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Digital Terrain Modelling

Updated August 20, 2024


This article applies to:
  • Terrain 3D
  • Terrain Forestry
  • RoadEng Civil
  • RoadEng Forestry

A TIN (Triangular Irregular Network) Model is a 3-dimensional surface which can be used to generate contours and profiles. Each triangle is a planar facet with vertices at the known elevation points.

Figure 1: Triangle Mode

Once a TIN model has been created, the program can rapidly determine the elevation of a new point using the known elevations of the surrounding triangle. This allows contours and profiles to be generated.

To follow the examples and procedures in this section, the Mapping and Drafting, Import Basic, Import Extended, Surface Generation and Contouring, function groups need to be enabled. The last example also requires the Volume Calculation and Reporting function group. See Function Groups in the On-line help for more information.