Guided terrain synthesis through distance transforms

Abstract

We present a novel approach for terrain synthesis where the terrain is created only through procedural techniques and an initial input sketch. We employ a heightmap function that creates a distance map of the source image. The sketch is semantically annotated so that sections of the image are seen as a terrain type. Once a distance map of the source image is created, the algorithm can begin defining the heights inside the heightmap based on the distance values of each underlying pixel, the terrain type of that underlying pixel, and which terrain type that is different from its own it is nearest to. The results we obtain are promising as the terrain creation is fast, and the input system is non-complex.