How to Generate Contour Lines

See about the Contour Lines generation in SPRING

Generating Contour Lines:

  • activate, in the "Control Panel", an Information Layer (IL), from the Numerical Category, which will be used as an input for Contour Lines generation. Make sure there is a rectangular grid representation or a triangular grid (TIN) for the activated IL;
  • select, in the main menu, the DTM option;
  • select, in the DTM list option the Contour Lines Generation... option to open the associated window; in the

    At the Contour Lines Generation window:
  • in "Generate", select the Screen option to generate the Contour Lines only in the screen or, select the File option to create this representation in the system. It is suggested that the Contour Lines should be initially generated in the Screen, so it is possible to check for Contour Lines consistency before storing them in the system;
  • in "Input", select the Grid representation or the TIN, over which the Contour Lines will be generated;
  • in "Step", select the Fixed option so the Contour Lines will be distributed equally among the height intervals, or select the Variable option, to insert the height values for each contour line manually;
  • if the Fixed Step is selected:
    • change, if desired, the text field values "Vmin:" and "Vmax:". These fields are filled, initially, with default values equals to the minimum and maximum values, respectively, of the chosen input representation, Grid or TIN;
    • give a constant value for the interval between two Contour Lines, in the text field named "Step:" ;
  • if the Variable Mode is selected:
    • fill the Value text field, with the desired contour line height value ;
    • press the Insert button, to insert this height value in the list values that is displayed to the right of this button;
    • repeat the last two instructions so all desired step values are in the list;
    • select a height value in the list and press the Remove button to remove an contour line value from the list;
    • press the Remove All button, to remove all contour line values from the list;
  • press the Execute button to display the Contour Lines in the screen or generate the Contour Lines in a file;
  • press the Close button to exit the Contour Lines Generation window;
  • press the Help button to get help during the contour line Generation execution.

NOTE: If the Contour Lines generation option selected was File, the Contour Lines option, available in the "Control Panel", will be enable when the processing is over. To visualize the Contour Lines, just activate the Contour Lines representation in the active IL, and press the Draw icon in the SPRING.

IMPORTANT: The Contour Lines generated using the interpolation method above are not available for editing. To edit the Contour Lines in this IL one should export them (to the ASCII or DXF format) and import them back to another IL, such that the data now belong to a Sample representation.

See also:

How to generate a Rectangular Grid
How to generate a Triangular Grid

Other DTM products in the SPRING