Problems with Digimap landscapes

Hi everyone,

I've just downloaded a a 3D contour map from Digimap. Originally in an NTF format, I converted it to DWG. However it appears now to be a very large series of dots!. I was hoping they would be linked and form some fashion of terrain that I could render a solid form and shadows out of, and maybe drape a geology map over the top. Any ideas if I've done something wrong... or if there is a way to link these dots, which are actually the correct heights. The attached image shows a small portion of the dots from and angle to show the varying nature of them. lyterally any help would be much appreciated!!!

Thanks!

Contours2.dwg

i opened the file and i wasnt able to do anything useful with it. You can give the dots thickness but that was about it. I couldnt even snap to the points without selecting them. Hopefully someone will have some useful info for you, sorry.

Thanks for trying anyhow guys... I'll be royally disappointed if its only a series of dots... absolutely useless!!!

have you tried selecting the node, with osnaps.

I'm not at work today, but if you search help, there is a command that allows you to change the appearance of a point. You can change to a crosshair for example, (probably not so useful for what your doing).

You will have to search help again, but the 3d mesh command would be the one id be looking at anyway.

Someone will know the way I'm sure, just thought I'd throw in my thoughts as not many have responded.

I just opened the drawing (after converting it with DWG Trueview), and I got a 10m grid of 3D points.

The versions of AutoCAD with ground modelling facilities should be able to turn this into a 3D mesh very quickly. Or perhaps there is a lisp routine that could take the data from the points. It would be very slow trying to do it manually.

You may wish to look into using Site Topo, which can be found at http://www.sitetopo.com

That would be my advice if you don't have a related autodesk civil product. With SiteTopo you can open the file (as .dxf) and it will automatically create a surface. Then you can saveas back to .dxf and tell it what you want; the surface, contours, points, etc.

ACE! that sounds like a good solution. Thanks for sharing the knowledge guys, I'll try that and then I'll poost my results if I can make it all work. Thanks!

Hello Everyone! I've managed to take the NTF format into Landserf 2.2 and convert it into a ACS. file. This can then be read by AutoCAD Map 3D, which I've downloaded a trial of. The attached image is what I've achieved so far with this.

Progressing quite nicely... However I'm having trouble with the serperate file references. As can be seen in the image the 'Stlye' is being applied relative to the heights of each individual square. How can I merge all these squares so the style becomes relative to all of them??? I'm also having trouble with the 'Style Ranges.' As I would like the water to be blue but I don't know the tool to find its level???

I know this is becoming a bit more niche now but any help would be greatly appreciated!!!.

Ben

How did you get the data into your .dwg thus far? Did you attach the surface files via a Map query?

I brought them in via 'Connect To data...' ---> 'Add Raster or Surface Connection' This brought them all in correct orientation and relative position to each other. So basically they are references, however I've found no method to merge/ permanently attach the files like you would a reference.

I honestly am not sure either. You can combine them into one layer in the data connection window it appears, but I don't know if that will give you the result you're after or not.

If no one else answers you might check at theswamp.org.

I brought all the rasters in as one from the folder option and merged them this has solved the problem of the seperate levels. So thanks. Still not got this whole level business down seems tempromental.

Here's some of the images of the almost complete landscape put together. Still needs some work as the water levels aren't exactly right. Thanks for the help guys.

Nice work. That looks pretty sweet. Maybe you could post how you did it when you complete the project. Perhaps place it in the tutorials forum.

i think that looks great!

That looks like the Mersey Estuary or thereabouts.

That would be correct. It is the Mersey. I'm making a book with a number of colleagues on all aspects of the construction of the ship canal. This part being its geology and how that relates to the location of the canal. Glad people like them Yea Rustysilo... since I've spent so much time getting this done I think I'll make one when I have chance to help others out. It's really hard finding any help on niche stuff like this. i.e. the mad file types! lol. Anyhow I'm draping geological maps over the model once I get access to 'GoGeo' on Digimap, so shall post those too. Thanks again for the help!

Very interesting autocad map!I wanna to see your step making.

I've been trying to use section plane to cut a section through the 3d Plane shown. Is this possible in map 3D? I can't seem to get it to produce anything.