data sculpture Tools

(APPRENTICE)

A few free online terrain modeling tools for my apprentice workflows (featured in an upcoming tutorial). No 3D modeling experience required.

I’m making these links available early for those who already own a CNC or 3D printer and want to make terrains for holiday gifts.

Get heightmaps of any Location

If you are looking for lightweight heightmaps of any location, look no further. This is easily one of the best tools available to grab PNG heightmaps to import into CAM software that accepts them like Vectric Aspire. You can also use them in software like Rhino, Blender, or C4D to displace a mesh or plane to export as an STL.

12/15/20: This site hasn’t been working for the past few days. I’m hoping it will be functional by the time I post the tutorial.

Generate Terrains for 3dp or cnc

If you don’t have experience with 3D modeling software, or just need to get something on your printer or CNC machine ASAP, these two tools are perfect for you. The basic tool will get 90% of you what you need. The advanced tool has a few more features like data source selection and options for 3D printing like tiling.

Fusion 360? No Problem.

One of the most common questions I get is how to get an STL of a terrain into F360 for machining. The process is usually overly complicated—but not with this tool. Just load your terrain.party heightmap and export an STL that meets the F360 triangle count limit.