The vieWTerra  platform consists of a strikingly realistic Earth Viewer, offering seamless navigation in every direction from the bottom of the oceans to outer space, and a set of tools enabling its users to build their own custom simulation or gaming applications in a fast and convenient manner from their own PCs.

Utilizing the unique capabilities of VWorldTerrain 3D real-time procedural rendering technology, originating from the gaming industry, vieWTerra provides its users with both state-of-the-art visualization and unique creative capabilities directly into its 3D Viewer, and this at any location on the entire Globe. It can be used either in off-line or on-line mode, so that users can easily build scenarios on their own and then share them with multiple users, anytime, anywhere.

About VWorldTerrain technology:
VWorldTerrain uses massive satellite databases (such as DEM, Land Cover, satellite textures, meteorological data, among others) and combines them with its proprietary procedural algorithms to reproduce all types of natural landscapes in real-time 3D, with amazing realism.

Thanks to its dedicated compression algorithms, it can display massive terrains, up to whole-planet size, while nevertheless maintaining extremely detailed rendering: the near-reality landscapes produced present both far-away horizons and close-up precision, even in areas which are not defined in high resolution, since the program constantly extrapolates data to cope with the satellite inaccuracies at ground level. This impressive level of detail is the key to its great immersion effect.

Owing to the various databases used, VWorldTerrain attributes each geographic zone its adequate geotypical vegetation cover, in keeping with the associated climate. Thanks to its Dynamic Weather System, all types of meteorological phenomena can be dynamically simulated (wind, rain, mist, snow, storms, etc can be triggered by users directly in the vieWTerra Viewer). Continuous time of day and illumination effects (dynamic lights and shadows) are also achieved, as well as the management of the celestial vault. Current features in development include the simulation of natural disasters like tsunamis or earthquakes.

vieWTerra: the 3D real-time Viewer:

vieWTerra today uses NASA’s Blue Marble and STRM Digital Elevation Models at a minimum default resolution of 464m to define imagery and topography on the entire surface of planet Earth, while including much more precise data in certain areas: today 20 millions km2 are already covered in higher resolution (90 m, 30m, 10m to 90cm), and the system is regularly enriched with new databases. vieWTerra also renders worldwide hydrographic network (main streams, rivers and lakes) whenever the Imagery is precise enough, and the global undersea topography (at a 2 kms resolution).

Users can integrate more accurate data in multiresolution format on their own thanks to the Databases Integration Tool, which is separate from the Viewer. Users can also very easily complete/correct the missing information from the Imagery or the LandCover via the Editor Tool, which is embedded in the Viewer and allows real-time modifications directly into the 3D (e.g. fill riverbeds with water to complete a river, add or remove trees, etc) .

The vieWTerra Viewer includes various controls via a 2D interface, so that users may conveniently and in real-time change the various parameters to customize their scenes: time of day (triggering dynamic lights and shadows), temperatures, wind speed, precipitations, snow cover and visibility (thus changing the type of weather or the height or range of the snow mantle in real-time). It also includes various transportation means (from 3D pedestrian avatar to space shuttle) which can be dynamically controlled by the user, either in 1st person mode or by using various 3rd person cameras. User-defined scenarios can be quickly implemented thanks to the Editor Tool, so that a great variety of scenes can be easily created, modified, shared and studied at will, as users can go backward and forward in time to record and edit videos.

vieWTerra comprises a comprehensive set of tools which enables its users to create real-time 3D environments in a very interactive and flexible manner. It is fully designed to support future enhancements (shaders, additional objects formats, V-maps, etc). Its powerful compression algorithms allow to integrate a great variety of 2D and 3D datasets, in order to achieve an ever greater true-to-life visual quality in the landscapes created. It supports additional GIS data, such as a 5 million+ place names directory, or GPS coordinates.

vieWTerra: the Databases Integration Tool

· Quick and simple integration of 2D and 3D data in Geotiff format  (and other formats via conversion to Geotiff)
· Data management in various layers
· Multi-resolution import
· Automatic insertion of datasets
· No limit to the scale of areas and projects treated
· Import of standard format Digital Elevation Models
· Import of standard format Raster Images
· 2D and 3D view selectable windows
 Fast level of detail calculations
· Automatic calculations between different resolutions
· Immediate visualization of result in the Tool

vieWTerra: the Editor Tool and 3D Objects Integrator

·  Easy positioning of objects and editing of terrains directly into   the 3D view: real-time visualization of changes
·   Expandable bank of 3D objects and ground types
·   Complex scenes building with dynamic shadows and weather   automatically impacting objects
·   Rapid scenario creation through easy modification of various ·    parameters and introduction of controllable entities/FXs
·  3DS and TGA formats import
·  3D objects properties creation
·  Real-time terraforming of terrain
·   Generation of digital videos and screenshots
·  Georeferencing of photos

vieWTerra: the SDK/libraries

Thanks to the SDK/libraries users are being offered to set or introduce various parameters in real-time (time, date, 3D objects, user-controllable entities, weather conditions, lighting, rendering, sounds...), and superimpose their own information layers so that the subsequent runtimes would be tailored to their specific needs.
Advanced users are being given access to VWorldTerrain libraries (high level and low level functions ) so that they may freely modify features and create import/export plug-ins for their own specific data (add/customize FXs, UI, entities' physics, UDPs...).