Japanese version

It is good not to read an explanation in English written by my poor English but to read terrain SDK itself, I think. So I write only a brief in USA terrain scenery.
First, you download DEM data from here. I think that it is good to download compressed data because of small of size. I think that the decompress method of gz file is different by tool. If you see no extension of decompressed file, you have to put ".dem" by yourself. After all, you will get dem file having 9.38 MB size.
Next, download read_dem.exe from here. For example, if you try to make for the south part of Hawaii island, please write batch file like this.
read_dem hawaii-s.dem hawaii-s.raw hawaii-s.hdrhawaii-s.dem is a decompressed file you have already downloaded, hawaii-s.raw is a binary file name to be made next, and hawaii-s.hdr is a header file name to be made next. You will get 2.75 MB size raw file and a small hdr file.
Next, you have to make an inf file for using the terrain SDK by looking at hdr file now you get. I show you an example for making whole of Hawaii state (14 dem files) here. You have to divide the value of lat. lon. by 3600 for getting value in degree, because there are shown value of latitude and longitude in second in hdr file.
Now you will use resample.exe like this.
resample hawaii0.infand you will get tmf file. (At the sample of Hawaii I show now, a file size of tmf file is 10.9 MB.) Next, you will use tmfcompress.exe like this.
tmfcompress hawaii0.tmf hawaii.tmf You will get compressed tmf file of the size of 1.51 MB in this example. And you can transform it to bgl file by tmf2bgl.exe like this.
tmf2bgl hawaii.tmf hawaii.bglAt last, you will get hawaii.bgl the size of 1.51 MB.
The result of making USA terrain

Place	The number of DEM files	Result
Hawaii	14	Default Hawaii scenery is displayed having priority. The terrain scenery I make is not displayed at all. If I choose only terrain scenery, there are no buildings nor no coast lines. It is impossible to use. Unfortunately, the terrain scenery is no use in Hawaii.

You should buy Digital Map 50m Grid (Elevation) CD-ROM from here. The version of this CD-ROM consists of I (North area), II (Mid area), and III (South area). The price is 7,500 Yen respectively. If you want to make whole of Japan terrain scenery, it is good to put all data (MEM files) within CD-ROMs into your hard disk.
Next, you should get the tool corresponding with read_dem.exe at USA part. Mr. Murakami develops this tool (plese visit Mr. Murakami's site (Goto "“ú–{ Terrain ƒV�[ƒiƒŠ Part 1 ŒöŠJ" from his page. He has opened it only in Japanese page.) and download JTerrainKit.zip. (I translate the manual of his program to English. If you want it, please contact me.) This program enables not only make raw files but also processes for making bgl files with terrain SDK. His this tool mem2bgl.exe can make bgl file automatically from MEM file, it's great. By the way, in Japan, a local map system is still used, it is not equal to WGS-84 system. So, data conversion to WGS-84 is required. Mr. Murakami's tool also proceeds this conversion. The problem of WGS-84 conversion routine is resolved completely by him, His tool can make whole of Japan scenery including Okinawa and Ogasawara area now. Further, jterrain which is packed together with mem2bgl.exe, enables to designate MEM files for converting Full Automatically. So you can make whole of Japan bgl files by only one process ! And he researches the operation of resample program of terrain SDK, he finds the method for upgrading the quality of file by picking up neighboring 3 rows and columns. (He attaches source file, it is also great.) He set LOD (Level Of Detail) 8 (sample size is 153 m), it is good value for playing FS2000 comfortably. Further, he attaches fuji.exe file which enables to make only Mt.Fuji bgl file by LOD 10 (sample size 38 m), this is just the feature expected by everyone !
As of July 30, Mr. Murakami develops ver1.1. In ver1.0, there were steep holes at the scenery near a coast line, e.g. Jonan-jima island vicinity of Haneda airport Tokyo, and Notsuke peninsula of Hokkaido. In ver1.1, there are holes yet, but the number of holes decreases, I feel. As far as I look at only a few part, I find no change about Jonan-jima hole. I feel the number of holes decreases at Notsuke peninsula.

I make little experiment, and I make program jt_auto by remodeling Mr. Murakami's jterrain. This program is set LOD to "Auto" of jterrain, so closest LOD is selected to the source cell size. (It means that I want to use full "22500 yen" expensive CD-ROMs ! ) By this program, real Japanese MEM files are converted in LOD 10 condition. Therefore, you can get detail bgl files same as Mr. Murakami's fuji file in the whole of Japan by jt_auto. But, the operation of FS2000 becomes VERY HEAVY !!! Only for file conversion, it takes about 4 hours ! File size after conversion is 470 MB ! (jterrain is 23 MB), Frame rate is 1 or 2 ! Further, FS2000 is terminated even in Windows2000 with 256 MB RAM and 4GB virtual memory setting !!
This is not suitable for real use at all. Only for sightseeing with no moving photo. (Even in Slew mode, if you move slightly, you will see out of memory warning. You have to change to jt_auto Terrain scenery after completing moving by default Microsoft scenery.)

Postscript on July 2001

Time goes by as an arrow, this is an era of different system which I made this jt_auto. The conclusion is that this is an era that the scenery made by this jt_auto has a practical use now. In detail, please look here.

I show you real examples of display this page. There is a comparison of screen shots of Microsoft default scenery, jterrain scenery, and jt_auto scenery.

jt_auto

It is a usage of jt_auto I made from Mr. Murakami's jterrain. It's easy, you need only to double-click after falling jt_auto.exe into the same folder which includes jterrain. The operation of jt_auto is the same as jterrain except "LOD = Auto" setting. I want to say thanks Mr. Murakami he made very nice program.

DownloadMMMMMMMjt_auto.exe (60KB)

It is thought in the public yet that Windows2000 is brand-new OS and strong even in the situation of much resource is required. FS2000 forces to overflow commit charge in Windows2000 very easily even in the situation. FS2000 is terrific software. And terrain scenery which forces to do this by FS2000, this is terrific scenery too. Certainly, This is not suitable for an actual flight, but shows that the hardware and the OS are not enough for FS2000 yet. It is shown that the PC grade-up life of FS user is to be continued more and more. It is hard to go with this FS2000, but it's FUN also !

On May 2001, We start to release the detail scenery of all Japan with above jt_auto from this site with an approval from MSI. Please use it, thank you.