RGB Terrain by MapTiler

The MapTiler Terrain-RGB contains the digital elevation model (DEM) - global coverage. Not only you can use this data to enrich your map styles with hill shade or colored slopes, but you can also use it in applications - such as elevation profiles, microwave link planning, etc. The MapTiler Terrain RGB covers the land, and MapTiler Ocean RGB covers the ocean floor. 

The coding process

MapTiler Terrain-RGB tileset is available up to zoom level 12. Elevation data provides height above the sea level in meters for every single place in the world, measured for regions of approximately 30x30 meters. The elevation model is split into tiles and each tile has elevations encoded into standard RGB image format where each pixel color (red, green, blue) can be turned into elevation using a smart formula:

elevation = -10000 + ((R * 256 * 256 + G * 256 + B) * 0.1)

The format allows storing elevations very efficiently (3 bytes vs. 4 or 8 bytes in case of floating-point numbers) with sufficient precision.

Splitting DEM into raster tiles has all the advantages of a tiled map. The main one is low traffic for web applications because the browser loads only the tiles in the current view with appropriate resolution and download additional data just in case the user zoom in or pan the map.

If you would open any tile from the tileset in an image viewer, you would see something like this:

Don’t be confused by the unusual look you will see at first glance: this is not yet a final product meant for direct viewing, but a base for adaptation.

Applications

Hillshading

Since the data contain the encoded elevation values directly, there are many potential applications. You can add the data into your map in order to create a nice visual shaded relief for your maps.

You can even change the hill shading colors and light direction. It can be easily done in the integrated map style editor in MapTiler Cloud.

DEM hill-shading is already present on our Outdoor map, which is available for free on MapTiler Cloud.
See MapTiler Tools - Hillshading

PS: MapTiler Cloud also provides Hillshading tileset. However, we recommend using the RGB terrain tileset because it covers a bigger area of the Earth and allows you to customize the color of the hillshade. 

Hypsometry

Another application where you can highlight elevation is hypsometry. The traditional color model used mostly for the relief model in geographical maps contains green color for lowlands, yellow for highlands, brown for mountains, and a different tone of blue for bathymetry.

Terrain Profiles

Terrain profiles have a wide range of applications. You can use them for trip planning, terrain analysis, microwave links planning, pipelines, and electric wires planning, etc.

Check out this demo of the Elevation Profile.

More applications

Since values can be manipulated even on the fly, you can create interactive tools in JavaScript. For example, we built an interactive “floods” simulator.

Useful links

MapTiler Tools - Hillshading
MapTiler Tools - Hypsometry
MapTiler - Elevation Profile
Draw an elevation profile for your path