Creating raster based on function of distance to points and assorted attributes in QGIS

Question

In QGIS 3.30 I have a dataset of points associated with several values, call them integers A and B.

I want to create a raster with maybe 5km x 5km pixels where the value associated with each pixel indicates a function of A, B and the distance to all points within a specific maximum distance.

Something of pseudo-code:

For each pixel in the raster.

• For each point within about 300km of the centre of the pixel calculate a value based on distance, A and B
• Sum all these calculations and assign them to the value of the raster

The final goal will be to combine a few of these rasters in numerous ways in the usual ways, such as clipping to a polygon and applying a function to combine these function raster values.

Answer 1

First create a vector polygon grid with the size/resolution of the raster pixels you want to create. Then use the following expression to create a new attribute field to create the value you need, based on fields a and b from layer points (in line 4, change the kind of calcluation to adapt to your use case):

array_sum (
    overlay_nearest (
        'name_of_point_layer',  -- change layer name
        a / b,  -- the calculation you want to make, based on fields "a" and "b" from layer points
        max_distance:=300000, -- max. distance of point to take into consideration
        limit:=-1
    )
)

When finished, run Menu Raster > Conversion > Rasterize (Vector to Raster) and set the new field creted before as input for Field to use for a burn-in value.

---

Edit

To answer your follow up question from the comments: to include the the distance between the feature being evaluated and the item from the array returned by overlay_nearest so that the calculation changes based on that distance, use the following expression. It calculates the division of attributes a and b and multiplies this with the distance a point is away from the current feature (thus higher values for points far away):

array_foreach(
    overlay_nearest (
        'points', -- replace with the name of your point layer
        @feature, -- available since QGIS 3.28
        max_distance:= 300000,  -- define the distance
        limit:= -1
    ),
    attribute (@element, 'a') /  -- get the value for attribute field a 
    attribute (@element, 'b') *  -- get the value for attribute field a 
    length (make_line ($geometry, geometry(@element))  -- get the distance between the feature being evaluated and the item from the array returned by overlay_nearest
    )
)

Answer 2

So I thought that I would post the solution that I came up with based on the excellent guidance of @Babel.

My source dataset was a spreadsheet of geocoded EV chargers across the country that came in as strings. So my first step was to create binned fields as follows:

-- handle definition
try(coalesce(to_int(attribute( @feature, 'Number of')), 0), 0)

-- handle_bin definition
case 
    when attribute( @feature, 'handles') > 10 then 5
    when attribute( @feature, 'handles') >= 8 then 4
    when attribute( @feature, 'handles') >= 4 then 3
    when attribute( @feature, 'handles') >= 2 then 2
    when attribute( @feature, 'handles') >= 1 then 1
    else 0
end

-- power definition
try(coalesce(to_int(attribute( @feature, 'Power Ra_1')), 0), 0)

-- power_bin definition
case 
    when attribute( @feature, 'power') >= 250 then 5
    when attribute( @feature, 'power') >= 150 then 4
    when attribute( @feature, 'power') >= 100 then 3
    when attribute( @feature, 'power') >= 50 then 2
    when attribute( @feature, 'power') >= 1 then 1
    else 0
end

After this, it was a pretty simple matter to follow Babel's instructions to create a grid (I used 10km for speed since my country is very large, might increase resolution later but it does not change anything in the code) and then add a calculated field as folllows

-- DCTravelScore definition
coalesce(
    array_sum(
        array_foreach(
            overlay_nearest (
                'Australia_chargers_xlsx_2c8dfa1c_99e3_4eeb_ae67_988ade0ad84e',
                @feature, -- available since QGIS 3.28
                max_distance:= 100000,  -- define the distance
                limit:= -1
            ),
            with_variable(
                'distance', 
                distance($geometry, geometry(@element)),
                coalesce(attribute (@element, 'handle_bin'), 0) *
                coalesce(attribute (@element, 'power_bin'), 0) *
                case 
                    when @distance <= 5000.0 then 5 
                    when @distance <= 10000.0 then 4
                    when @distance <= 20000.0 then 3
                    when @distance <= 50000.0 then 2
                    when @distance <= 100000.0 then 1
                    else 0
                end
            )
        )
    ), 0
)

Not sure whether there is a more elegant way to do binning like this? At least the with_variable function exists to create a variable in local scope without jumping into full script mode!