Fractal—based analysis of 3D natural shapes and its application to terrain modeling

This paper describes the fractal analysis and interpolation of 3D natural surface shapes and their application to terrain modeling in a sensor simulation for an earth resource satellite. After reviewing the concept of fractals, especially the fractional Brownian function and its fundamental characteristics, we present fractal‐based techniques for analyzing and interpolating 3D surface shapes. These techniques are based essentially on the approximation of the surface by the fractional Brownian function. Finally, the application of these techniques to terrain modeling is described. The analysis‐followed‐by‐interpolation method is applied successfully for generating the digital terrain map of high spatial resolution from the existing coarse terrain data.