topic 3D analyst help in 3D Questions

3D analyst help

pbDudley — Thu, 07 Mar 2013 16:45:29 GMT

hello
I have done this before but its been a while. I have a bathymetric shapefile. If I look in the attribute table it shows FID, shape as polyline, and CONTOURS

The contours values all have a negative sign, which is right so this should be 3D data?

Then i have an image of the gulf of mexico sea floor
I am trying to use the properties, base heights option to display the image in a 3D look, the floating on a custom surface is greyed out

I thought i would be able to drape the image onto the bathymetic contour lines, Im almost 100% positve ive done this before with the same data, i must be missing a step
The image is a geotiff, but the spatial reference is undefined.
Both the bathymetric shapefile and tif image overlay properly

Can anyone please guide me in the right direction. I couldve sworn i just went to base height and selected float on custom surface, but its greyed out, so maybe I never

Thankyou

Re: 3D analyst help

pbDudley — Thu, 07 Mar 2013 16:52:03 GMT

Well i think i know why, my image isnt a 3D layer maybe?

I really dont know

Re: 3D analyst help

EricRice — Thu, 07 Mar 2013 20:03:38 GMT

You cannot drape imagery onto contour lines. You need a surface to drape on. You can interpolate a surface using contour line input with Topo to Raster.

I do not recommend working with undefined data. ArcScene bases its z units on the x,y units from the defined projection. Data should be projected before using in ArcScene.

Best,
Eric

Re: 3D analyst help

pbDudley — Mon, 11 Mar 2013 16:16:15 GMT

OK

Thanks

I created a surface from the bathymetry line data

Now the new bathymetric surface and my seafllor image overlay, but when i goto overlay the image onto the surface, the image is all stretched out
If i click on the image with identification i only get pixel values. Perhaps its not the right type of image? I would need seafloor depth values? they overlay, I thought it would conform to the surface i created

Ill keep playing around

But thank you