Terrain height lines. Who wants to convert?

[quizzy]

I got an Autocad 2004 file with polylines on the right heights. I've tried to use terrain in VIZ and drape in ADT, but I came across the form-z site and saw they have some very nice terrain modelling tools. Could any of you form-z users convert this one into a nice and dense mesh that I can read back into ADT (Autocad) ?? Or maybe one of you has Rhino that also can do the trick?? Well, here's the file:

 

http://www.3idee.nl/cgarchitect/terrainversie1.zip

 

You can email me at info@3idee.nl

 

And thanks in advance...

 

PS, Ow and if you need an autocad 2000 file just let me know... I can export that from VIZ

[Vince Paske]

Maybe you could use this .lisp file. It'll take your polylines and create a mesh over them. Try it out, it works pretty slick.

[manta]

What's a .lisp file and how do you use it ?

[Crazy Homeless Guy]

hope this helps. i thinkthe scale came is 1" as the base instead of 1', so i scaled everything up by 12. this made the site about 390-400' across. if it is wrong, scale down.

 

i created 2 versions of the site. one meshed at 2', which is pretty tight, and the other at 5'.

 

i left my construction lines in so you can kind of see how formZ works with terrains. i had to draw a closed construction line around the contours to give the site shape. i had to clean up 5 spots in the CAD where the line work was not joined. formZ requires that a line enter the base shape i made, then cross out of the base shape before the line ends. basically you can not have loose ends inside the base shape, because it does not know what to do with them.

 

http://www.phase22.com/temp/terrain_versie_2.dwg

 

..let me know if there are major problems with it.

[Erno]

Just found a terriffic way of doing terrains with smooth, nice meshes:

 

Use whateever terrain generator you have (max, form Z, some script, - whatever), then render out the z-depth from above (orthographic top view) very high res(4k or more). Then use this as a displace map to create the nice version. (I used the Dreamscape terra object).

 

If you stick with the Dreamscape terrain it'll be totally managable in the viewport even if its huge.

[Vince Paske]

To answer the few people who have asked me about it: A lisp is set of instructions, or scripting routines that execute a bunch of commands at once. You can do a google on lisp and get a lot more info.

To use the lisp routine I posted you place it in your ACAD\support directory, and while in cad, go to the "tools" pulldown and select "load application". Scroll and load the "lv" lisp. Then type "lv" at the command line.

It'll ask you for some elevated lines (if you have polylines, explode them), select them in plan view, then it'll ask you to select the lower-left hand corner of the mesh you want to create (just select a spot in the lower left hand corner - don't snap on anything) and then the upper right.

Next the routine will ask you have many segments you want in the x and y direction. The larger the number, the denser the mesh. It'll then generate a nice, clean polygonal mesh.