Name

ST_Transform — Reprojects a raster in a known spatial reference system to another known spatial reference system using specified resampling algorithm. Options are NearestNeighbor, Bilinear, Cubic, CubicSpline, Lanczos defaulting to NearestNeighbor.

Synopsis

raster ST_Transform(raster rast, integer srid, text algorithm=NearestNeighbor, double precision maxerr=0.125, double precision scalex, double precision scaley);

raster ST_Transform(raster rast, integer srid, double precision scalex, double precision scaley, text algorithm=NearestNeighbor, double precision maxerr=0.125);

raster ST_Transform(raster rast, raster alignto, text algorithm=NearestNeighbor, double precision maxerr=0.125);

Description

Reprojects a raster in a known spatial reference system to another known spatial reference system using specified pixel warping algorithm. Uses 'NearestNeighbor' if no algorithm is specified and maxerror percent of 0.125 if no maxerr is specified.

Algorithm options are: 'NearestNeighbor', 'Bilinear', 'Cubic', 'CubicSpline', and 'Lanczos'. Refer to: GDAL Warp resampling methods for more details.

ST_Transform is often confused with ST_SetSRID(). ST_Transform actually changes the coordinates of a raster (and resamples the pixel values) from one spatial reference system to another, while ST_SetSRID() simply changes the SRID identifier of the raster.

Unlike the other variants, Variant 3 requires a reference raster as alignto. The transformed raster will be transformed to the spatial reference system (SRID) of the reference raster and be aligned (ST_SameAlignment = TRUE) to the reference raster.

[Note]

If you find your transformation support is not working right, you may need to set the environment variable PROJSO to the projection library your PostGIS build is using. This just needs to have the name of the file. So for example on windows, you would in Control Panel -> System -> Environment Variables add a system variable called PROJSO and set it to libproj.dll. You'll have to restart your PostgreSQL service/daemon after this change.

[Warning]

When transforming a coverage of tiles, you almost always want to use a reference raster to insure same alignment and no gaps in your tiles as demonstrated in example: Variant 3.

Availability: 2.0.0 Requires GDAL 1.6.1+

Enhanced: 2.1.0 Addition of ST_Transform(rast, alignto) variant

Examples

Compare a source raster with nearest-neighbor and bilinear reprojections. The diagonal bands make the resampling behavior visible: nearest-neighbor keeps hard pixel steps, while bilinear smooths values between pixels. All three figures are generated from this query at manual build time.

Code
WITH rows AS (
    SELECT
        y,
        array_agg(
            ((
                    x * 3 + y * 5
                    + CASE WHEN (x + y) % 8 < 4 THEN 80 ELSE 0 END
                ) % 255)::double precision
            ORDER BY x
        ) AS row_values
    FROM generate_series(1, 80) AS y
    CROSS JOIN generate_series(1, 80) AS x
    GROUP BY y
), source AS (
    SELECT ST_SetValues(
        ST_AddBand(
            ST_MakeEmptyRaster(
                80, 80,
                -500000, 600000,
                2500, -2500,
                0, 0,
                2163
            ),
            1, '8BUI', 0, NULL
        ),
        1, 1, 1,
        array_agg(row_values ORDER BY y)::double precision[][]
    ) AS rast
    FROM rows
), transformed AS (
    SELECT
        rast,
        ST_Transform(rast, 4326, 'NearestNeighbor') AS nearest,
        ST_Transform(rast, 4326, 'Bilinear') AS bilinear
    FROM source
)
SELECT
    ST_AsPNG(rast) AS "source (EPSG:2163)",
    ST_AsPNG(nearest) AS "nearest (EPSG:4326)",
    ST_AsPNG(bilinear) AS "bilinear (EPSG:4326)"
FROM transformed;
Output
PNG image, 80 x 80 pixels | PNG image, 98 x 64 pixels | PNG image, 98 x 64 pixels
Figure
Geometry figure for visual-rt-st-transform-01

Raster reprojection and resampling.

Massachusetts State Plane source

WGS 84 nearest-neighbor

WGS 84 bilinear

Variant 3.

The following shows the difference between using ST_Transform(raster, srid) and ST_Transform(raster, alignto)

Code
WITH foo AS (
    SELECT 0 AS rid, ST_AddBand(ST_MakeEmptyRaster(2, 2, -500000, 600000, 100, -100, 0, 0, 2163), 1, '16BUI', 1, 0) AS rast UNION ALL
    SELECT 1, ST_AddBand(ST_MakeEmptyRaster(2, 2, -499800, 600000, 100, -100, 0, 0, 2163), 1, '16BUI', 2, 0) AS rast UNION ALL
    SELECT 2, ST_AddBand(ST_MakeEmptyRaster(2, 2, -499600, 600000, 100, -100, 0, 0, 2163), 1, '16BUI', 3, 0) AS rast UNION ALL

    SELECT 3, ST_AddBand(ST_MakeEmptyRaster(2, 2, -500000, 599800, 100, -100, 0, 0, 2163), 1, '16BUI', 10, 0) AS rast UNION ALL
    SELECT 4, ST_AddBand(ST_MakeEmptyRaster(2, 2, -499800, 599800, 100, -100, 0, 0, 2163), 1, '16BUI', 20, 0) AS rast UNION ALL
    SELECT 5, ST_AddBand(ST_MakeEmptyRaster(2, 2, -499600, 599800, 100, -100, 0, 0, 2163), 1, '16BUI', 30, 0) AS rast UNION ALL

    SELECT 6, ST_AddBand(ST_MakeEmptyRaster(2, 2, -500000, 599600, 100, -100, 0, 0, 2163), 1, '16BUI', 100, 0) AS rast UNION ALL
    SELECT 7, ST_AddBand(ST_MakeEmptyRaster(2, 2, -499800, 599600, 100, -100, 0, 0, 2163), 1, '16BUI', 200, 0) AS rast UNION ALL
    SELECT 8, ST_AddBand(ST_MakeEmptyRaster(2, 2, -499600, 599600, 100, -100, 0, 0, 2163), 1, '16BUI', 300, 0) AS rast
), bar AS (
    SELECT
        ST_Transform(rast, 4269) AS alignto
    FROM foo
    LIMIT 1
), baz AS (
    SELECT
        rid,
        rast,
        ST_Transform(rast, 4269) AS not_aligned,
        ST_Transform(rast, alignto) AS aligned
    FROM foo
    CROSS JOIN bar
)
SELECT
    ST_Collect(ST_ConvexHull(not_aligned) ORDER BY rid) AS not_aligned,
    ST_Collect(ST_ConvexHull(aligned) ORDER BY rid) AS aligned
FROM baz
Output
MULTIPOLYGON(((-107.007 50.2,-107.005 50.2,-107.005 50.198,-107.007 50.198,-107.007 50.2)),((-107.004 50.201,-107.002 50.201,-107.002 50.198,-107.004 50.198,-107.004 50.201)),((-107.001 50.201,-106.999 50.201,-106.999 50.198,-107.001 50.198,-107.001 50.201)),((-107.007 50.199,-107.004 50.199,-107.004 50.196,-107.007 50.196,-107.007 50.199)),((-107.004 50.199,-107.001 50.199,-107.001 50.196,-107.004 50.196,-107.004 50.199)),((-107.001 50.199,-106.999 50.199,-106.999 50.196,-107.001 50.196,-107.001 50.199)),((-107.006 50.197,-107.004 50.197,-107.004 50.194,-107.006 50.194,-107.006 50.197)),((-107.004 50.197,-107.001 50.197,-107.001 50.194,-107.004 50.194,-107.004 50.197)),((-107.001 50.197,-106.998 50.197,-106.998 50.195,-107.001 50.195,-107.001 50.197))) | MULTIPOLYGON(((-107.007 50.2,-107.005 50.2,-107.005 50.198,-107.007 50.198,-107.007 50.2)),((-107.005 50.202,-107.001 50.202,-107.001 50.198,-107.005 50.198,-107.005 50.202)),((-107.002 50.202,-106.998 50.202,-106.998 50.198,-107.002 50.198,-107.002 50.202)),((-107.007 50.199,-107.003 50.199,-107.003 50.195,-107.007 50.195,-107.007 50.199)),((-107.005 50.199,-107.001 50.199,-107.001 50.195,-107.005 50.195,-107.005 50.199)),((-107.002 50.199,-106.998 50.199,-106.998 50.195,-107.002 50.195,-107.002 50.199)),((-107.007 50.198,-107.003 50.198,-107.003 50.194,-107.007 50.194,-107.007 50.198)),((-107.005 50.198,-107.001 50.198,-107.001 50.194,-107.005 50.194,-107.005 50.198)),((-107.002 50.198,-106.998 50.198,-106.998 50.194,-107.002 50.194,-107.002 50.198)))
Figure
Geometry figure for visual-rt-st-transform-02