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Making 3D Terrain Maps (2017)

82 points by nkurz 8y ago

Animats 8y ago
This is how to make 3D terrain maps "by hand", or with a lot of manual labor. Not how to use Mapbox or Cesium-JS to make an interactive map. "It is very costly to change, say, the direction of view, in the final stages of map production. Changing the direction of view by even one degree would mean starting over from scratch." I've been trying to do 3D terrain maps in Mapbox, and real elevation isn't working yet. They only have "hill shading", which is what graphics people call bump mapping. They have an experimental project to use Three.js with Mapbox, which looks very nice, but it's just a demo right now. Cesium-JS supposedly can do 3D elevation maps, but I haven't tried it yet. These all produce live "slippy maps", like Google Earth - you can pan, zoom, rotate, and change the viewpoint.
- trynewideas 8y ago
  See also ArcGIS API for JavaScript, specifically SceneView: https://developers.arcgis.com/javascript/latest/sample-code/intro-sceneview/index.html https://developers.arcgis.com/javascript/latest/sample-code/... Zoom in on a place, switch from pan to rotation, and look around. There's also a more dramatic example: https://developers.arcgis.com/javascript/latest/sample-code/scene-toggle-elevation/index.html https://developers.arcgis.com/javascript/latest/sample-code/...
- jacobolus 8y ago
  On the flip side, Tom Patterson’s maps are undoubtedly better quality (as static images) than anything that can be automatically made using easily available tools today. People willing to put in manual effort can get amazing results. The folks trying to make tools should be reading Patterson (and Imhof’s Cartographic Relief Presentation, and so on) and trying to make their tools produce output closer to the best work done by expert craftspeople.
- pheelicks 8y ago
  You may find the maps we create at my company, Procedural, interesting: https://www.procedural.eu/ https://www.procedural.eu/ We use WebGL to create Procedural Maps, which are created from a combination of real terrain data, vector features from OSM along with procedural generation, all coming together to make a beautiful 3D map.
- anc84 8y ago
  https://cesiumjs.org/Cesium/Build/Apps/Sandcastle/?src=Terrain.html https://cesiumjs.org/Cesium/Build/Apps/Sandcastle/?src=Terra...
jamiethompson 8y ago
The flat-earthers are gonna have a field day with some of these.

82 points by nkurz 8y ago

This is how to make 3D terrain maps "by hand", or with a lot of manual labor. Not how to use Mapbox or Cesium-JS to make an interactive map. "It is very costly to change, say, the direction of view, in the final stages of map production. Changing the direction of view by even one degree would mean starting over from scratch." I've been trying to do 3D terrain maps in Mapbox, and real elevation isn't working yet. They only have "hill shading", which is what graphics people call bump mapping. They have an experimental project to use Three.js with Mapbox, which looks very nice, but it's just a demo right now. Cesium-JS supposedly can do 3D elevation maps, but I haven't tried it yet. These all produce live "slippy maps", like Google Earth - you can pan, zoom, rotate, and change the viewpoint.

trynewideas 8y ago
See also ArcGIS API for JavaScript, specifically SceneView: https://developers.arcgis.com/javascript/latest/sample-code/intro-sceneview/index.html https://developers.arcgis.com/javascript/latest/sample-code/... Zoom in on a place, switch from pan to rotation, and look around. There's also a more dramatic example: https://developers.arcgis.com/javascript/latest/sample-code/scene-toggle-elevation/index.html https://developers.arcgis.com/javascript/latest/sample-code/...
jacobolus 8y ago
On the flip side, Tom Patterson’s maps are undoubtedly better quality (as static images) than anything that can be automatically made using easily available tools today. People willing to put in manual effort can get amazing results. The folks trying to make tools should be reading Patterson (and Imhof’s Cartographic Relief Presentation, and so on) and trying to make their tools produce output closer to the best work done by expert craftspeople.
pheelicks 8y ago
You may find the maps we create at my company, Procedural, interesting: https://www.procedural.eu/ https://www.procedural.eu/ We use WebGL to create Procedural Maps, which are created from a combination of real terrain data, vector features from OSM along with procedural generation, all coming together to make a beautiful 3D map.
anc84 8y ago
https://cesiumjs.org/Cesium/Build/Apps/Sandcastle/?src=Terrain.html https://cesiumjs.org/Cesium/Build/Apps/Sandcastle/?src=Terra...

jamiethompson 8y ago

The flat-earthers are gonna have a field day with some of these.