Numerical Simulation of Geophysical flows (debris flows, landslides, avalanches...) usually needs "theorical" bottom topographies in addition to true DTM (Digital Topographical Models). It could be thus tricky to build own testing DTM. In an other hand, Blender offers very powerful and easy to use tools for 3D modeling. Here is an exemple of the utility of using Blender as a DTM editor for numerical simulation input of geophysical flows.

- Blender
- awk
- GMT (Generic Mapping Tools)
Should works on Linux,FreeBSD, Mac OS X

1 - Lunch Blender (several websites are available for beginners)
2 - Create a plane and subdivise it so as to get numerous vertices

3 - Sculpt it as you would like to

5 - Then export it as wavefront 3D object (Obj) with following options


6 - then run the blenderflow csh-script on your 3d-Obj file, you will get binary raw and ascii files in a regular grid ready to be used in your simulations:

Warranty:
This tip comes without any warranty, but any comment are welcome!



A. Lucas / 09-2009