New terrains on the way.

[bigben]

Hi All

I have a revamp of my site to complete before I release some more terrains, but here's a teaser of one of the next terrains in the pipline. The water transparency is exaggerated so that you can see some of the subsurface detail derived from additional 2m bathymetric data.

In view of other changes at work I've been speeding up my downloads from USGS and by the end of tomorrow I should have filled in the gaps between 36°N-50°N and 100°E-125°E. I have a few ideas for terrains that I've worked on before, but having reviewed the stats on my ISP I appear to have plenty of space and bandwidth left to consider suggestions for other areas of interest.

So if you have a favourite area, drop me a line either here or via email with the coordinates for the middle of the area of interest... (or Google Map link or KML/KMZ placemark)

[cyphyr]

Great news BB
The only area of interest I would be really err interested in is the UK and if you can find decent resolutions elevation data I would be very greatful. Unfortunately our wonderful (not) mapping service here, the Ordinance Survey, have deemed if fit not to make their data freely available ... grump. So my taxes pay for them to do their work and then they charge me for the privilege of using it!
Anyway hope to see the rest of the world soon
Richard

[mr-miley]

Cyphyr

Don't get me started on the OS and getting data out of them. I downloaded a sample DEM from them (or whichever company is responsible for distribution).... the resolution is apalling. There are some realy spectacular areas I'd love to have a go at (Brecon Beacons, not far from where I live, and the area around the A465 (Swansea to Aberdare road) even closer to where I live) The landscape id interesting, with massive mine spoil tips everywhere forrestry commission pine plantations everywhere etc  I once collared a guy from the BGS (British Geological Survey) at an AGS file format conference (The BGS are partly responsible for the UK DEM mapping) and asked why we are limited to crappy resolution paid for DEMs when you can download the whole of the US at good res for free and he shrugged his shoulders and said he was as annoyed as I was about it but tis a government thing... they have to charge, and the Hi res stuff just isn't available to the general public     

Miles

[rcallicotte]

Excellent news, Ben.

Scotland Highlands...or the beaches (and surrounding cliffs) of Normandy...would be cool.  I guess it depends on your time and resources, but this would be nice if you get to it.

[bigben]

They're a little out of the range of this data.  But I do have some 90m resolution terrain sets on the way of other countries (or whatever resolution I can get my hands on).

I've managed to produce a set of all of NZ at 90m so it may be possible to do the whole of this quaint little country too 

Higher res data for AU is about $3,000 the last time I looked.

[rcallicotte]

NZ is a beautiful country with beautiful terrain.

$3000 is a bit over my limits.   

[bigben]

The very next terrain set that I'll be releasing though is the Glacier National Park.  I looked at various arrangements of 4097 terrains but in the end I decided on an 8194x8194 terrain at 10m resolution.  From my previous work on this area, one of the biggest problems is the very long line of site from the peaks, so this is one area where the lower res padding terrains are a must. It's also makes good use of my new river/lake model with lots of hanging lakes.  Here's an overview of the central terrain.