tsw Posted March 18, 2020 Share Posted March 18, 2020 Is there a way within Vectorworks to bake a displacement map texture to actual 3D geometry? I've mapped a digital elevation model (DEM) image to a simple plane that I would like to convert to use as a site model. Thanks! Quote Link to comment
herbieherb Posted March 18, 2020 Share Posted March 18, 2020 No, the displacement map does only affect the renderworks-rendering. You coul'd use the original data to create a dgm. Can you give a sample file of how the data looks like? Quote Link to comment
tsw Posted March 18, 2020 Author Share Posted March 18, 2020 Thanks for confirming. I did manage to get what I needed using Blender and importing it. The original file I was working with was a 1 arc-second GeoTIFF that I was using as a displacement map. Sample attached. Quote Link to comment
unearthed Posted March 18, 2020 Share Posted March 18, 2020 I almost always do these in QGIS, more recent QGIS versions make geotiff to 3D contours reasonably simple. If VW is trying to market itself as GIS-capable it should be able to handle at least the basic DEM operations. Quote Link to comment
herbieherb Posted March 19, 2020 Share Posted March 19, 2020 GeoTiffs with elevation information are basically tifs that come with a text file stating how they are georeferenced. The only difference is that instead of RGB values for the pixel heights they contain numbers. It is quasi a matrix of height numbers, for example 705.1, 705.7, 705.9, 706.2 704.8, 705.4, 706.0, 706.1 704.6, 705.2, 705.8, 706.2 704.2, 705.1, 705.5, 705.9 The separate .tfw file contains information about how big a pixel is, where it is located and how it is rotated. In order to be able to use something like this in Vectorworks, you need a file in .xyz format or similar. They look like this: x-coordinate y-coordinate z-coordinate for example: 2677000.25000000 1246999.75000000 569.249939 2677010.75000000 1246999.75000000 569.999939 2677021.25000000 1246999.75000000 570.769958 2677031.75000000 1246999.75000000 571.219971 2677042.25000000 1246999.75000000 571.859985 2677052.75000000 1246999.75000000 572.940063 2677063.25000000 1246999.75000000 574.370056 2677073.75000000 1246999.75000000 575.350037 You can use an online converter to convert geotiffs into xyz format. Then import this xyz point cloud into the open source program CloudCompare. There you reduce the point density (Edit-Subsample), so that in the end you only have about 10'000 points. These can then be imported into Vectorworks via 'Survey Input'. Select 'Create 3D Locus Objects'. You can then use these 3D locus objects to generate a terrain model. This way you get a fully editable, georeferenced terrain model. 3 Quote Link to comment
Popular Post Benson Shaw Posted March 20, 2020 Popular Post Share Posted March 20, 2020 (edited) @herbieherb - Many thanks for tips about the GeoTiff data formats and conversion to xyz! CloudCompare and other externals likely have many advantages. If a point cloud can be generated or found for the geo area, note that Vectorworks Point Cloud features include: Import Point Cloud menu provides a limiter for cloud density. Point Cloud Menu and associated right click context menu provide command for creation of 3d Loci from the point cloud "surface" with user determined number of points created. These loci can be used as source data for creation of a DTM. I used the Stanford Bunny scan for fun, included here as a Zip file. bun_zipper.ply.zip Edited March 20, 2020 by Benson Shaw trying to stay on topic, and sometimes failing 5 Quote Link to comment
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