I haven't been active on the forum for quite some time.
My latest project has been rendering views of computer model projections of a glacier's retreat in the next 100 years.
I had nothing to do with the science of the computer projections but was tasked with making presentable images for posters and such.
I used IFSAR satellite DEMs along with the glaciologist's modeled DEMs to use as hightfields. Some of the terrain color was an image shader using a geotif from NASA. I exaggerated the elevation(Z) scale by 150%. This was approved to be acceptable for their presentations.
The mountains look a bit cartoonish, but that was caused by the computer model exporting a DEM at low resolution.
The view here is from an altitude of 3,500 meters. It shows about 55 kilometers of the spreading glacier piedmont, the flat area.
The little ship in the lower left corner of the first render is an 800-meter container ship for scale.
The bay formed in the future projection is about 25 kilometers long.
I did intermediate renderings too of different scenarios of glacier recession. These were just the most dramatic ones.
I learned a lot about GIS and glaciers in the last four years for this. The publications for this project are way over my head in math and understanding, but I like to pretend I am more learned now.
This the Malaspina glacier in Southeast Alaska at 59.90N, -140.59W.
Russ