuths as a negative value

3) In OJ go on Change Style>label and change these voices:
“Enable labeling” = enabled
“label attribute” = SYMBOL
“angle attribute (degrees)” = AZIMUTH
“Height” = at least 20 or more
“Change Colour”= set the colour you want for your symbols
“Change font…” = Geological Symbols

4) On Change Stle>Rendering uncheck both
“Fill” and “Line” to avoind that vertex overlaps symbol

5) Click on “OK” ... and magically you see your
geological fonts displayed on the OJ workbench view with the right orientation

Using this technique you can display whatever symbols you
use, not only geological (if translate to a Font set) and you can rotate them.

If you want to use a different symbol font, remember always to print its reference table, using a font editor software (see How to have a reference table from your favorite font symbols).

Since the OJ label style is used as a “symbol
displayer”, you can’t display other label close to
your symbols. But a duplicate of your point dataset (with a (LABEL) attribute) can be used as label layer, instead.

Giuseppe Aruta