Terrain surface editing tool

[KPerison]

A new tool aimed at editing the interface between terrain surfaces edges is required. 

The projects I work on are primarily outside the US. Thus the Model Builder function generates it terrain surface from SRTM 90m DEM data.  The 30m data is available for use if you want to go retrieve it yourself.  Even with the 30m DEM data, once I import LIDAR or any higher resolution surveyed surface data, the interface between the surface edges always generates large elevation differences. Especially in steep forested areas.

A tool that can smooth or fuzz the surface edges would be very useful and make the interface look more natural. 

My initial thoughts were the tool could:

1. Hold edge of surface A and blend into surface B by distance
2. Hold edge of surface A and blend into surface B by slope
3. Average both sides of interface over a buffer width
4. Ability to apply blending criteria to different ranges or areas

Alternately provide a similar tool to Photoshop's "Heal" brush to be able to "Paint" over the affected areas  <---Not sure about this one, but somehow act like sandpaper or filler depending on which surface you were trying to edit.

Anyhow, see the attached PDF for an example.

[ramesh_sridharan]

Let us check with the team. I believe the performance and other technical details might be some of the stopper but let us discuss and iron out the details.

[JamesMaeding]

@ramesh_sridharan 

Just please be transparent with discussions, so we can help choose between options and compromises.

You for sure will run into the issue of how IW pastes the list of surfaces into one ground, as what happens if we remove or add a new surface overlapping the area edited?

Tracking that will not be easy, and keeping it simple, but not too simple, will be the trick.

I write surface software too so talk to us.

[ramesh_sridharan]

Absolutely @JamesMaeding. I am curious about what would be the best way to have a call/chat. Please email me so that we can try to hop on a call, which we can share in this forum for others as well. 

[JamesMaeding]

@ramesh_sridharan 

I'm in California, so anytime 8-5 PST for a call or conference.

for email I am at j maeding at hunsaker com.

Kill the spaces, switch the at, and add the dot 🙂

thx

[Anonymous]

Mountain Time here - flexible would like to be engaged if this moves forward
Still holding out hopes for mesh deformation brush tools like those that showed up in Memento>ReMAKE, then dissapeared into RECAP photo ? Only these were designed for 3D objects not topo mesh editing at scale?
I use GM for smoothing edges, but want more functionality in IW - again - ability to deform, push pull, smooth, ECT

[JamesMaeding]

@Anonymous 

Can you comment on how IW should handle adding or removing surfaces after edits?

Autodesk will not likely do this feature assuming one surface. The whole point is making the seams between multiple surfaces smooth, so it must be addressed.

If I were with adesk, I would not do this feature until there was some level of agreement with users like us, as to how changes get handled. The classic mistake is to listen to some big client on a feature, then realizing they play things too simple or complex. Avoid that by suggesting solutions early on. I will do the same.

[Anonymous]

@JamesMaeding I don't hv the answers nor claim to be expert - but here are some rambling thoughts:

Scenarios in IW provides opportunity for versioning, modded topo doesnt have to destruct original surfaces.
Brush mods would use whatever proximity and strength is set to, then re-triangulate with nearest neighbor cells in some fashion - (just like all other programs do, that contain these type of tools).

I disagree that this should only about fixing seams - you can do that in GM and other programs as shown by @srksphillips . Users should be able to deform topo on the fly period. Like @srksphillips i fix my topo seams if possible prior to bringing it in, but for many users, perhaps it IS fixing disparate seams, but maybe it is also modifying a needed swale, or creating other landforms quickly..

Yes with IW Coverages you can do some mods, but its ridiculously clunky, hard to control with any precision and has limited functionality (IMO) compared to programs that use brush and/or shape driven deformers. If IW can already mod topo using coverages - why not put a more intuitive toolset on top of this? Oh BTW, the toolset already exists - we saw it in Memento..

When Memento was alive back in '15 @Anonymous ALREADY demonstrated the mesh editing tools on both objects (pickup truck) AND terrain. *So Autodesk already has some code to start with here.. it just hasn't made it into IW.  A mesh is a mesh and the tools exist(ed) in Menento>Remake (now apparently in RECAP Photo). 3D object mesh are triangles, reality meshes are triangles, and IW are tiled mesh triangles (albeit organized by rectangular grid cells for db tiling efficiency). But I prefer not going back and forth between RECAP photo and IW (or any other silly workaround) unless i am already doing some other larger reality mesh work. 

If you have ever used Lumion or Bentley LumenRT - topo brush tools are also there but these are mostly closed black boxes with horrible interoperability for topo in particular.
More sophisticated brush tools exist in more heavy-duty real 3D programs as you likely are aware. What is missing is the interoperability path to modify surfaces to get back and forth to IW (or vice versa). There are numerous ways to accomplish it - one example is using heightmap tiffs over DEMs or other formats - these can be painted in Photoshop to modify aka game industry. + many other workarounds to modify topo and bring back and forth.. - the key point of my wishlist is to have the on the fly mesh editing functionality baked in with intuitive tools. 

[JamesMaeding]

@Anonymous 

I get what you mean, but you are talking about end results. I think the critical detail for the adesk team is how they "store" the edits. To know that, you have to define what they are. You are saying the answer is 42, then not defining what the question is.

Other progs like Unity have terrain modelers with brushes and things, but they deal with one terrain surface.

That situation is really a different feature than discussed here. In that situation, you just edit away and save the new surface in some format.

For blending, if you save results as one surface, you destroy the ability to switch out or update the original surfaces.

Honestly, if you don't address that, you are leaving the question so vague the programmers will likely not even attempt to solve this. I wouldn't, knowing the history of civil3d and IW. Even when we do suggest solutions they often get so mutated the results are not very usable.

I know you don't have all the answers yet, nor do I, but you're gonna need some at least.