Question

I am using the diamond-square algorithm to generate random terrain.
It works fine except I get these large cone shapes either sticking out of or into the terrain.
The problem seems to be that every now and then a point gets set either way too high or way too low.

Here is a picture of the problem

And it can be better seen when I set the smoothness really high

And here is my code –

private void CreateHeights()
    {
        if (cbUseLand.Checked == false) 
            return;
        int
            Size = Convert.ToInt32(System.Math.Pow(2, int.Parse(tbDetail.Text)) + 1),
            SideLength = Size - 1,
            d = 1025 / (Size - 1),
            HalfSide;
        Heights = new Point3D[Size, Size];
        float
            r = float.Parse(tbHeight.Text),
            Roughness = float.Parse(RoughnessBox.Text);

        //seeding all the points
        for (int x = 0; x < Size; x++)
            for (int y = 0; y < Size; y++)
                Heights[x, y] = Make3DPoint(x * d, 740, y * d);

        while (SideLength >= 2)
        {
            HalfSide = SideLength / 2;

            for (int x = 0; x < Size - 1; x = x + SideLength)
            {
                for (int y = 0; y < Size - 1; y = y + SideLength)
                {
                    Heights[x + HalfSide, y + HalfSide].y =
                      (Heights[x, y].y +
                      Heights[x + SideLength, y].y +
                      Heights[x, y + SideLength].y +
                      Heights[x + SideLength, y + SideLength].y) / 4 - r + ((float)(random.NextDouble() * r) * 2);
                }
            }

            for (int x = 0; x < Size - 1; x = x + SideLength)
            {
                for (int y = 0; y < Size - 1; y = y + SideLength)
                {
                    if (y != 0)
                        Heights[x + HalfSide, y].y = (Heights[x, y].y + Heights[x + SideLength, y].y + Heights[x + HalfSide, y + HalfSide].y + Heights[x + HalfSide, y - HalfSide].y) / 4 - r + ((float)(random.NextDouble() * r) * 2); 
                    if (x != 0)
                        Heights[x, y + HalfSide].y = (Heights[x, y].y + Heights[x, y + SideLength].y + Heights[x + HalfSide, y + HalfSide].y + Heights[x - HalfSide, y + HalfSide].y) / 4 - r + ((float)(random.NextDouble() * r) * 2);
                }
            }
            SideLength = SideLength / 2;
            r = r / Roughness;
        }
    }

Answer 1

Gavin S. P. Miller gave a SIGGRAPH ’86 talk about how Fournier, Fussel & Carpenter’s original algorithm was fundamentally flawed. So what you’re seeing is normal for any naive implementation of the Diamond Square algorithm. You will require a separate approach for smoothing, either post each Diamond-Square compound step, or as a post-process to all diamond-square iterations (or both). Miller addressed this. Weighting and box or gaussian filtering are one option; seeding the initial array to a greater degree than just the initial 4 points (i.e., replicating the resultsets of the first few steps of diamond-square either manually or using some built-in intelligence, but instead supplying unbiased values); the more initial information you give the array before increasing the detail using diamond-square, the better your results will be.

The reason appears to be in how the Square step is performed. In the Diamond step, we’ve taken the average of the four corners of a square to produce that square’s centre. Then, in the subsequent Square step, we take the average of four orthogonally-adjacent neighbours, one of which is the square’s centre point we just produced. Can you see the problem? Those original corner height values are contributing too much to the subsequent diamond-square iteration, because they are contributing both through their own influence AND through the midpoint that they created. This causes the spires (extrusive and intrusive), because locally-derived points tend more strongly toward those early points… and because (typically 3) other points do as well, this creates “circular” influences around those points, as you iterate to higher depths using Diamond-Square. So these kinds of “aliasing” issues only appear when the initial state of the array is underspecified; in fact, the artifacting that occurs can be seen as a direct geometric consequence of using only 4 points to start with.

You can do one of the following:

• Do local filtering — generally expensive.
• Pre-seed the initial array more thoroughly — requires some intelligence.
• Never smooth too many steps down from a given set of initial points — which applies even if you do seed the initial array, it’s all just a matter of relative depths in conjunction with your own maximum displacement parameters.