Terrain Conformer

12 votes
Version: 
1.1
Date Updated: 
12/04/2012

This script conforms a terrain surface to a road in just a few click. It's very easy to use.

Additional Info: 

1- Create a road and a terrain as an editable_poly.
The objects must not have any thikness. (Very important!)
To conform smoothly, the terrain must have enough subdivision.
Also, you will get a better result if you build the road near the terrain
otherwise it can produce some distortion on the topology.

2- Launch the script, pick the road, pick the terrain,
choose the distance of the blending (smoothness of the slope),
click the button "Conform terrain" and wait a few seconds...

3- If you don't the result, click "undo conform",
then move, rotate or scale what you want and click again "Conform terrain"...

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The road does not change at all.
Only the terrain is conformed right under the road
but, outside the road, it keeps the original relief.

The terrain is conformed to the road only on the Z-axis,
it's not doing anything along the other axis X or Y.

A important thing :
The original objects are not deleted, just hidden.

Version 1.1:
Correction of an offset that appeared in certain cases.
The script works now in world coordinate system and respects
the initial position of the objects.
The spinner indicates the actual system units.

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If you have any suggestions, feel free to post comments !

Look at the video demo on youtube ! (there is no sound)

Version Requirement: 
2010, 2011, 2012, 2013
Video URL: 
AttachmentSize
terrain_conformer.mse3.75 KB
terrain_conformer1.1.mse4.59 KB

Comments

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luisllamas's picture

Great Script

It works now. (I used a road with thickness :P )
Thanks for the instructions.
Tested in 3ds Max 2010 and 2011, 64 bits. You can add it to version requirement info.

Good work!
+1 for you.

LittleLordPotala's picture

There are prerequisites...

The objects must be "open" objects, so you can easily select the borders
of the road and the terrain. They must not have thikness,
like with the "Shell" modifier.
Do not apply any modifier on your objects:
collapse the stack modifier (or duplicate and collapse the stack).
It works also better if the faces normals are directed upward.

I tested it a lot of times with different combinations
and it has always worked as expected.

For example : I always create my road with a spline.
Then I add a "Sweep" modifier and select "use custom section",
pick a simple line, uncheck the "Banking" option. If the normals are
directed backward, in "Sweep parameters", I check "mirror on XY plane".
Finally I convert it to editable poly.
If you don't want to use this road to render your scene, you can use it
as a proxy-road to conform the terrain and make another road with the same spline,
more complex, even with thikness for the final render.

I hope it helps ! Best regards.

luisllamas's picture

Interesting script

Very interesting...

But tried doing some experiments and it hasnt worked as expected. May be I have been doing something wrong.

Best regards

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