Converting vector or polygon layer to a continuous raster in ArcMap

Question

I am currently trying to create a raster layer from a vector or polygon layer with a cell size 5, but the vector data breaks and becomes discontinuous when converting. As the continuous features are very important, is there a way to select every cell that the vector or polygon layer intersect?

I have read about a 'rasterize' option, but cannot find this on ArcMap.

The image was created from the polygon to raster option, where the raster cells can be seen to be broken up and disconnected, unlike the original polygon. The same thing happens when converting from vector to raster.

Blue boxes are the vector data and the dark blue squares are the raster cells

• Vince: Welcome to GIS SE. As a new user, please take the Tour. You have converted to a raster. You just need to decide if connectivity is more important than retaining the target resolution with the current features. You could halve the resolution, or you could buffer the features by 1-3 units so that the half-scanline algorithm finds more pixels at cellsize 5.
• MidPiedmont: You could also try downloading QGIS and using its rasterize/vector-to-raster tools to see if you get better results

Answer 1

An off the top of my head approach you could explore is to use:

1. The create fishnet tool to create a grid of polygons
2. Select the grid polygons that intersect your polygon data
3. Run convert to raster which will honour the selection

This approach will very likely be TOO INCLUSIVE at a 5m resolution when you have say linear polygons that are representing a width of 2m. You can't have your cake and eat it too.