Implementing heightmaps into Celestia: Is it possible?

[rl90599]

Hello, is it possible to implement heightmaps/Displacement mapping into Celestia, rather than Celestia.sci? If it's possible to implement it here in Celestia.sci, then I can implement it in Celestia (if I have enough skill). Unfortunately, I don't have that much skill on modifying Celestia's source code, and I'm not willing to install Visual Studio, which is more than 10 GB. Plus, it would require some technique for applying displacement onto a surface. However, if someone comes up with a demo or something, it will be appreciated. I also want it to not load the whole displacement map, so it can save some memory (for example, if I put the observer near an area of the terrain, the terrain that is near the observer and can be seen is rendered detailed, while parts of the terrain that are farther and/or not seen by the observer are rendered as low-poly or just not displayed.)

[onetwothree]

Everything is possible, but we just don't have enough human power for.

[Janus]

My guess is the size of any height map for a planet would be HUGE!!!

Would it work it use cmod to make a height map for a moon or planet?
At ~14.6 million square miles, one mile accuracy, and ~16 bytes to the cmod vertex, gives ~233Mb, just for Luna, our Moon.
Unless you want to do height data per feature, such as impact craters, not sure how that would work.
Even then it would not do any good beyond low orbital viewing distances.

Compare google maps to google earth, even the Himalayas don't show much once you get out of the atmosphere.
Some thoughts.


Janus.