Model my Property › 3D print terrain from lidar
How to 3D print terrain from lidar
Lidar gives the shape of the ground to within centimetres, and in much of Europe it is free. Model my Property fetches it for you and turns it into a print-ready STL in your browser, with no GIS software, no downloads to stitch and no mesh repair.
Lidar in a nutshell
Lidar is a laser survey flown from an aircraft. It comes as two height grids:
- DTM (digital terrain model): the bare ground, with buildings and trees taken away.
- DSM (digital surface model): the first thing the laser hit, so roofs and tree tops.
The site prints the ground from the DTM, and uses the difference between the two to find buildings with their real heights and roof shapes, single trees, woods and hedges. They go on the model as clean solid shapes rather than the lumpy blobs a raw DSM print gives.
Where lidar is fetched for you
| Country | Source | Grid |
|---|---|---|
| England | Environment Agency National Lidar Programme | 1 m |
| Wales | DataMapWales (Welsh Government) | 1 m |
| Scotland | Scottish Remote Sensing Portal | 1 m where flown |
| Netherlands | AHN (Actueel Hoogtebestand Nederland) | built at 1 m |
| France | IGN LiDAR HD | built at 1 m |
| Everywhere else | Terrain Tiles on AWS, a blend of SRTM and national datasets | varies, often around 30 m |
Have your own lidar? Add GeoTIFF files to the site and they are used instead. Files are read in your browser and never uploaded.
Step by step
1. Draw the area
Search for a place, set the area width, and click around the land you want. A plot can be any shape, and the print can be cut to it.
2. Fetch the heights
Press Auto model. Lidar is fetched for the area, and buildings, hedges and trees are found from it and from OpenStreetMap. Turn any of them off if you only want bare terrain.
3. Set the vertical exaggeration
At true scale most land prints almost flat: a 50 m rise across a 1 km model printed 150 mm wide stands only 7.5 mm high. The exaggeration slider runs from 0.5× to 6×. As a rough guide, use 1× to 1.5× for mountains, 1.5× to 2.5× for rolling country, and 3× or more for flat land where you want ditches and banks to show.
4. Choose detail and size
Detail runs from Draft to Ultra. Fine or Very fine suits most prints; Ultra makes very large files. Set the print width (60 to 300 mm) and base thickness (2 to 12 mm). The scale and the size of each piece are shown as you go.
5. Download the STL
The STL is a solid model with a flat base, ready to slice. For prints bigger than your printer, split it into 2 to 16 pieces; hidden bow-tie keys are cut into the back of each join and come as an extra file.
Printing tips
- Print it flat, base down, with no supports needed.
- Use fine layers: 0.1 to 0.16 mm brings out gentle slopes. Adaptive or variable layer height in your slicer saves time on flat areas.
- Low infill of 10 to 15 % is plenty; the strength is in the walls and base.
- Matt filament in white, grey or stone shows the shape of the ground best. Light from one side brings out the relief.
- For colour, download the coloured OBJ, which carries the satellite picture, and use a full-colour printing service.
Common questions
Is the lidar free to use?
The sources above are published under open licences, such as the Open Government Licence in the UK. Credit the source when you share the model.
Can I get a coloured or textured model?
Yes. The coloured OBJ and the offline 3D viewer carry the satellite picture or the map, and buildings can wear their own wall photos.
Can I use it for a whole valley or hill?
Yes. The area can be several kilometres across, with the lidar fetch capped at a size your device can handle.
More: How it works · A 3D printed farm model · A 3D model of your house
Lidar: Environment Agency (Open Government Licence), Welsh Government, Scottish Remote Sensing Portal, AHN, IGN. Elevation elsewhere: Terrain Tiles on AWS. Map data © OpenStreetMap contributors.