I thought it would be cool to have a Mount Everest model, but I didn’t want to pay 30 bucks for someone else to make a 3D printed one for me, so I decided to figure out how to make it myself.

Supplies

You will need

A computer than can run blender
A 3D printer

It’s a cheap and easy project, so not much is required.

Step 1: Terrain2STL

Open terrain2STL at jthatch.com/Terrain2STL/ you’ll be greeted with this interface.

Step 2: Find the Coordinates of Your Area

This is by far the easiest step, search up the coordinates and write them down, remember that N and E are positive, whilst S and W are negative.

Step 3: Finding Your Area

After entering your coordinates you should see a small red dot, zoom in and you’ll find your area.

Step 4: Generating the Model

Open model details on the side panel. You’ll probably have to make it smaller by adjusting the size, and dragging the box over your area, if it’s a very flat area, and you want to make it more visually interesting, you can increase the vertical scaling, but be careful because at high values it becomes spiky. Then press generate and download the model.

Step 5: Importing Into Blender

If you look at the model especially for high above sea level areas, there is quite a large base to the model, using blender, we can easily remove it. Import the stl as shown above, and zoom out to get a better view.

Step 6: Making the Base Smaller

Press tab to enter edit mode and you’ll see a wire frame view of the model, from their, enable x ray view in the top right (It’s the two squares button) and select all of the bottom nodes, then press g, and then z and drag until you have your preferred base size.

Step 7: Finnish Touches and Exporting

Go to object on the top toolbar as shown above and set the origin to centre of mass, I’m not sure this is necessary, but I’m superstitious and worried it won’t work otherwise so I’d do it anyway. Then to export go to file, export, export as stl.

Step 8: Slicing and Printing

import The stl into your favourite slicer, and set it to print, I printed mine on low quality settings to get it out faster, as with the low res satellite data, you can’t really tell the difference.

Step 9: Final Thoughts

There you have it, that’s how you can make a terrain map of whatever natural wonder you feel, though I do have some closing notes.

It can’t really do overhangs and finely detailed structures
You have to checks for seams or other small issues, there was a strange artefact on my print of Everest because I forgot to check and smooth it. That’s what I’d change next time.

Happy printing!