qgis - Why does the buffer take up whole screen?

I am trying to create buffers around the Hurricane Sandy path I created in QGIS (points are lat/long).

I have both points from each day she was tracted and the line I created from it with Points2One.

When I go to make buffers around either the line or the points, the buffer takes up the whole screen. Its all just one color.

I have made buffers before but from data I did not create.

Right now all of my projections are set to WGS 84 EPSG 4326.

Answer

It sounds like you are entering a value in miles or km (ie 10) but the projection is in geographic. The buffer tool will interpolate that as a 10 degree buffer. You will need to do one of two things:

1. translate your value to equal the buffer size in degrees, or,


2. reproject your data into a projection that is not geographic