This page is work in progress, this is not a complete tutorial. This is notes written down from our discord arma server #terrain_makers channel discussion. I will try to finish this page into tutorial as soon as possible, so far I have not been successfully with my efforts to get real world data through QGIS into terrain builder and arma3.

If you're lurking in the channel, read this page and know some new information or different way to do something; please let me know by @Snake Man highlight in the channel, thank you.

btw you can scroll to bottom of this page to see last update time in lower right corner.

Goal of this work in progress page is to learn how to get real world data for:

• terrain
• satellite texture
• satellite mask
• roads
• vegetation

And process these through QGIS (free open source program) into terrain builder and finally into finished arma3 terrain addon.

I do not know if all of the above is possible, terrain is but mask? vegetation? No idea yet, I'm learning one step at the time.

HOWTO get real world terrain data into ArmA 3

ALOS World 3D - 30m data from opentopo.sdsc.edu

Go to opentopo.sdsc.edu website, click Global Data tab, click satellite data → “ALOS World 3D - 30m”. Now you should see world map with red boxes marking the areas for available data.

PMCTODO steps how to select and download data

You should be able to imported the tar gunzip (.gz) file into QGIS, however you should unpack it first (with rar for example). You can save the heightmap from QGIS into TIF file format and then read the tif with L3DT. L3DT can then save the heightmap as ASCII grid or XYZ.

Use plugins → manage and install plugins…

Select OpenLayer and click install, select OSMDownloader and click install.

QGIS settings → options → CRS, allows you to setup default CRS for new projects and layers. Set this to EPSG:32631, WGS 84 / UTM zone 31N

Terrains used in arma3 can only be power of two grid, like 256 x 256, 512 x 512, etc. When you get real world data from various web sources its usually downloaded in “hand drawn box” which is not perfect square (power of two), so you must clip this data into square power of two.

PMCTODO now idea how to select power of two square other than typing in lat/lon coordinate numbers

Once you have terrain loaded in QGIS, you can get streets / roads to show transparent on top of it.

Use web → openlayers plugin → openstreetmap → openstreetmap (heh yes twice).

This opens open street maps layer in your project on top of your terrain heightmap. On layers panel double click openstreetmap layer to bring up its properties. Select transparency tab and move global transparency slider to about 50% then click apply and ok.

Now you can see your terrain heightmap and openstreetmap road data together.

You can click the X button in layer panel on each layer to turn them on/off.

Use web → openlayers plugin → google maps → google satellite

Hydrra: Under Open Layers plugin there will be google maps and bing maps tabs that you can use to get your sat image. On both street map and sat map there will be a button two rows under new file icon called download OSM data. Use it then select the area you want to use. let it download then when you have both your street map and sat image use the vector tool and align them. I do believe you also need to set the SRS layer as well. UTM 31.

Hydrra: to get to the vector tool hit Ctrl + alt + T and your toolbox will pop up. Just type in vector and the tool you will most likely need is the transform tool in case your sat image and street map aren't alligned.

Hydrra: Yeah, The plugin provides both sat image and street map. just make sure to separate the layer groups so it's easier to keep track of.

Terrain Processor should be able to convert geodetic .ASC heightmap into something that terrain builder would read. I have not managed to get it to work, terrain processor always does (Not Responding) freeze, meaning my file and/or settings were wrong.

Source bis wiki terrain processor tutorial: heightmap.

Terra Incognita should be able to download high resolution satellite textures for you.

Source SOURCEFORGE.NET - be warned! sourceforge.net/p/terraincognita2.

Ice: Also in TerraIncognita zoom right in so it says 1m\px or something right at top of your screen, then export your image as OziExplorer, import that to GM and it will place it exact over your height map

Print Composer will save an image of your current view.

Open it by Project → new print composer, or use CTRL-P

Make it a square pare size, for example 100mm x 100mm.

Select layout → add map, drag a box around the white area.

The view should look like your current QGIS main view, hide/show layers to get the view you want like google satellite.

Item properties → extents, no idea what to do with those :)

FinCenturion: you need to know now exactly how large of a chunk you need. and the coordinates / extents of this data. I have changed up everything to match arma worldspace by using the methods in my QGIS Reproject & Transform Tutorial.

FinCenturion: but you need lower left corner x,y and upper right corner x,y coords
FinCenturion: if you have more data than you will need you can of course use an area that is in power of two - so you can keep the horizontal scale 1:1 with real life
FinCenturion: say you want to do a 4096 x 4096 m map, and your lower corner is in the (fictive) coords of x 1000 and y 1000 - > exents 1000, 1000 and 5096 and 5096
FinCenturion: if that made any sense :smile:

To save the image use composer → export as image

Snake Man: ok when you choose area of terrain you want to download, do you just get “bulk” data with large amounts of room to maneuver or do you get square power of two exact size for arma3 use like 10km x 10km?