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I conceived the idea for the DME Project after watching Peter Jackson's Lord of the Rings
movie. The stunning visual landscape imagery inspired me to see if I could build a computer
model of Middle Earth that could, in some way, capture that sense of size and beauty.
I have been creating digital landscapes for some time for both commercial and personal
projects. The DME Project was one that I felt could stretch my capabilities both in terms of
scale and my ability to merge the scattered information about Tolkien's world into one
continuous model. I felt that if I could create a landscape that the other fans of Middle
Earth could easily recognize then I knew that my modeling techniques for creating massive
world models are sound.
I started out with some simple but challenging goals:
1. The digital model for Middle Earth needs to be one continuous model.
2. The model needs to be viewable on both the macro and micro levels.
3. The shorelines must match the original Tolkien map of Middle Earth.
Who would be interested in large scale world models and
visualizations?
Game Developers - With massively multiplayer online gaming becoming more and
more popular, game developers will need to be able to provide worlds of ever-increasing
complexity and size.
Film Industry - Creating the right background for a movie shot can be very complex and
costly endeavor. A digital landscape could be created to match the movie's script. Once
created, this digital landscape could be used to create scrolling matte paintings as complex
backdrops for movie actors.
Fantasy/SciFi Authors - Authors can visualize the landscapes of their stories for cover
art or illustrations.
Welcome to my world, I hope you enjoy the view.
Steve Young
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