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Real World Height Maps for Terrain Creation


digman
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Terrain Party will create for you a nice downloadable height map from 18 km to a 8 km grid for a landscape base. The height map can be used in Unreal 4 and other rendering engines. World Machine can import the map for further work and Vue as well. 

I currently use the height map in Vue, Unreal and 3DC for further work on the terrain after exporting from Vue. I then export a height map out of 3DC.

 

http://terrain.party/

Edited by digman
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Thanks for posting the link, David. Nice find.

However, I do have problems finding a region that I can download heightmap of. I tried parts of many European countries, but I only receive 1 KB zip files with a text file inside where they state that:

 

No height map data was available. That's a bummer.

If you're way at the poles, that's probably why. Orbital measurements only go
so far away from the equator.

If this area is filled with water, try a box that has less water. That's
probably a good idea for gameplay reasons anyway.

Otherwise, this could be a problem with terrain.party. Retrying the link above
at a later time might help, or try posting it in the Discuss link for help.

At any rate: there's no height maps here. Sorry!

 

Are there any locations that work?

---

OK, Paris and major cities do work, but the maps could be of better quality. They're good for base terrain shapes though.

Edited by ajz3d
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Thanks for posting the link, David. Nice find.

However, I do have problems finding a region that I can download heightmap of. I tried parts of many European countries, but I only receive 1 KB zip files with a text file inside where they state that:

 

 

Are there any locations that work?

---

OK, Paris and major cities do work, but the maps could be of better quality. They're good for base terrain shapes though.

What I found is that you need to be on the default map view, "MapQuest Street map" to get the data... I use the MapQuest Satellite map to get the terrain topology area I like, Then switch back to the MapQuest Street map. I had no problems so far in getting any data. 

 

The data is good for a base terrain to further work on as stated. I like the natural forms of the topology you get to start with as a base. I use the merged file as it tends to be the best one. These height maps can be loaded in Vue or World Machine for further work. I get several terrain areas, save them out as obj files from Vue, Import them into 3DC, merge pieces together I like plus do more work on them using stencils. Once done bake for the final height map.

 

Update: You can increase the grid above 18km too...

Edited by digman
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