landscape

Software:
3ds max 2019

To model a terrain form an DWG (Autocad) file containing a topographical plan:

1. Import the DWG file to into the 3ds max scene, and move the plan to the center of the 3ds max scene if necessary.
2. Select the VIZBlock object and extract its linked geometry:
   
3. Right click the Linked Geometry object and select:
   Convert To: Editable Spline
   
4. Enter Spline editing mode, select all the splines that are not part of the topography, and delete, or detach them so only the terrain ‘height lines’ will remain.
   
   
5. With the topographical plan editable spline selected,
   Choose Create > Compound Objects > Terrain
   
6. A Terrain object is now created:
   

To retopologize the terrain mesh to more usable quad polygon mesh:

1. Create a new Plane primitive above the terrain mesh, slightly smaller at the sides, that has the wanted polygon resolution:
   
2. From the Top view (important), with the new plane selected, choose:
   Create > Compound Objects > Conform:
   
3. Set the creation method to ‘Move“, click Pick Wrap-To Object and than click the terrain mesh.
   It will now take some time for the new conformed mesh to be calculated..
   When the new object is ready, right click the viewport to exit the object picking mode.
   
4. The Conform object is no ready, and contains both the terrain mesh and the new conformed quad polygon mesh:
   Right click it and choose:Convert To: Editable Poly
5. In Element editing mode, select the terrain mesh part and delete it to remain only with the new quad polygon mesh:
   
6. Fix non conformed mesh parts by either moving or deleting them:
   
7. The new retopologized terrain is ready:
   

 

The example demonstrated here is a DWG file by Jose Vega, free to download from Bibliocad.com