I have tried to get my head around the heading option , but I always come back to north up
Me too DAMA - tried heading up once, got very confused and nearly ran aground. North up for me.
regards allan
Heading (or course) up! When I look down at the plotter and see an island or AIS traffic to the left on the screen, I look up and guess what I see off to the left of the boat?
Also probably because I stare at this all day.
I prefer north up but am quite OK with course up.
Like southace I can and mostly do have on on each setting.
I'm lucky enough to have two plotters, one is an oldie that still works well in black and white and the other has Navionics in colour.
I also run Navionics on my tablet as well as my phone.
Also have Memory-Map on the laptop.
It sounds like overkill but the boat came with the two plotters installed and I already had the tablet with Navionics and the laptop.
We usually sail with the colour plotter and the tablet running and at night have the second plotter running which is mounted in the cabin for the off watch to see where and how we are going without having to leave the cabin.
As a ex navigator I use both. On passage north up. When in pilotage situation course up as you are referring to markers, bearings and objects relative to your boat.
Funnily enough, I spend my time looking at similar screens to FreeRadical. However on my plotter and Hema navigator when 4wding, I have north up.
Select to expand quoteHG02 said..southace said..
I kinda of like both how about you guys?
Thanks HG,
I guess that was a vote for heading up?? 
On a delivery a couple of years back with the owner on board he preferred heading up. He had his raymarine plotter set that way and I had my tablet with memory map charts set the way I like, north up.
When the boat was surfing in a good following wind and sea, the chart plotter had the chart gyrating around keeping up with the heading up display. I think it would do my head in if I had to look at it for long.
North up. 
Almost got wrecked going into Port Stephens with heading up, was so rough, and dark, that only the nav buoys got me in. 
It's a matter of whatever you get used to.
My Garmin plotter gives heading up by default in most situations. But when you zooms out for a "big picture" look over about 20-30 km, it automatically switches to North up. It was a bit confusing at first, but now I kind of like it that way.
North up.
Just like Auscruisers, l have one oldie at the chart table below and one in the cockpit with C-Map.
Also a tablet with MemoryMap.
And the paper charts.
When l mark my passage on the chart the old plotter comes very handy with all the data at hand right on the front of me at the chart table.
Have three anchor alarms to boot which seems to be an overkill until you start to drag your anchor. 
Whatever method you choose, don't use both at the same time, like in the photos above. This is considered one of the key reasons why Jessica Watson hit the ship during her test sail. You can imagine trying to interpret that at midnight.
Funny story, I was in a 3 day race. I was at the opposite end of the very long start line from all the other boats. My friend brought his handheld GPS (Not a chart plotter). When looking between the boat compass and his GPS, it was obvious that we were getting a 10 degree lift from the current, in very very light winds. It was only an hour later when we realized that he had his GPS set to true, not magnetic. We were actually getting a 10 degree knock!
Paper charts are north up so having north up on plotter avoids confusion.
The problem with head up on plotters is that the map keeps jumping around every second or so with position updates. Maybe some nav programs have something to smooth this out.
The only head up or north I do is going to the boat to work on it South Ace But I do like having both
Heading up so that when you look out forward, left and right everything is where it is on the plotter.
I use North up on my plotter. Heading marker prominent with a "dot" along the heading marker showing my position in 30 seconds time. With a larger screen and a prominent heading marker and a track displayed it's almost a relative screen anyway.
The point being made about having course up and having markers, buoys etc in perspective on your bow is fine but surely if you are running with north up and you have even the very basics of a sense of direction you would have to know where to expect to see the same markers and buoys in relation to your bow.
If my sense of direction was so bad that my brain didn't automatically compute this then I shouldn't even be out on the water let alone trying to plot a course.
I can see what people are saying but it's a bit like the argument about tying a bowline with the eye to the left or the eye to the right. You still end up with a bowline.
Better ground all airline and air force pilots who use heading
Reminds me of being excommunicated at one time by various sailors for using left and right back and front on my boat when racing instead of port and starboard. Also colour coding the sheets and referring to them as red, green, yellow etc. Funny thing was there was a huge improvement in speed of new crew work and less mistakes when they didn't have to translate our "sea speak" into what they could understand.
I guess its personal taste.
Ive never really considered this before , but i have always had the heading facing forward . and i don't think i could change now !!
and thinking about this some more ............... I like north to stay in the north !!!
I always had mine North up, even when I was sailing south from the Whitsundays. When I was going through the narrows before Gladstone though I changed it to heading as it got pretty confusing in those tight quarters.
Having head up is like treating the yacht as the centre of the earth.
The yacht is moving relative to the earth and what we want to know is where the yacht is going relative to fixed points of geography.
North up makes the best sense to me.
Crikey Southace.........!
If I'd known you didn't know that North was up..... I would've had my doubts about you coming on the trip!
I guess it's just how people prefer to see it. I prefer North up - all the time.
That way it's a variable that is taken out of the equation (so I guess it's not a variable....)
North up for me!!!
One reason I like North up is so I can get a perspective of wind direction relative to my bow and heading, coarse up would work well with AIS overlay and what lies ahead.
Personally I don't really care but noticed my iPad and raymarine where set to opposites so when I corrected them I realised I like both so converted back to the way it was.
Now n zen I can't even remember what yours was set on and I didn't even think about it, just got onboard and drove! One thing I didn't like was the size of the factory set ship on your plotter I was going to suggest if you new of a option to change this size. Just a little arrow will do the job not the Titanic. Anyway each to there own.
Select to expand quotesouthace said..
One reason I like North up is so I can get a perspective of wind direction relative to my bow and heading, coarse up would work well with AIS overlay and what lies ahead.
Personally I don't really care but noticed my iPad and raymarine where set to opposites so when I corrected them I realised I like both so converted back to the way it was.
Now n zen I can't even remember what yours was set on and I didn't even think about it, just got onboard and drove! One thing I didn't like was the size of the factory set ship on your plotter I was going to suggest if you new of a option to change this size. Just a little arrow will do the job not the Titanic. Anyway each to there own.
When you've got a widescreen chart plotter, you can afford to have the yacht displayed the size of the Titanic heh heh!
I don't think you can change it anyhow.
I just hope it continues to float, unlike the Titanic......
If the plotter manufacturers give the option of either course up or north up then they can't seem to agree what is best.
Yet on the other hand if you don't have a plotter and are steering a course by compass then obviously you are using north up as your compass bearings are relative to the north position.
I learned to plot on paper charts and so I like north up, I find heading up confusing as I naturally assume north is up, this is a problem that would probably take quite awhile to fix so I think its safer for me just to stick with north up
When using the radar on a split screen with the chart plotter it is always Heading up, other wise I use North Up.
North up is what my "inbuilt bloke navigation" system uses on land so it's probably why I like it on the water. But I've got mates with smaller screen chartplotters and they get better use of the display using heading up. I suppose it's what you get use to and being able to work (mentally) with both variations is an advantage.
